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 ologicaksSemuinary. 
 | PRINCETON, N. J. 
 
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 eile, Hugh, 1795-1879. 
 church and the churches, 
 
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THEOLOGICAL LIBRARY, VOL, 1. 
 
 THE 
 
 COLLECTED WORKS 
 
 OF ; 
 
 THE VERY REV. DEAN M'NEILE, D.D. 
 
 IN FOUR VOLUMES, 
 
 VOLE Tw 
 
 THE CHURCH AND THE CHURCHES; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST, AND THE 
 CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT 
 - HERE ON EARTH. 
 
 “ Scripturarum ignorantia omnis mali fons et origo est: nobis enim salus 
 Christus est; salutis via Fides; viee dux Scriptura.” 
 
 LONDON: 
 THE CHRISTIAN BOOK SOCIETY, 
 11, ADAM STREET, ADELPHI, W.C. 
 
 HODDER AND STOUGHTON, 
 27, PATERNOSTER ROW. 
 
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 PRINCE TEx 
 
 
 
 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 PAINFUL as the necessity is, it seems now to be impossible to 
 deny that the necessity exists for Christian controversy. If 
 miracles may not be expected, and if therefore means must be 
 used for the preservation of Christian truth in the world, it 
 is plain that the prolific ingenuity of the advocates of error 
 must be patiently and perseveringly resisted. 
 
 There is nothing new in this state of things except in degree. 
 Since the beginning of the world controversy has been an in- 
 evitable condition of the preservation of truth. The sacred 
 writings are eminently controversial. 
 
 The prophets of Baal who patronised idolatry, and the false 
 prophets of Israel who said, “ Peace, peace, when there was 
 no true peace, daubing the wall with whtempered mortar,” 
 compelled the faithful witnesses for Jehovah to engage in 
 controversy. 
 
 A similar: necessity was laid upon the great Prophet, “the 
 faithful and true witness,” by the Sadducees who denied the 
 ‘ resurrection, and the Pharisees who ‘made void the command- 
 ments of God through their traditions.” 
 
 And in like manner the apostles were compelled to become 
 controversialists, by the various false teachers, who, even then, 
 intruded into, disturbed, and divided the infant Christian 
 Churches. “The noble army of martyrs,’ both primitive 
 and Protestant, were controversialists. : 
 
 We must not complain of the inheritance of our fathers, 
 
 + 
 
v1 Preface. 
 
 and, judging by their experience, we have no reason to fear 
 for the great cause of “our Master and only Saviour, Jesus 
 Christ.” For ourselves, it is of primary importance that we 
 should defend what we believe to be His truth, with “ meekness 
 of wisdom;”’ and not defend only, but restate that truth also, 
 with all plainness of speech; remembering that Christian 
 knowledge is not hereditary, and that the real source of danger 
 from the heresy of the few, is to be found in the ignorance of 
 
 ? 
 
 the many. 
 
 The writer of the following pages has addressed himself to 
 direct teaching, rather than direct controversy ; and his standard 
 of ultimate reference for all his teaching, has been the holy 
 Scripture. With a cordiality which words can but inadequately 
 express, he agrees in the statement that “what we find there 
 (in holy Scripture) is a part of Christianity, whether recognised 
 as such or no, in after ages: what we do not find there is no 
 
 part of Christianity, however early, or however general may 
 have been the attempts to interpolate it. If this be not so, we 
 must change our religion and our master ; we can be no longer 
 Christians, servants of Christ, instructed by Him and His own 
 apostles; but Alexandrianists, Syrianists, Asianists, following 
 the notions which happened to prevail in the Church, according 
 to the preponderance of particular local or temporary influences, 
 and following as our master neither the wisdom of God, nor - 
 even the wisdom of men; but the opinions of a time and state 
 of society, whose inferiority in all other aspects is acknow- 
 ledged.””! 
 
 To a mind duly sensible of its own. infirmity in grappling 
 with questions of abstract truth or falsehood, and a conscience 
 awake to the solemn responsibility of influencing other minds, 
 every fresh reflection tends to enhance the value and the mercy 
 to us, of God’s written word. 
 
 It is. difficult, perhaps impossible, for us to form strictly 
 
 1 Arnold’s Fragment on the Church, p. 47. 
 
Se oat Vii 
 
 
 
 accurate judgments of our fellow-men ; to examine fully, fairly, 
 and impartially, the operations of mind, the workings of affec- 
 tion, the conflicts of passion, the calculations of interest which 
 compose the complicated machinery of a human character ; to 
 trace with nice discrimination the boundary lines between the 
 sincerity which deceives self, and the hypocrisy which deceives, 
 or aims at deceiving, others. 
 
 Our difficulties in so doing arise from various causes. 
 
 First, these elements of character are evanescent. They 
 fluctuate. They do not, like masses of matter, present always 
 the same aspect to the inquirer. Rather they resemble the 
 clouds, ever changing their forms before the wind, and their 
 colours in the rays of the passing sun. 
 
 Moreover, secondly, they are deceitful, frequently presenting 
 appearances which are not real, like the clouds again, exhibiting 
 fantastic shapes of mountains, castles, battlements, or even of 
 ‘living beings. Neither are our difficulties confined to those 
 causes only which belong to the things to be examined. 
 
 They arise, thirdly, from the state of the examiners. We 
 also ourselves are fluctuating and deceitful. If Adam, in all 
 the perfections of his unfallen nature and unclouded under- 
 standing, had been brought to the investigation of such a 
 creature as one of his fallen descendants, doubtless his glance 
 would have been penetrating, and his knowledge derived there- 
 from extensive and accurate. The glass would have been 
 steady in the hand of the enquirer, and whatever inaccuracy 
 might have arisen in the process, would have been occasioned 
 exclusively by the movement in the object of his examination. 
 But in all our enquiries the case is different. We are our- 
 selves involved in the movement. The hand which holds the 
 glass is unsteady, as well as thepobject to which the glass is 
 directed. The subject to be investigated is dark, and the 
 investigator is a partaker of: that darkness. The human 
 character is deceitful, and the human student of character 
 
Vill Preface. 
 
 
 
 also is deceitful. Man as the subject of an experiment is 
 morally blind, and man as the acting experimenter is morally 
 blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the 
 ditch. 
 
 Such, in brief and in truth, is the history and character of 
 all human philosophy of the human mind, unassisted by the 
 enlightening teaching of the Spirit of God. Such indeed is 
 the undesigned confession of philosophy. The celebrated saying 
 of one of the celebrated sages of Greece was, know thyself. He 
 was wise enough to find out that he did not know himself; and 
 he holds up self-knowledge as the climax of wisdom attained by 
 none, to be desired and aimed at by all. No man knows him- 
 self, and how then with fewer opportunities for examination 
 can he know others, who, in all the essentials of their nature, 
 are like himself? te 
 
 Here, in the impotence of man to detect himself, or investi- 
 gate his fellow, we discover another reason for devout thankful- 
 ness to our God for ‘the inestimable treasure of holy Scripture, 
 the living and lively oracles of truth. “For the Word of 
 God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged ᾿ 
 sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, 
 and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts. 
 and intents of the heart” (Heb. iv. 12). Jesus Christ is the 
 Word of God. In Him is more than the created wisdom of 
 
 Adam in its best estate. He is “the wisdom of God.” Οὗ. 
 
 Him it is truly written that, “ J7e knew what was in man.” He 
 sounded all the depths of man’s mind. He penetrated the most 
 secret recesses. He detected the most deceitful appearances. 
 He arrested the most fitful and evanescent operations. He 
 fixed, embodied, condensed, so as to exhibit to our view, and 
 hold fast for our investigatios, the cameleon character of man. 
 Refraining then from the masses of abstract theological 
 metaphysics, in which it is easy to be elaborately useless, and 
 learnedly lost, I have endeavoured in all simplicity to use the 
 
Preface. ΙΧ 
 Word of God as “a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my 
 path” (Psalm exix. 105), while engaged for my own satisfaction 
 —and that, I trust, of my readers also—in an investigation 
 of the truth concerning the Church of God in Christ, and the 
 Churches of Christ militant here on earth. 
 
 On the subject of what is called “the notes of the Church,”’ 
 I have been.much struck with the justice and force of some 
 observations in an anonymous discourse, attributed to Dr. 
 Sherlock, in refutation of Cardinal Bellarmine’s celebrated 
 treatise. The writer urges the important distinction between 
 the inquiry, “What is a true Church?” and the inquiry, 
 “ Which is the true Church?” He describes the right use of 
 “notes” to be, to ascertain what it is which makes a Church 
 a true Church; which he affirms to be necessary for all 
 Christians to know, that they may take care that nothing be 
 wanting in their communion which is essential to a true 
 Church. And he charges the cardinal with having introduced 
 and discussed quite a different question, viz., how, among all 
 the divisions of Christendom, we may find out that only true 
 Church which is the mistress of all other Churches, the only 
 infallible guide in matters of faith, and to which -alone the 
 promises of pardon and salvation are made; and by some 
 -notes and characters of such a Church, to prove that the 
 Church of Rome is that Church. 
 
 He “says,—“ Let_us now consider the cardinal’s way, by 
 some certain marks and notes, to find out which is the true 
 Church, before we know what a true Church is. To pick out 
 of all the Churches in the world one Church, which we must, 
 own for the only true Church, and reject all other Churches 
 which do not subject themselves to this one Church. To find 
 out such a Church, on whose authority we must rely for the 
 whole Christian faith, and in whose communion only pardon 
 
x | Preface. 
 
 
 
 of sin is to be had. That is the use of notes in the Church of 
 Rome, as I have already shown you; and truly they are very 
 pretty things to be proved by notes; as, to consider them 
 particularly :— 
 
 “To find out which is the true Church before we know what 
 a true Church is. This, methinks, is not a natural way for 
 inquiry, but is like seeking for we know not what. There are 
 two inquiries in order of nature prior to Which is the true 
 Church, viz., Whether there be a true Church or not, and 
 what it is. The first of these the. cardinal takes for granted, 
 that there is a Church; but I won't take it for granted, 
 but desire these note-makers to give me some notes, to prove 
 that there isa Church. There is, indeed, a great deal of talk 
 and noise in the world about a Church; but'that is no proof 
 that there is a Church; and yet it is not a self-evident pro- 
 position that there’ is a Church; and therefore it must be 
 proved. Now, that there is a Church must be proved by 
 notes, as well as which is this true Church, or else the whole 
 design of notes is lost; and I would gladly see these notes 
 which prove that there 15. a Church before we know what a 
 Church is. To understand the mystery of this, we must briefly 
 consider the reason and use of notes in the Church of Rome. 
 According to the Popish resolution of faith into the authority | 
 of the Church, the first thing we must know is, which is the 
 true Church; for we must receive the Scriptures, and the 
 interpretation of them, and the whole Christian faith and 
 worship, from the Church; and therefore we can know no- 
 thing of religion until we have found the Church. The use, 
 then, of notes is to find out the Church before and without the 
 Scriptures; for if they admit of a Scripture proof, they must 
 - allow that we can know and understand the Scriptures without 
 the authority or interpretation of the Church; which under- 
 mines the very foundation of Popery. Now, I first desire to 
 know how they will prove that there is a Church without the 
 
Preface. Xi 
 
 Scripture? That, you will say, is visible itself, for we 866 
 a Christian Church in the world. But what is it I see? I 
 See a company of men who call themselves a Church, and this 
 is all I can see; and is this seeing a Church? <A Church must 
 have a divine original and institution; and therefore there is 
 no seeing a Church without seeing its charter, for there can 
 be no other note or mark of the being of a Church but the 
 institution of it. 
 
 “And this proves that we cannot know that there is a 
 Church without knowing in some measure what this Church 
 is; for the charter which founds the Church must declare the 
 nature and constitution of it: what its faith, and worship, and 
 laws, and privileges ‘are. But, now, these essential characters 
 of a Church must- not be reckoned by the Romanists among 
 the notes of a Church; for then we must find out the true 
 Church by the true faith and true worship, (not the true faith 
 by the true Church,) which destroys Popery. 
 
 _“ Hence it is that these note-makers never attempt to’ give 
 us any notes whereby we shall know that there is a Church, 
 or what this Church is; for there are no notes of these, but 
 such as they dare not give, viz.,—The authority, of the Scrip- 
 ‘tures, and every man’s private judgment of the sense and 
 interpretation of thém; for at least till we have found a 
 Church we must judge for ourselves; and then the authority 
 of the Church comes too late; for we must first judge upon 
 the-whole of religion, if we must find out a true Church by the 
 true faith before we can know the true Church; and we cannot 
 rely on her ‘authority before we know her; and therefore they 
 take it for granted: that there is a Church, which they can 
 “never prove in their way, and attempt to give some notes 
 whereby to know which is the Church, and then learn what 
 
 “the. Church is from the Church itself, which jeriiee Biving , 
 inarks whereby to know an unicorn, befosé*T khow whétker: 
 
 
 
 
 2 PRINOE TOY 
 
 there be an unicorn or not, or what i 
 
 Mics TI KB. ¢ 
 oo ae wa” 
 
 ΄ 
 
 THEOLOGICKL 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ΧΙ ὰ Preface. 
 
 “ Another blunder in this dispute about notes is, that they 
 give us notes whereby to find out the true catholic Church 
 before we know what a particular Church is. For all Bellar- 
 mine’s notes are intended only for the catholic Church, and 
 therefore his first note is the name catholic. Whereas the 
 catholic Church is nothing else but all true Christian Churches 
 in the world, united together by one common faith, and such 
 acts of communion as distinct Churches are capable of, and 
 obliged to. Every particular Church, possessing the true faith 
 of Christ, is a true Christian Church; and the catholic Church 
 is all the true Christian Churches in the world, which have all 
 the same nature, and are, in some sense, of the same communion. 
 So that it is impossible to know what the catholic Church is 
 before we know what a particular Church is; as it is to know © 
 what the sea is before we know what water is. Every true 
 single particular Church has the whole and entire nature of a 
 Church, and would be a true Church though there were no 
 other Church in the world; as the Christian Church at 
 Jerusalem was, before any other Christian Churches were 
 planted, and therefore there can be no other notes of a true 
 Church but what belongs to every true particular Church ; and 
 that can be nothing but what is essential to a Church, and what 
 all true Christian Churches in the world agree in, viz., the true 
 ' faith and worship of Christ.” 
 
 In answer to the cardinal’s argument, that we cannot know 
 what true Scripture is, nor what is the true interpretation of 
 Scripture, but from the Church; and that, therefore, we must 
 know the Church before we can know the true faith; the writer 
 replies,— 
 
 “T readily grant that, at this distance from the writing of the 
 books of the New Testament, there is no way to assure us that 
 they were written by the apostles or apostolical men, and owned 
 for inspired writings, but the testimony of Christians in all ages. 
 But herein we do not consider them as a Church but as credible 
 
Preface. Xili 
 
 
 
 witnesses. Whether there be any such thing as a Church or 
 not, we can know only by the Scriptures. But without know- 
 ing whether there be a-Church or not, if we know that for so 
 many hundred years these books have been owned to be written 
 : by such men, and have been received from the apostles’ days till 
 now by all who call themselves Christians; this is as good an 
 historical proof as we can have for anything. And it is the 
 authority of an uninterrupted tradition, not the authority of the 
 Church, considered as a Church, which moves us to believe 
 them. For, setting aside the authority of tradition, how can 
 the authority of a company of men, who call themselves the 
 Church, before I know whether there be any Church, move me 
 to believe anything which was done sixteen hundred years 
 ago? . | 
 
 “But there is a company of men in the world, and have 
 been successively for sixteen hundred years, (whether they be 
 a Church or not is nothing to this question,) who assure me 
 that these books which we call the Scriptures. were written by 
 inspired men, and contain a faithful account of what Christ did, 
 _ and taught, and suffered; and therefore I believe such books, 
 and from them I learn what that true faith is, which makes a 
 true Christian Church, 
 
 _ “As for the true interpretation of Scripture, that we cannot 
 ‘understand what it is without the Church, this I deny. The 
 Scriptures are very intelligibie to honest and diligent readers, 
 in all things necessary to salvation; and if they be not, I desire 
 to know how we shall find out the Church. For certainly the 
 Church has no charter, but what is in the Scripture; and then, 
 if we must believe the Church before we can believe or under- 
 stand the Scriptures, we must believe the Church before we can 
 possibly know whether there be a Church or not. The Scrip- 
 ture cannot be known without the Church, nor the Church 
 ‘ without the Scripture, and yet one of them must be known 
 first! and yet neither of them can be known first, according to 
 
X1V ie: | Awe ace. 
 
 
 
 these principles ;—which is such an absurdity as all the art of 
 the world can never palliate.”’ 
 
 The distinction here marked between men considered as 
 credible witnesses to facts, and men considered as a Church, is 
 of vital importance. To constitute men competent and credible 
 witnesses to facts occurring in their own times, no divine con- 
 stitution is necessary, no mission, no revelation, nothing but the 
 ordinary functions of sense and reason which men possess as men. 
 But to constitute them a Church, (especially such a Church as 
 is supposed, invested with such authority as is claimed,) a 
 divine constitution is indispensable, and ἃ very special mission. 
 
 These questions then arise. Where is this divine constitution 
 described? By whom was this special mission given? Who 
 formed men into a Church? 
 
 To say that our Lord Jesus Christ did it, to appeal to the 
 
 Scriptures in support of this fact, and to believe the authenticity; 
 genuineness, and inspiration of the Scriptures on the authority 
 
 
 
 of intelligent witnesses considered as men—all this is simple, 
 and clear, and satisfactory. But to appeal to the Church as a 
 Church, for a primary proof that there exists such a thing as a 
 Church, is wilfully to confound the distinction between men as 
 nen, (possessing sense, and reason, and memory, existing as we 
 see and know without any proof that men do exist,) and men as 
 a corporation; invested with authority by a divine institution, ° 
 and so existing in a way for which we demand proof. It is 
 through inattention to this distinction that the sophism of the 
 Romanists seems to be an argument. 
 
 The use made of the “notes of the Church”’ in the Po llavae ing 
 pages, is to show that in their true and full meaning they belong 
 o “the Church of God in Christ,” and to nothing else. To 
 any of the Churches of Christ militant here on earth, they can- 
 not be applied with truth, except in a very qualified sense. 
 
 The distinction here made between the Church and the 
 
Preface ENE 
 
 
 
 Churches introduces the outward and visible ‘ordinances of 
 Christianity. 
 
 To a Christian discussion of this branch of the subject, careful 
 discrimination and charitable forbearance are indispensable ; 
 discrimination to distinguish between what is of divine institu- 
 tion, and what of human addition; and forbearance to deal 
 moderately with what man has added, as with what man may 
 emit, or alter, “so that nothing be ordained against God’s Word.” 
 
 The institutions themselves, in all that is indeed divine, are 
 the common characteristic of “the Church of God in Christ :” 
 the human ‘additions, in all that it is lawful for man to add, 
 are the varying badges of “the Churches of Christ militant 
 here on earth;” while to ordain unlawful additions, ie., such 
 as are against God’s Word, and to insist on their observance as 
 indispensable to salvation, is one of the predicted marks of the 
 great “apostasy” from the Church. 
 
 Touching the nature and efficacy of the ordinances, no ex- 
 treme views are advocated in the following pages. The writer 
 eannot rely on the Christian sacraments as physical miracles of 
 never-failing efficacy. He can find no divine promise to them, 
 to justify such reliance; and no human assertions, or assurances, 
 or anathemas,! however confidently advanced, or vehemently 
 reiterated, can in his judgment supply the needful proof. 
 
 Neither can he, on the other side, be content to think or feel 
 concerning the Christian sacraments as if, they were, and could 
 be, nothing more than emblems of spiritual truth, and badges of 
 a Christian man’s profession. Still less can he ‘coincide in the 
 opinion that they were temporary semi-Jewish institutions, in- 
 tended for the infancy of the Christian Church, till her true 
 spirituality was understood and established; but not now bind- 
 ing upon the practice of Christian men. 
 
 Mh Si quis dixerit, sacramenta nove legis non continere eratiam quam sani - 
 
 ficant ...si quis dixerit, per ipsa novee legis sacramenta ex opere operato non 
 confervé gratiam ... anathema sit.”—Cone. Trid., Sess. vii. c. 6, 8. 
 
XVi Preface. 
 
 
 
 Rather he desires to express his convictions in the following 
 words of Hooker, where all these points are comprehensively 
 touched. ‘‘The sacraments contain in themselves no vital effi- 
 cacy; they are not physical, but moral instruments of salvation; 
 duties of service and worship, which, unless we perform as the 
 Author of grace requireth, they are unprofitable. They are 
 moral instruments, the use whereof is in our hands, the effect 
 
 in His; for the use, we have His express commandment ; for 
 
 the effect, His conditional promise.’”! In happy accordance 
 with this, the twenty-fifth article of our own Church declares, 
 that “in such only as worthily receive the sacraments,.they have 
 a wholesome effect or operation ;”’ and the twenty-ninth contains 
 a significant description of those who do not receive worthily, 
 
 and in whom, consequently, the sacraments have no wholesome 
 
 effect or operation, viz., “such as be void of a lively faith.” 
 
 In no society upon earth do the marks of “the Church of 
 God in Christ’’ appear more conspicuously—or, as the writer 
 as in the Church of England; judged 
 
 
 
 thinks, so conspicuously 
 by her constitution and authorised standards. He is grieved to 
 be obliged, by the force of facts, to feel; but feeling it, he 
 cannot withhold the faithful avowal, that, judged by her present 
 practice, she is not entitled to such commendation. 
 
 Yes, though our adversaries should mock at our complaints ; _ 
 
 though they should misrepresent as essential and inseparable 
 parts of our system what we deprecate as departures from, and 
 abuses of, that system; and though they should ascribe to un- 
 worthy motives our continued attachment to our Church, not- 
 withstanding the evils so exposed and deplored ; still our duty is 
 clear ; our attachment is sincere and unaltered; though this we 
 freely confess, that to render that attachment abidingly con- 
 scientious in existing circumstances, it must be continued under 
 protest against the abuses. . 
 ' Ecc. Pol. vi, 5. 
 
ane 
 
 Preface. XVii 
 
 
 
 
 
 Instead of being a fair counterpart of her standards, the 
 present practice ‘of the Church of England, viewed in her 
 authoritative administration, is in many respects a deplorable 
 contrast. Apostolical doctrine, in all the free grace and un- 
 searchable riches of Christ, is plainly maintained in her stan- 
 dards, and as plainly discountenanced by her rulers—with 
 some exceptions. Apostolical fervour, in earnest prayer for the 
 inspiration of the Holy Spirit, breathes through her Liturgy, 
 but is condemned as unhallowed enthusiasm when expressed in 
 any other than the very terms which have become familiar to 
 the ear, while the life and power of their true meaning is far 
 from the heart. Her prayers are consecrated by prescription’ 
 and use, and are very highly commended; provided they are 
 read without any really serious intention of being heard and 
 answered : but such of her warm-hearted sons as really believe 
 what she has taught them to say; and give thanks in good 
 
 earnest to their heavenly Father, because He has been graciously 
 
 pleased to hear them, and “ grant them in this world knowledge 
 of His truth,” are frowned upon by the governing party as 
 vastly too ΤΡ tie 
 
 In her standards, there is a faithful echo to the scriptural 
 
 truth, that “it is good to be zealously affected always in a good 
 
 cause,” and an earnest invitation to follow the example of Him - 
 who said, “the zeal of thy house hath eaten me up;”’ but in 
 her administration, there is an unfeigned and scarcely concealed 
 horror of zeal, as of a most unorthodox and ungentlemanlike 
 
 ‘quality, altogether unsuited to sober-minded and safe churchmen. 
 
 In her standards, the Church of England is Protestant— 
 emphatically Protestant;+ but in her present administration— 
 
 1 Even this is denied by some of her “non-natural” sons; but how can it be 
 disproved in the face of this one fact, to mention no other, that'the Church of 
 England, in her declaration after her communion-service, condemns the distin- 
 guishing and most solemn act of the worship of the Roman Church—to wit, the 
 
 ᾿ς adoration of the Host—as “Idolatry, to be abhorred of all faithful Christians” ? 
 
 ὀ 
 
XVill Preface. 
 
 thank God not universally, but—in a very influential section 
 of her governing body, she is, to say the least, doubtful ; softly 
 expressing one opinion,\and with infatuated inconsistency acting 
 upon another; gently reproving Tractarianism, and substantially 
 promoting Tractarians. The good sense of the country is 
 shocked by such proceedings, and whether our rulers will 
 believe the painful fact or not, it is a fact, that the attachment 
 
 ‘of the lay-members of the Church, in unnumbered multitudes 
 
 throughout the kingdom, is becoming seriously relaxed ; and in 
 those immediate localities where Tractarianism is encouraged by 
 authority—in act, though not in word—dissenters from the 
 National Church are in rapid multiplication. Thus while some 
 of the Tractarians have themselves dissented into Romanism, 
 
 the others, who remain and find favour in the eyes of our rulers, 
 
 are hurrying the Christian laity into congregational indepen- 
 dency. 
 
 The writer is quite aware that the persons cub ought most 
 deeply and practically to feel such a statement as this, are 
 precisely the persons most likely to turn away from it as from 
 the disagreeable voice of a needless alarmist. Yet it might be 
 supposed, that sufficiently emphatic proofs have been supplied 
 to them, on many topics, that the country will not rest quiet 
 because they wish it to do so, and that danger cannot be averted 
 by closing our eyes to the fact of its existence. 
 
 Neither is existing danger all of one kind. While a twofold 
 defection is weakening the Church from within, our danger - 
 
 from without is imminent; exposed as we are to the systematic, 
 patient, and skilfully-conducted advances of Romanism. Our 
 Romanist opponents are not merely that portion of our own 
 population who are members of the Church of Rome—if this 
 were so, the danger would be comparatively small—but the 
 whole organised system of that Church, ye ἀν the whole 
 world, is against us. 
 
 Universal supremacy is the claim of that system—a claim 
 
 \ 
 
Preface. X1X 
 not admitting of abandonment, or even of modification. It is 
 declared to be divine in its origin, and absolute in itself. To 
 say that the subjects of the Papal Court aim at the establish- 
 ment of such a supremacy, is only to say that they are sincere 
 ‘and consistent. To say that they make use of all practicable 
 means for the attainment of their object, is only to say that they 
 are active and diligent. To say that they vary the means made 
 use of, as the circumstances vary under which they are called 
 to act, is only to say that they are sagacious and skilful. And 
 to say that they act often as if they thought the end justified the 
 _ means—denying or asserting, and that on oath, as seems most 
 
 expedient at the time—is only to say that they treat some of 
 their own principles practically. To allege, therefore, that they 
 aim at the destruction of the British constitution in Church and 
 State, and the subjugation of England to the Papal crown, is 
 not to accuse them of any dereliction of duty. On the contrary, 
 holding the principles which they hold, it would be a great 
 dereliction of duty, on their part, not to attempt this consumma- 
 tion ; which, in prostrating England, would prostrate the whole 
 world at the feet of St. Peter’s chair. All our colonies, east 
 and west, would, as a matter of course, fall in the wake of the 
 mother country. The Protestant communities on the continent 
 of Europe would prove a still easier conquest ; and no steady 
 or combined resistance could be expected from the insulated 
 and unorganised congregations of the Protestants in America. 
 There would not remain on the face of the globe a single 
 citadel unstormed ; not a voice of even remonstrance against 
 the imprisonment, torture, or martyrdom of the last of the 
 heretics. Illustrations of this abound. Madeira, Sardinia, 
 Ancona, Ireland, supply living proofs that Romanism now, as 
 in the days of Hildebrand, claims the world as her own; and 
 would ' make,-if practicable, an unrelenting clearance of all 
 obstinate nonconformists from the face of the earth. They are 
 bound to make the attempt; they are bound to persevere in the 
 
XX ο΄ Preface. 
 
 
 
 attempt ; however circumstances may, from time to time, lead 
 them to restrain or modify their successive demands in this 
 country. Whether it be the elective franchise in 1793; the 
 establishment of Maynooth College in 1795; admission to the 
 Imperial Parliament, and other offices of trust and power in 
 1829; to the Municipal Corporations in 1834; whether it be 
 the State endowment of Maynooth in 1845; the repeal of the 
 Trish Union in 1847; or the formal national establishment of 
 the Roman Church in Ireland in 1850;—all have been, and 
 would be, only instalments—instalments, at no one stage sup- 
 plying a level on which contentment and peace might ‘be 
 expected; but in every instance serving as the steps of a ladder 
 for gradual ascent, increasing the possibility, and therefore 
 animating the prospect, and stimulating the ambition to reach 
 the top. . Baits 
 Were England’s Church true to herself, Rome’s ambition 
 could never be gratified. Present appearances, however, are 
 mournfully against us. Warning after warning has been dis- 
 regarded. Even the declension of above half a hundred of our 
 clergy, and I know not how many laity, through the “ facilis 
 
 ᾿ of Tractarianism, down to the “lower deep” of 
 
 descensus” 
 prostrate and unquestioning superstition, does not appear to 
 have produced the smallest practical alarm in our rulers. There 
 is nothing new-under the sun. In vain Cassandra raised her 
 voice. In vain Laocoon hurled his spear. In vain the clang 
 of hostile armour sounded from the bowels of treachery. Troy’s 
 temper was infatuation, and the natural consequence was Troy’s- 
 
 ruin. 
 
 Engaged, as the writer is, in the incessant activities, public 
 and private, of the ministry of the gospel, in the midst of a 
 
 poor and densely-crowded population, preaching, at the least, — 
 
 three times every week, and never without thoughtful and 
 . earnest preparation; liable to interruption at every hour of the 
 
 I, AX 
 
Preface. XXxi 
 day and night; and having access to books on but a limited 
 scale, he feels deeply his inability to do justice—not to his 
 _ subject, no uninspired man can do it justice, but—to his own 
 feelings and convictions. 
 
 -He does not say this to deprecate criticism, but for the sake 
 of the good cause which he so unworthily 
 fold disadvantages, when compared with its assailants—defends : 
 
 
 
 and at such mani- 
 
 since there is scarcely a position taken in this book, which, on 
 a re-perusal, he does not feel that he could and would -have 
 made stronger, but for the interruptions referred to. 
 
 ‘With regard to criticism: considered in a literary point of 
 view, he is comparatively little concerned about it; but he 
 hopes, in all sincerity of meekness and teachableness, to profit 
 by any serious and sound theological criticism which ie publi- 
 cation may elicit. 
 
 He loves the Church of England cordially, while neither 
 ignorant nor heedless of the painful practical abuses which 
 sa sadly interfere with her full efficiency. He has served in her 
 ministry with “a ready mind” for six-and-twenty years. His 
 ‘soul reposes on the fundamental truth so plainly and pointedly 
 expressed in her Articles. His heart’s best desires are fervently 
 uttered in her Liturgy. His most matured convictions are in 
 accordance with her order and government. He is fully satisfied 
 that she supplies abundant scope and opportunity for every 
 exercise of devotion, and for every act of self-denial and benevo- 
 ‘lence which go to constitute the whole “reasonable service ”’ 
 to which Christians are called in this world. And he will 
 esteem himself richly rewarded for his labours, if they tend, in 
 some measure, to settle the now agitated minds, to fix the 
 wavering affections, and to stimulate the active services—in 
 Chureh teaching and Church extension—of his fellow-church- 
 meh. : 
 
 “ $1. JUDE’s, LIVERPOOL, 
 
 March 1846, 
 
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. - 
 
 ΤῊΝ Author has to acknowledge several favourable and even 
 flattering notices of this Book by Reviewers both in England 
 and Ireland. As yet he has met with no hostile observations 
 upon it, nor any attempt by either Romanist or Tractarian, to 
 gainsay the conclusions he has arrived at. | 
 
 To one of the interpretations of Scripture which he has 
 advanced, an objection has been made in a quarter entitled to 
 the highest respect and deference. Upon that objection, so far. 
 as it is based on argument, he will not take the liberty to 
 comment; but as it has come to him chiefly based on the 
 alleged matter of fact, that the interpretation in question is 
 novel, he feels altogether justified in supplying such of his 
 readers as look upon the testimony of antiquity as a test of 
 orthodoxy, with the following citations from two of the most 
 celebrated writers among those who are commonly called “ the 
 Fathers.” He cannot indeed himself see how a writer, exer- 
 cising his private judgment on a passage of Scripture, in the 
 second, third, or fourth century, can supply any nearer approach 
 to an infallibly correct interpretation of the passage, than 
 another writer exercising his private judgment on the same 
 passage in the nineteenth century. He cannot, therefore, place 
 any more reliance upon the opinion of John Chrysostom, than 
 upon the opinion of Stanley Faber, as to correctness. Of 
 course, if the question be one, not of correctness, but of novelty, 
 the case is wholly altered. | 
 
Preface to the Second Edition, ἀκ xxiii 
 
 
 
 
 
 The passage of Scripture here referred to, is the eleventh 
 verse of the eleventh chapter of St. Matthew: “Verily I say 
 unto you, among them that are born of women there hath not 
 risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that 
 
 is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” 
 
 Upon these words, the Author (after stating what appeared 
 to him the relevancy of the subject to the argument he had in 
 hand) commented thus:—“ It is to be observed that the phrase, 
 ‘he thatis least,’ in the superlative degree, is here given as the 
 translation of a Greek word in the comparative degree. O 
 Mixportepos signifies he that is lesser, not he that is least. The 
 kingdom of heaven, in the passage, is on all hands admitted to 
 signify the opening dispensation of the gospel. There was at 
 that time in the kingdom of heaven, so understood, an individual 
 in many respects lesser than John. He was despised and re- 
 jected, while John was hailed as a burning and a shining light. 
 _ His ministry was scorned. ‘ Have any of the rulers, or of the 
 Pharisees, believed on Him?’ was the insulting question: 
 while, on the other hand, Pharisees and Sadducees, Jerusalem, 
 and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, flocked 
 to the baptism of John. Yet, notwithstanding all this, He who, 
 in the opening of the dispensation, was thus so much lesser than 
 John, was really greater than he. The distinction in the latter 
 part of the verse is not between John and all down to the least 
 of the New Testament saints, but between John and Jesus.””— 
 Pp. 106, 107, first edit. ; 
 
 Is this a novel interpretation?. First, let Chrysostom answer, 
 
 “Οὐκ εγήγερται ἐν γεννητοῖς γυναικῶν μείζων Τωάννου του Βαπτιστου. 
 
 “GN ἵνα μὴ πάλιν ἡ ὑπερβολὴ τῶν ἐγκωμίων τέκη τινὰ ἀτοπίαν, 
 πρωτιμώντων ἀυτὸν του Χριστου τῶν Ἰουδαίων, σκόπει πως καὶ τουτο 
 ε διορθουται: καθάπερ γὰρ ἐξ ὧν ᾧκοδομουντο οἱ μαθηταὶ, ἐβλάπτοντο ὃς 
 ὅλι, εὔκολον αὖτον εἶναι νομίζοντες" οὔτω Kat ἐξ ὧν ἐθεραπεύοντο οἱ ὄχλοι, 
 μείζων ἄν ἐγένετο ἡ βλάβη, σεμνοτέραν του Χριστου λαμβανόντων αυτωνι 
 ὑπόνοιαν ἐκ τῶν εἰρημένων. διὸ κὰν τουτο ἀνυπόπτως διορθουται λέγων. 
 Ὃ δὲ μικρότερος ἐν τῇ βασιλεία των ουρανων, μειζων ἄυτου ἐστι. 
 
XX1V Preface to the Second Edition. 
 
 
 
 
 
 ΄ε Ν 
 Μικρότερος κατὰ τὴν ἡλικίαν κὰι κὰτα THY τὼν πολλων δόξαν, κὰν γὰρ 
 a ΄ err re® 
 ἔλεγον αὐτὸν φάγον κὰι οἰναπότην. κὰι, οὐκ TOUTS ἔστιν ὃ TOV τέκτονος ULOS ; 
 Ν ὌΝ Ν / 
 Kal TavTaxov αὐτὸν ἐξευτέλιζον. 
 ‘< ΄, > , Ν Ν , , , ee ” 
 Τί οὖν, φησί, Kata τὴν σύνκρισιν του Ἰωάννου μείζων ἣν ; ἄπαγε. 
 / / ΩΝ 
 οὐδὲ γὰρ Iwavyns ὅταν λέγη, ἰσχυρότερός μου ἐστὶ, συγκρίνων λέγει. οὐδὲ 
 ΄ Ν 
 TlavAos, ὅταν Μωσέως μεμνημένος γράφη, πλείονος γὰρ δόξης τουτο παρὰ 
 Μωσῆν ἤξιωται, συγκρίνων γράφει, κὰι αὐτὸς δέ, ἰδοὺ πλέων Σολομῶνος 
 ὧδε λέγων, οὐχὶ συγκρίνων φησί. cide ἄρα δοίημεν κὰι Kara σύγκρισιν 
 a rn lal , 
 εἰρῆσθαι ὑπὲρ αὐτοὺ τουτο, οἰκονομικῶς ἐγένετο. dla τὴν τῶν ακουόντων 
 3 , Ν Ν , Φ Ν 8 τ , Ce, L4 
 ἀσθένειαν. κὰι γὰρ Σφόδρα ἦσαν πρὸς αὐτὸν κεχηνότες οἱ ἄνθρωποι, τότε 
 ᾿Ν ’, δ. aiN \ \ 9 , 3 , Se \ \ ' , 
 δὲ λαμπρότερον ἀυτὸν Kau TH δεσμωτήριον ᾽ποίησε, Kou ἡ πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα 
 5ε , ΔΤ NK , a A \ a an \ 
 παῤῥησία, κὰν ἀγαπητὸν ἣν τέως TOVTO δεχθῆναι παρὰ Tots πολλοῖς. Kat 
 > a bY 
 γραφὴ Kau ἡ παλαὶα oidev οὔτω διορθουν τὰς τῶν πεπλανημένων ψυχὰς, τὰ 
 5 , Ν ’ 4 ε μὲ / 3 3 2 Ψ 4 
 ἀσύγκριτα κατὰ σύγκρισιν παραβάλλουσα. ws ὅταν λέγη᾽ οὐκ ἔστιν ὅμοίος 
 > a , ὕ Ν ΄ »υ ” Ν Cx © Ν ἘΠ δ 
 σοι ἐν θεοῖς Κύριέ. κὰι πάλιν, ᾿οὐκ ἔστι θεὸς ὡς 6 θεὸς ἡμῶν΄. 
 ᾿ val al / ᾿" 
 “ς πνὲς δὲ φασιν, ὅτι περὶ τῶν ἀποστόλων TOUTO ἔιρηκεν ὁ Χριστός. ἔτεροι 
 ω ᾿ lal ‘ 
 περὶ των ayyéAwy, κακως. ὅταν yap της αλεθείας τινὲς ἐεκτραπῶσι, πολλὰ 
 ΚΝ 5.) , whic) Bouse AS , oy +> 
 πλανᾶσθαι εἰώθασι. ποία yap ἀκολουθία ἢ περὶ ἀκολουθία ἢ περὶ ayyeAwv 
 3 \ lal , > τ τ αν Ν > Ν la) Δ ἔλ ad 
 ἢ περὶ TOV aTooTOAwy εἰπεῖν; ἄλλως δὲ, εἰ περὶ τῶν αποστόλων ἔλεγε, τί 
 ἐκώλυεν ὀνομασὶ παραγαλέιν ; περὶ μὲν ἑαυτῦυ γέγων εἰκότως κρύπται TOV 
 πρόσωπον διὰ τὴν επικρατῦυσαν ὑπόνοιαν, κὰι τὸ μὴ δόξαι περὶ EavTOv eye 
 4, Si Ν Ν / / \ 3 > οἱ 
 τί λέγειν κὰν γὰρ πολλαχου φαίνεται τουτο ποιων. Ti δὲ ἐστιν ἐν τῇ βασι- 
 λεία των ουρανων ; ἐν τοῖς πνευματικῦις κὰι τοῖς κατὰ, τὸν ουρανὸν ἄπασι. 
 Lal lal / 
 κὰι TO εἰπεὶν δὲ, οὐκ ἐγήγερται ἐν γεννητοῖς γυναικῶν μείζων Ἰωάννου, αντι- 
 ὃ / > ε Ν / Ν “ ε Ν ε 29) 
 ιαστέλ λοντος ἣν ἑαυτω τὸν Iwdyvynv, κὰι οὕτως ἑαυτὸν ὑπεζαιρουντος.᾿᾽᾽ "-- 
 
 Chrysost. in loco., Edit. Paris, 1727. 
 
 Thus this celebrated Greek father interprets O’ Muxpdtepos 
 as referring to Christ Himself: less in age than John, and less in 
 the estimation of the multitude; for they said of Him that He 
 was an eater (gluttonous) and a‘drinker of wine, and “is not 
 this the carpenter’s son?”’ and everywhere they made light of 
 Him. 
 
 Now hear Jerome. “ Qui autem minor est in regno ceelorum, 
 major est illo. Multi de Salvatore hoc intelligi volunt: quod 
 qui minor est tempore, major sit dignitate.”’ 
 
 ? The annotation on this word is— 
 “ Sese subducentis, ne compararetur Joanni,” ° 
 
Preface to the Second Edition. SOR 
 
 Jerome proceeds to give his own opinion, to wit—that the 
 persons referred to are the members of the Church triumphant : 
 thus adopting an interpretation which is rejected by Chrysostom 
 in the passage just quoted.” He says, “Nos autem simpliciter 
 intelligamus, quod omnis sanctus qui cum Deo est, major sit illo 
 qui adhuc consistit in preelio.”” But this opinion, he confesses, 
 was in opposition to many who understood the passage as 
 
 ‘referring to Christ. It would seem also to be in opposition to 
 what Jerome himself has written on the preceding verse. 
 
 * Amen dico vobis, non surrexit inter natos mulierum major 
 Johanne Baptista. Inter natos inquit mulierum. His ergo 
 prefertur hominibus qui de mulieribus nati sunt et de concubitu 
 viri; et non ei qui est natus ex Virgine et Spiritu Sancto.’’— 
 Jerome in loc. | 
 
 Whatever objections may still remain against the interpreta-_ 
 tion of this passage given in this book, the facts that, Jerome 
 wrote ‘‘ multi de Salvatore. hoc intelligi volunt,” and that Chry- 
 
 .sostom was one of those who so understood it, must be received 
 as abundantly sufficient to repel the charge of novelty. 
 
 = It must be in ἐς ordinary degree mortifying to the anxious seekers after the 
 
 unanimous consent of the Fathers, to find such a Father as Jerome coming thus 
 under the lash of the “ xaxws”’ of such a father as Chrysostom. 
 
 LIVER>OOL, 1847. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS, 
 
 True Happiness in Man eH upon his Knowledge of and Con- 
 formity to God . : 
 
 The Character of God revealed in hres ἘΠῚ Hontures.Jeelie ex- 
 istence, absolute sovereignty, and holy love . 
 
 Effect on Creatures illustrated by cari and by Men 
 
 The Gospel of Christ, what? . : 
 
 Interesting to Angels . ν 
 
 Intrusted to the Ministry of Men 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS CATHOLICITY, 
 
 Various significations of “ the Church, Dr. Barrow 
 
 The Doctrine of Election hastily but unjustly cout lenasens 
 
 The Ninth Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans expounded ‘ 
 
 The Rey. George Stanley Faber’s view of the Primitive Doctrine of 
 Election examined 
 
 Chrysostom—Jerome . 
 
 Eph. i. 3—5 5 : : : : Ρ 
 
 Dr, Graves on ἘΦ ΕΓ ΤΉΝ : : ; ; : ᾿ 
 
 Our Lord’s Language on this subject 
 
 St. Paul’s Language to the Thessalonians 
 
 Bishop Jewell on ditto 
 
 The purpose of God is serene and ἜΒΑ the true ‘dice of OGaineuony 
 
 The performance of the Divine Purpose is progressive, presenting to our 
 view the Constituent Parts cf the Church. 
 
 The Head—the Members—one Body. 
 
Contents. XXVIi 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—rITS UNITY. 
 
 Unity desired and desirable: but, in the sense of uniformity, hopelessly 
 unattainable ; 
 
 Valuable Testimony of Archdeacon nee on this cia 
 
 In what true Unity consists 
 
 Mr. Palmer's statement on this Subject ae ΣῈ : 
 
 Old Testament Believers, though differing in Ordinances, included in ἫΝ 
 Unity of the Church ; 
 
 No tenable objection to this from our Lord’s Terence to His ΛΈΩΣ in 
 
 5. St. Luke x. 23, 24, or from His "ΤΣ to John the Baptist in 
 St. Matt. xi. 11 
 
 * One Spirit,” by whose power wee there is antubnee ay the Church of 
 God 4 : 
 
 External nature opens no ice: : . 
 
 Christ is the one only Door, but even here fallen man cannot enter, save 
 by the power of the Holy Spirit 
 
 The Holy Spirit, though given only through Christ, was ΕΣ ἴο the 
 Members of the Church of God, for 4000 years prior to the Incar- 
 nation of Christ : : 
 
 True Unity thus shown to be πα τες of ane ee nal cena 
 
 Recognition of Christianity in those who differ from us in many things, a 
 Duty—Practical Co-operation with them, an Impossibility . 
 
 True Union is in Labour—Division of Labour 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS HOLINESS. 
 
 ka what true Christian Holiness consists : 
 The Importance of right Views on the Fallen State at Man oe 
 Mr. Ward’s Advocacy of Inherent Righteousness examined : 
 ' The notion of “ Congruity ” incompatible with the Scriptural Bedaionens 
 of Man’s state by Nature 
 The young Ruler (St. Mark x. ) no ΠΈΣ ΕΣ 
 Cornelius (Acts x.) no Objection 
 Sanctifying Truth ; & 
 The Word of God in its deuipletenoss ἢ 
 (1) Blessing 
 (2) Guiding 
 (3) Warning ἢ Sea tre ἐξ ὃ ἑ 
 Ὁ4) Promising . ἢ 
 The Nature and Amount of emis to i ἜΡΟΝ in the ΤΑ ΤΉ of 
 the Church of God while on earth 
 (1) Habitually sincere . 
 _(2) Upon the whole rarer 
 (3) At the best imperfect ; : 
 If such be the Members of the Church of God, ἈΠΟ ΝΑ ΑΜ among 
 men can be entitled to that name? —. ᾿ 7 ὃ . 
 
 
 
 52 
 57 
 64 
 67 
 
 71 
 
 72 
 
 99, 
 100 
 104 
 
 106 
 108 
 112 
 115 
 118 
 
 122 
 127 
 129 
 
 139 
 139 
 141 
 144 
 
 148 
 
XXVlii Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER. V. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS APOSTOLICITY, 
 
 PAGE 
 The meaning of “ Apostolicity,” as used by Roman Catholic writers . 150 
 Its true meaning—* The Apostles’ Doctrine and Fellowship ” ; . 151 
 Without the Apostles’ Doctrine no ON ΝΗ Church—Proofs from 
 ; Scripture ; ᾿ ᾿ ; ᾿ : » 152 
 Proofs as stated by Dr. Hance : ἢ . 155 
 A principle laid down by Mr. Palmer sadnceda in further prout : SLT 
 Opposition to this on the hypothesis of Development answered . . 159 
 Note on Mr. Newman’s recent treatise : ; : " ΤΟΣ 
 Tertullian ἐν 4 ; 4 : Ὁ 3 , Le? 
 “ Apostles’ Fellow aig What? ϊ ὁ : ϊ : ον 169 
 Connexion with the Doctrine. 5 : : ; ΣΝ ΠΣ 
 Succession, however regular, cannot secure either the Doctrine or the 
 Fellowship : Pe ; : 3 : ie 
 Note on Pope Joan, from Plating ΤΩΣ . 176 
 Claim to Infallibility from Analogy with “ The Church Guitles of the ola’ 
 Law,” answered is 111) 
 Where ther is an Apostolical Church to be ‘found ? only among ἘΌΝΤΟΣ, 
 men.) - : : ; : oy LOM 
 Natural Men cannot receive True ἘΠ ΕΒ 189 
 
 _ Professing to receive “The Things of the Spirit of Goa, ἣ they have 
 corrupted them to meet the Senses, and the Natural Principles of 
 
 men. 
 (1) The Person of Christ : : : : » ls 
 (2) The Worship of God . : ; F 2 194 
 (3) The Doctrines of Christianity ὃ 195 
 Where these Corruptions are most notorious, the pr dieuuusa to Apostoltcity 
 is most arrogant : ; : : : ὶ 190 ἡ 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 | THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS SECURITY AND VISIBILITY. 
 
 What the Security of the Church does not mean. ye : 20% 
 First, 2'Peter ii. 22 -. : : OL Manet . 202 
 Second, St. Matt. vii. 22,23 \ τ΄. ; ues . 208 
 “Third, Rey. iii, 1 4 : ‘ ὃ ες, 204 
 Fourth, Rom. vii.'23 ; Gal. v. 17 ; : . 205 
 What the Security of the Church does mean—1 Peteri.5 . ‘ ες 208 
 The Rock, St. Matt. xvi. πετρος-πετρα : eh tones |) 
 Dr. Barrow’s interpretation in answer to Bollaemine . 210 
 Indefectibility of the Church on Earth different from the Seonnity of the 218 
 Church against “ the Gates of Hell” ‘ ‘ : ς 
 The Visibility of the Church not yet. ; : ἢ 219 
 “The Manifestation of the Sonsof God” . : 4 ἢ .« 2920 
 
 The Resurrection of the Body ; Ν ‘ 4 ἐπὶ . "220 
 
 / 
 
\ 
 
 Contents. ΧΧΙΧ 
 
 
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 Attempts to prove present Visibility answered λ : ‘ .) 221 
 Our Lord’s Prayer for the whole Church, St. John xvii... ; . 230 
 ‘ CHAPTER VII. 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH— 
 THEIR ORDINANCES 
 
 An exclusively Spiritual State of Things: Salvation without Ordinances 
 conceivabie 3 Σ ᾿ ; : . 234 
 But not the Existing State of hinges : : , sv Peed BO 
 Man’s Compound Creation . : : Ant . 236 
 Visible Ordinances Instituted from the ἘΠΕ ὑπ ; ὶ > . 287 
 His Religion suitable thereto . : : i : : ~ Qo 
 The Tree of Knowledge : ᾿ς : ; : é «| 238 
 The Bleeding Sacrifice i , ; ; ἮΝ : ay 
 ’ The Rainbow . : A Ϊ : ; : : ~ 242 
 Circumcision . ; ὴ : ; i ! : colt Diep 
 The Mosaic Types. i ὶ ats 210%, f δ . 243 
 The Person and Ministry of Jesus. 248 
 And now, Ordinances rest on the same (ee ΟΣ with Sarena Tr uth... 250 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH—BAPTISM. 
 Baptism a Divine, Institution . : . : 09 
 Its Origin to be traced to the “ Water of Purification,” Num. xix. . 254 
 Its Practice afterwards Superstitiously Abused * ; : . 256 
 Its Adoption into the Christian Church s Σ β ἢ . 209 
 Its Form, as so adopted, includes --- 
 
 (1) The Use of Water . af : ἦν 260 
 , (2) An Acknowledgment of “ the Trinity” : . 263 
 Tt does not daelvde: as Essential to the Ordinance 
 (1) Any precise Form of Words : 265 
 (2) Nor any precise Description of Persone as it aol 
 Administrators . 266 
 (3) Nor any precise mode or Mesnure in the per ie: Gt 
 the Water : ; : E ἢ 209 
 The proper Subjects for Baptism are— 
 (1) Adults who Believe the Gospel . . . 272 
 (2) Adults who Profess to Believe the Gospels b * 276 
 (3) The Infant Children of Baptized Parents, that ‘“ the 
 blessing! of Abraham”? may come upon the Gentiles 
 through Jesus Christ . 5 ΣΎΡΗ 
 Council of Carthage,—Letter from Cyprian to Fidus SS ies Ἵ . 282 
 The Nature and Efficacy of Baptism . . 283 
 Analogy between the Body of Christ and the Soul of the Glartdtiast ead, 
 Buried, Raised . : ; . 288 
 
 When Genuine and tambien “ Baption doth Save” : i . 292 
 
XXX wg Contents. 
 
 But it may not be Genuine or Complete— then it does not Save 
 
 How should a Christian Church speak of it, but as the’ Apostles aid, 
 though they have many failures such as the Apostles had? . 
 
 The English Church Service ; ξ 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST \MILITANT HERE ON EARTH— 
 , THE LORD’S SUPPER. 
 
 Figurative Language 
 Force of Words 
 Exposition of our Lord's Figurative iedaken in, St. J ἼΤΩ vi. 
 The Disciples of Christ prepared for such language as ‘‘ This is my body” 
 What is Essential to the Right Celebration of the Lord’s Supper ». 
 The True Spiritual Nature of it— 
 (1) A Commemoration of an Absent Friend . : > 
 (2) A Confession of Faith ; 5 4 : vs 
 (3) A Vow of Service 5 
 (4) A Feeding on Truth ; : 
 The ‘‘ body and blood of Christ ’”’—‘‘ God manifest in nthe flesh ἌΡ ΣΟ 
 sive of all Revealed Truth ὃ ς . : yas 
 Proportions of Apostolical Teaching on this subject 
 Christ may be Eaten without the Bread and Wine, and the Beda and 
 Wine without Christ : Ἶ 
 _ Our Absent Lord is coming back 
 Extract from a Sermon on 1. Cor, x. 16—18 . 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH—THEIR 
 MINISTRY AND CONNEXION WITH THE CIVIL RULER. 
 
 A Religion with its Doctrines Revealed—A Society with its Officers 
 Founded ; 
 
 The Appointment of the ἘΣΤΕ ΝΣ Σ 
 
 Clearly Distinguished from the Lay-Members of the Church 
 
 Duty of Christian Ministers to Deal Impartially with Holy Scriptures as a 
 whole 
 
 Difference between Christ’ 8 Ehnedaes to ἘΠῚ esnied ‘Apostles, i Eyen 80 
 send I you,” and St. Paul’s Language to his Uninspired Successor, 
 
 “T charge you... . preach the word” ; Ἶ ἢ 
 The Authority of the Ministers of Christ Ἴ Α ὴ 
 Derived from the Word of God ΐ ᾿ Y 
 
 The Bible, though sufficient in ΠΑΡ ον ἈΜΑ was never eae τὰ bea 
 Sufficient Guide in all the Details of Management in the Churches 
 of Christ r ; ἡ ἢ 
 
 It Delegates Authority to the MGrhateee of the Chtcches 
 
 It Limits that Authority , ; 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ' 292 
 
 297 
 300 
 
 «τ 802 
 
 304 
 305 © 
 310 
 313 
 
 316 
 317 
 317 
 319 
 
 320 ᾿ 
 320 
 
 824 
 326 
 328 
 
 335 
 336 
 338 
 
 340 
 
 848 
 849. 
 861 
 
 353 
 353 
 354. 
 
Contents. Xxxi 
 
 
 
 : PAGE 
 
 Tn Matters of Fuith, no Addition to, or Subtraction from; in matters of 
 Ceremony, no Opposition to the Written Word : ἢ . 355 
 Members of the Church Subjects of the State, Inevitable Connexion . 357 
 The Civil Ruler : F ; ᾿ ; : : . 359 
 Absolute ; ἶ ὰ : ; : : . 365 
 Mixed . ὃ ‘ 5 : . 874 
 The Mixed uiersi in fosiind ; : -' 375 
 Appeal to Rulers on their Duty tq the Lord J esus Christ ὁ ‘ . 381 
 APPENDIx A,—Baptism : , . : : Σ . 387 
 
 APPENDIX B.—Canon Law . , . i : - . 405 
 

 
THE CHURCH AND THE CHURCHES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 Happiness in Man—The Character of God—The Gospel of Christ—Interesting 
 to Angels—Intrusted to Men specially commissioned for its Proclamation 
 and Extension, 
 
 1. Happiness! True and abiding happiness for man, where and 
 how is this to be found? “ My soul, wait thou only upon God, 
 for my expectation is from him!”’* We are all expectants. 
 Hach of us has something in progress or in prospect upon 
 which we are waiting, and from which we are in expectation of 
 some advantage or enjoyment, or both. We may have been 
 disappointed in such expectations often; still, new objects 
 suggest themselves. The world is fertile in them. Before one 
 project comes to a termination, another has started, and the 
 interest excited by it has engaged the mind. Thus man is 
 beguiled from one expectation to another, till the thread of 
 life is suddenly snapped, and all his hopes perish. There is 
 no hope in hell. If hope were there, hell would be no 
 longer hell. But hope descends to his children upon earth, 
 and they follow in the footsteps of their father. Their father’s 
 hopes have indeed perished ; but he does not come back to tell 
 of the disappointment. Stone after stone falls in the water, one 
 with a louder noise and making a somewhat greater commotion 
 than another, but the difference is momentary—the water 
 
 1 Psalm ἸΧΊ], 5. 
 
 1 
 
2 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 closes over both; each is followed by another and another; and 
 the water closes over all. The mean man and the mighty man, 
 where are they? The learned man and the ignorant man, the 
 rich man and the poor man, the party man and the moderate 
 man, and the neutral man, where are they? Ah, Lord God! 
 Thou hast taught us that “wide is the gate and broad is the 
 road that leadeth to destruction, and many there be that go 
 therein ;” therefore “hell hath enlarged herself and opened her 
 mouth without measure, and their glory, and their multitude, 
 and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth shall descend into it.” ? 
 
 There is a strait gate, a narrow way, a way of escape from 
 the common ruin. That which we have heard of the saving 
 truth of God, that which we have seen with our eyes in the 
 holy Scriptures, which our understandings have perceived and 
 our affections embraced of the power of divine grace; that 
 which we have thus known and felt, declare we unto you, that 
 you may have fellowship with us; and truly “ our fellowship 
 is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.” In the 
 enjoyment of this fellowship happiness is found. Here man’s 
 expectation is indeed from God. This supplies an object of 
 attraction to the soul, which, though it hinders not the man 
 from attending to other things, does hinder him from adhering 
 to other things. It does not take him out of the world, but 
 it raises him above the world ; it does not become exclusive, but 
 it does become paramount. 
 
 Towards this fellowship with God some degree of right and 
 true knowledge of God is indispensable. But no man has any 
 real, true knowledge of God except he has received it from 
 God Himself. Flesh and blood cannot by searching find out 
 God. Except God Himself tell of Himself, no man can know 
 Him. To guess at Him by inferences from His works ; or, 
 as St. Paul expresses it, “to feel after Him if haply we may 
 find Him ’’—this is not to know Him ; but to hear His own 
 word concerning Himself, and to believe what we hear, this is 
 to know Him, and this is life eternal.” 
 
 It is our high privilege—surely I may truly say our highest 
 
 1 St. Matt. vii. 13; Isa. y. 14. 2 St. John xvii. 8, 
 
ΩΣ ΕΣ Observations. 3 
 
 
 
 
 
 privilege—to possess in our own native language, no man 
 hindering us, a faithful translation of the word Sahih God has 
 been eivady pleased to speak concerning Himself. 
 
 Upon a careful examination of this word we find three leading 
 features comprising all that is made known to us of the divine 
 character. First, self-existence ; second, absolute sovereignty ; 
 third, holy love. These are compressed into a few words, and 
 these are dilated over the whole Scriptures. “ Hear, O Israel” 
 —hear, O England—for Jehovah hath spoken: “I am the 
 Lord thy God ;” and “thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
 all thy heart.” All is here. 
 
 First: I am. 
 
 Here is self-existence. Here spake the high and lofty One 
 who inhabits eternity. His name—His descriptive name—was, 
 is, and ever shall be, I am. With Him “there is neither 
 variableness nor shadow of turning.”” The end is before Him 
 from the beginning ; and the beginning is with Him to the 
 end. There is no history, for τ is nothing past; no 
 prophecy, for there is nothing future; no speculation, no ex- 
 periment, for there is nothing doubtful with Him. Does God 
 reason? Think of the question before you allow your mind to 
 answer. Reasoning implies some degree of doubtfulness and 
 difficulty. The highest reasoning powers among men are re- 
 quired in matters most beset with difficulty. In proportion as 
 the things before us are simple, they cease to demand reasoning; 
 they are objects of intuition as distinct from reasoning. Then 
 God does not reason: for all things are open and naked to Him. 
 His universal knowledge is .one intuitive glance. We cannot 
 properly say of Him, “He was,” for this implies something 
 past, which is not now ; we cannot properly say of Him, “ He 
 will be,” for this implies something future which is now now. 
 Our only really correct saying is, “ He is ;” and thus He says 
 Himself, “ I am.” 
 
 Second : THou sHALT. 
 
 Here is the language of absolute sovereignty; God’s rightful 
 tone to every creature, for they are all His ; and “ Have I not 
 aright,” He asks, “to do what I will with my own?” He is 
 
4 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 the source from which all creation has arisen, the foundation 
 upon which all creation rests, the energy by which all creation 
 is sustained. “Thou shalt.” This is the voice of lawful autho- 
 rity. The creature who disregards this does so at his extreme 
 peril, for God is able to render creation a curse, sensation 
 agony, an eternity Οἵ consciousness an eternity of torture. 
 “Fear God, and keep His commandments, for this is the whole 
 duty of man.” Fear not man, a worm, nor the son of man that 
 shall die. Fear not his reviling, his sneer, his curse, nor his 
 sword, though he had the power, as too frequently he has the 
 will, to use it ; fear not him that can kill the body, and after 
 that has no more that he can do; but I forewarn you whom 
 you shall fear—fear God, and tremble at His word. 
 
 Third : Houy Love. 
 
 “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart.” 
 Here is paternal love desiring the happiness of His children. 
 He knows that to love Him would make them happy, therefore 
 He says, “ Love me :”’ He knows that to love Him perfectly, 
 without an intruding rival, would make them perfectly happy 
 without intermixture of uneasiness, therefore He says, “ with 
 all thy heart.” 
 
 When an intelligent creature yields an appropriate response 
 to all this, he-is in harmony with God. This is law, this 
 is love, this is life. Consider, then, in what an appropriate 
 response consists; it is first, conscious dependence ; second, 
 willing submission ; third, grateful love. 
 
 When the sound, “I am,” proceeds from the throne of the 
 Kternal, the appropriate response in every creature is, “ And I 
 by Thee; in Thee I live, and move, and have my being ; from 
 Thee I spring ; upon Thee I rest ; by Thee I am sustained :. 
 not unto me, O Lord, not unto me, but unto Thee !”’ 
 
 When the sound, “Thou shalt,” proceeds from the throne, 
 the appropriate response in every creature is, ‘‘Hyen so, Lord, 
 for so it seemeth good unto Thee ;” give me what Thou wilt ; 
 keep from me what Thou wilt ; make me what Thou wilt have 
 me to be :— 
 
Introductory Observations. 5 
 
 “Ὁ Lord, my God, do Thy most, holy will, 
 I will lie still ; 
 I will not move, lest I forsake Thine arm, 
 And break the charm 
 Which keeps me leaning 6n my Father’s breast, 
 In perfect rest.” 
 
 When the sound, “ Love me with all thy heart,” proceeds 
 from the throne, the appropriate response in every creature is 
 love produced by love—happy love in the creature, responding 
 to the happiness-desiring love of the Creator. 
 
 These three combined constitute eternal life. They are con- 
 geniality with God; they are the fulfilling of holy law ; they 
 are the harmony of creation. The key-notes and chords of this 
 harmony define the leading features of the creature’s duty ; 
 and the variations, still in harmony, touch in the finest and 
 most delicate points, the various details of that duty in act, and 
 thought, and feeling. Ἶ 
 
 It is in this state the holy angels live. The very elements of 
 their being are, conscious dependence, willing submission, and 
 grateful love. Hvery sound from God, every note from the 
 throne, reverberates among them, producing kindred sounds in 
 sweetest echoes. This is happiness. 
 
 From this some angels departed. They “kept not their first 
 estate.” “They sinned.”’ Aiming at independence, they 
 jarred against the Mighty One, and recoiled into discord. The 
 appropriate response of the creature to the self-existence, 
 sovereignty, and love of Jehovah, is no longer awakened in 
 them. Thus ruined, they know it; their state is one of con- 
 tinual sensitiveness to this departure. They have no refuge, no 
 screen of matter, behind which they can hide themselves from 
 the immediate view of the great Father of spirits. They are at Ὁ 
 every moment conscious of the contrariety of their being against 
 His being. Rebellion is in their hearts ; sovereignty is upon 
 _ His arm ; they are miserable, and cannot but be consciously 
 and eternally miserable. 
 
 This view of real happiness enjoyed by the holy angels, and 
 
 1 Jude 6; 2 Peter 1]. 4. 
 
6 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 of the essential misery endured by the fallen angels, will help us 
 to clearer views of man’s condition, and of what is indispensable 
 to man’s real happiness. 
 
 Man was created in love, sin the knowledge and enjoyment of 
 God. The elements of his being were an appropriate response 
 to God’s character. In Adam, as proceeding from the hand of 
 God, when God pronounced him “very good,” this combina- 
 tion was perfect—conscious dependence, willing submission, and 
 grateful love : there was no contradiction to this high and holy 
 law of intelligent creation, no discord against this heavenly har- 
 mony. 
 
 But fallen man has departed from that happy state of light, 
 and life, and love. The appropriate response is no longer 
 awakened in him. Aiming at independence, he too has jarred 
 against the Mighty One, and recoiled into discord. So far his 
 condition resembles that of the fallen angels ; but in another 
 and very important respect it differs from theirs. Fallen man 
 has a screen of flesh to hide behind,—a cage which enables the 
 bird to shield itself from the sight of the heavens. Under 
 favour of this shelter he has recourse for his happiness, such as 
 it is, to things below—things visible—and endeavours to forget 
 his high and spiritual nature. He is so stunned and stupified 
 that he has lost all ear for the heavenly music, and almost lost 
 all consciousness of the discord in which he lives. Living in 
 sin, he has no true sense of sin, and thus he is pronounced to be 
 “dead in sin.” 
 
 How is he to be recovered? A discovery must be made to 
 him of the state to which he has fallen, for “ they that are whole 
 desire not a physician, but they that are sick.” How then can 
 this be? The letter of the law will not do it; he has lost due 
 respect for the Lawgiver, and accuses the law itself as over- 
 strict and even unjust. Punishment will not do it: he resents 
 the blow, and increasingly hates the hand that inflicts it ; in 
 other words, punishment increases his misery by increasing his 
 hatred. ‘To deprive him of the screen of flesh will not do it. 
 This would only make him conscious of what his state is ; it 
 would not change it. This is what is done to the ungodly at 
 
 
 
Introductory Observations. 7 
 
 their death: visible things are withdrawn ; God Himself con- 
 fronts them. Their condition is then identified with that of the 
 fallen angels, as the Lord Jesus Christ says to them, “ Depart 
 into the fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’’? 
 
 How then? By the knowledge of God and Jesus Christ 
 whom He hath sent. The pardoning love of God! This is the 
 first step. ‘ God so loved the world that He gave His only- 
 ‘begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, 
 but have everlasting life.’ Thus, the glorious gospel of the 
 grace of God is the tuning-key of creation, and when used by 
 the Holy Ghost, it restores man to holiness, to happiness, to 
 God! 
 
 2. Happiness, or what is essential to happiness in every crea- 
 ture, must vary with the nature and capacities of the creature. 
 To the irrational animals, all that seems needful for happiness is 
 a sense of perfect ease. There is an enjoyment in the flow of 
 animal life ; and if this be unabated by any sense of pain, mere 
 animal nature seems to require no more. But the case of a 
 creature endowed with reason and immortality is vastly dif- 
 ferent ; for to such a creature present ease is far from sufficient 
 for happiness. Such a creature is not only capable of antici- 
 pation, but he is compelled to anticipate. He can as soon cease 
 to exist, as he can cease to look forward. Unto the happiness 
 of such a creature, therefore, there must not only be a conscious- 
 ness of present enjoyment, but there must be a consciousness of 
 security, investing that enjoyment with a character of per- 
 manence. 
 
 Every creature is absolutely and inevitably at the disposal of 
 the Creator ; and consequently security, irrespective of the will 
 οἵ the Creator, is out of the question; and thus we see the 
 elements, the reasonable elements, of that momentous truth— 
 that it is essential to the true happiness of man that he should 
 have, and that he should know that he has, the favour of God. 
 
 The best illustration of this is found where we might expect 
 to find it, in the scriptural narrative, brief as it is, of the state 
 of things in the garden of Eden. Man, in the absence of all 
 
 1 St. Matt, xxv. 41, 
 
8 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 pain, and in the full flow of animal life, with all its supplies ready 
 at hand, possessed that species of happiness which was appro- 
 priate to his animal part. And in the enjoyment of the fayour 
 of his God he possessed that happiness which is equally appro- 
 priate to his intellectual, moral, and immortal part. When he 
 forfeited the favour! of God, he lost his happiness. If at the 
 same time he could have lost his conscience, his reason, his im- 
 mortality, and sunk to the level of the brute creation, so that 
 mere animal enjoyment would have been sufficient for his 
 happiness, he might have continued happy ; but losing his holi- 
 ness, losing the favour of his God, without losing his ‘none 
 his reason, and his conscience, he became ἘΠ disturbed : 
 he could not be happy. We find him accordingly endeavouring 
 to escape from the presence of his Lord God, which had till then 
 been his constant delight; and with ΤΙ ΗΙ absurdity and 
 wickedness expecting to hide himself amongst the trees of the 
 garden. 
 What was this, but an effort to make the creatures a screen 
 between him and his offended God ; a vain. effort to be happy 
 without God? And what has been the effort of fallen man from 
 that day to the present, but by various inventions of his per- 
 verted intellect and strugglings of his wounded affections, to 
 attempt to make himself happy, while absent and alienated from 
 his God? If he could so debase himself as to silence his con- 
 science altogether, and bring himself to the level of the brute— 
 this is one mode by which he might lose sight of the loss he has 
 sustained, and so enjoy a present happiness. Or, if he could 
 distort the character of God ; if he could persuade himself that: 
 God is altogether such a one as he is (Psalm 1. 21), and would 
 connive at his iniquity, or would indulgently overlook certain 
 iniquities, provided he was more careful in other respects, and 
 provided he experienced some sorrow, and underwent some 
 punishment for those transgressions—this is another mode in 
 which he might seduce hineolf into present peace, under the 
 delusion that : it is possible to be safe without being holy. Or, 
 if he could altogether pervert his reason, and bring himself to 
 believe that there is no.God—this is a third mode in which he 
 
Lntroductory Observations. 9 
 
 might attain to a semblance of happiness in a fancied independ- 
 ence of any superior being. 
 
 These three comprise an epitome of the history of mankind. 
 What are the sensualities of man, but an attempt to carry on 
 the debasing process which brings him to the level of the brute ? 
 What are the false religions of man, with all their deprecating 
 sacrifices and. self-imposed austerities and toils, but an attempt 
 to carry on a deluding system of bargaining with God, as if He 
 were altogether such a one as man’s self? And what is infidel 
 philosophy, but an attempt to banish God out of His own cre- 
 ation, and leave proud man without a superior ? 
 
 Hence the value beyond the power of language to express, 
 beyond the reach of man’s heart or mind adequately to conceive, 
 of the proclamation of the gospel, which is given in charge to 
 the Church to carry through the world. For what is the 
 gospel? It is the glad {tidings of a Father’s heart of love, 
 beneath the Creator’s arm of power. Itis the voice of mercy 
 - that comes into the garden to call to Adam and ask him, 
 “Where art thou?” to bring him forth from his wretched 
 hiding-place ; to tell him of a Redeemer, of a Rescuer from 
 ruin, a Mediator between God and hin, a sacrifice, an all-suffi- 
 cient atonement made for his transgression; not that he may 
 substitute reliance on that sacrifice for personal holiness, but 
 that therein beholding the open bosom of his offended Father, he 
 may return and live ‘in that favour, that assimilating communion 
 which produces holiness (2 Cor. iii. 18). Nothing else can 
 produce true holiness, and therefore nothing else can give real 
 and permanent happiness to an intelligent immortal creature. 
 The atonement by Jesus Christ was made, that a pardoning God 
 might be just (Rom. iii. 26); and it is proclaimed that pardoned 
 man may be sanctified (John iv. 9, 10,19). It was made that 
 God might invite man (Isa. xlv. 21, 22) ; it is proclaimed that 
 man may answer the invitation, and come to God. The fact 
 was necessary for God’s character as a governor, before angels, 
 principalities, and powers in heavenly places. The proclamation 
 of it upon earth i$ necessary for man’s holy happiness: for he 
 must not only have God for his friend, but he must know that 
 
10 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 he has Him. As the beloved disciple exclaims, “ We have 
 known and believed the love that God hath to us” (1 John iv. 
 16). 
 
 In prolonging this proclamation, it is the will and wisdom of 
 God to make use of the instrumentality of man. The subject 
 is indeed full of lively interest to the holy angels. And a clear 
 perception of its bearing in heaven and earth may be had by 
 considering it in the point of view in which it must have pre- 
 sented itself to those creatures of high and holy intelligence. 
 
 They know something of what eternity is, and of what it 
 must be for an immortal spirit to spend eternity excluded from 
 the favour and friendship of the great Father of spirits, the 
 living God. They have read a solemn lesson in the history of 
 multitudes of their angelic brethren. They have witnessed 
 the tremendous wrath of God in the swift vengeance which fell 
 upon those multitudes when they sinned ; and they are capable 
 of appreciating the fearful consequences to Beelzebub and his 
 confederates in rebellion, through an eternity of torment. They 
 witnessed the creation of our world and of our first parents, 
 and delighting in the works of their heavenly Father, the morn- 
 ing stars sang together, and the sons of God shouted for joy. 
 What may have been their anticipations on beholding this 
 lovely world, and Adam and Eve in their primeval purity and 
 blessedness, it.is not for man to conjecture. But when they 
 saw the fair flower blighted, when they saw the rebel angel, the 
 enemy of their great Creator and gracious Upholder, permitted 
 to succeed against the new-formed world, and entice the happy 
 man and woman into a kindred rebellion, we may conceive with’ 
 what holy awe they turned to contemplate the as yet unexplored 
 depths of their incomprehensible God! They expected, pro- 
 bably, the destruction of the earth, and the same vengeance to 
 fall on guilty man that had fallen on guilty angels. But such 
 was not Jehovah’s plan. The world was spared. Man was 
 spared. Men multiplied and replenished the earth. Yes, and 
 angels were sent from time to time on errands of love to the 
 fallen race. Some glimpses were probably afforded of the de- 
 signs of God, when the Eternal Word Himself deigned to visit 
 
Introductory Observations. II 
 
 the abodes of sin and sorrow, and hold communication with 
 patriarchs and prophets; but still the mystery was concealed from 
 ages and generations, and the wondering angels desired to look 
 into the ways of the high and lofty One who inhabiteth eternity. 
 
 At last, the fulness of time arrived for the development of one 
 _ essential part of the great design. Self-manifestation is the 
 purpose of God. His whole character must be known, that He 
 may have from every region, and for ever, the praise due to His 
 name. Mercy, infinite, eternal mercy, formed a depth yet un- 
 explored in the divine character. The holy angels—objects of 
 His love, did not require mercy. The fallen angels—objects of 
 His wrath, did not receive mercy. Man was the foreordained 
 vessel of mercy; of free, rich mercy, conferred upon the miser- 
 able, the helpless, the wicked, without the slightest compromise 
 of high, unbending, infinite, eternal justice. In this was to be 
 exhibited to angels and principalities, and powers in heavenly 
 places, the manifold wisdom of God.t To the accomplishment 
 of this divine purpose, Jehovah Himself moved from His ever- 
 lasting glory, and in the person of His eternal Son, equal to 
 the Father, took man’s nature unto Himself, in the unity of one 
 Person. 
 
 This is the wondrous work of the incarnation. The facts are 
 plainly recorded; but without controversy, great is the mystery 
 involved in those facts. That the Almighty, who originally 
 created man’s body of the dust of the earth, and added there- 
 - unto an immortal spirit, had power to cause a virgin to conceive 
 in her womb, cannot be reasonably denied or doubted. That 
 He exercised that power, is the foundation fact of revealed re- 
 ligion. We believe it—and it is a perversion of language and 
 truth to call any one a Christian who does not believe it. The 
 child so conceived was in due time born. Thus was prepared a 
 Being such as had never been before, divine and human in one 
 person! And thus preparation was made for a work such as 
 had neyer been performed before. A work of mercy. The ob- 
 ject of it was lost, rebellious man. The Author of it was God. 
 The execution of it, while it discovered the depth of mercy in 
 
 1 Eph, iii, 10. 
 
 
 
12 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the divine bosom, fully maintained the already discovered heights 
 of justice in the divine government. 
 
 As the wondrous person thus constituted was human, made of 
 a woman, made under the law, the righteous vengeance of 
 Jehovah against human transgression of His law, could fall 
 upon Him and take effect upon Him, both soul and body. 
 And as He was divine, He possessed the infinite capacity of 
 concentrating upon Himself and exhausting the tremendous 
 vengeance. 
 
 In the foresight of this work, and on the credit of it, as it 
 possessed certainty in His own mind, God had been sparing, 
 yea, saving sinful men, and taking them to everlasting glory. 
 This liad been going on for four thousand years. The astonished 
 hosts of heaven seem to have waited in trembling anxiety for 
 God’s explanation of this mysterious proceeding. Something of 
 it must have been revealed to them, when one of their number, 
 Gabriel, was sent to the selected virgin of Galilee to tell her 
 what God designed to do in her and by her. Yet still, they do 
 not seem to have penetrated the mystery, for on that occasion 
 we read of no song of joy and praise among them. 
 
 But on the morning when the child was born, and one of the 
 angelic company was commissioned to proclaim the glad tidings 
 to the shepherds at Bethlehem, no sooner were the blessed words 
 uttered, than suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of 
 the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, “ Glory to God 
 in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill towards men.” 
 
 “Glory to God in the highest.” This song must be prolonged; 
 this is the harmony of creation; no holy angel would join any 
 song which interfered with this; nay, which did not recognise 
 this, and introduce it as the first and chiefest part. 
 
 “Glory to God in the highest.” The scheme of salvation 
 manifested—justice satisfied in the nature that rebelled—sin and 
 death destroyed in the nature that sinned and died—the devil 
 conquered in the nature which had been conquered by him ! 
 The glorious majesty of the great Jehovah shines forth in a 
 blaze of harmonised perfections. 
 
 “ Glory to God in the highest.” New discoveries in the un- 
 
Introductory Observations. 13 
 
 fathomable depth of His character and resources are made to 
 the countless hosts of heaven. They sing His praise anew, and 
 the echo of their song resounds in revelation here on earth ; 
 ““ Peace, goodwill towards men.” ‘Themselves, too, are sent 
 forth as “ ministering spirits, to minister for those who shall be 
 heirs of salvation ”’ (Heb. i. 14). 
 
 But the special proclamation of the gospel is committed to 
 men; first, to men chosen and appointed by the Lord Himself, 
 and after them, to men commissioned by them, and continued 
 in constant succession. God has deposited the glad tidings in 
 earthen vessels, and commanded His poor helpless servants— 
 fellow-sinners with those whom they address—to go, and carry 
 His blessed word over all the world, to preach the gospel to 
 every creature. Amongst the men so employed there are diver- 
 sities of gifts, but the same spirit. And in the work there are 
 differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there 
 are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which 
 worketh all in all (1 Cor. xii. 4—6). 
 
 Believing that our heavenly Father works by means, and 
 seeing in His providence (at least over this our native land) the 
 mighty working upon men’s minds of what is called public 
 opinion ; seeing also how the voice of comparatively few, if 
 forward and clamorous, may be mistaken for the general voice, 
 and thus become more and more influential, unless there be a 
 counter-tone raised—a rallying-point for the quiet majority— 
 and raised loudly and in detail: it is my deliberate conviction 
 that it has now become the duty of every watchman, who sin- 
 cerely loves our Church and nation, however insignificant he 
 may be in himself, however humble his station, however mode- 
 rate his talents, however inconsiderable the additional light he 
 may be able to throw on the subject, faithfully and honestly to 
 declare in his place, the convictions of his understanding and 
 conscience, on the questions involved in this great thesis—THE 
 CuuRCcH oF Gop IN Corist—and THE WHOLE STATE OF CHRIST’S 
 CHURCH MILITANT HERE ON EARTH. 
 
 May the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, 
 give to the writer of these pages, and to every one who shall 
 
14 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 read them, “the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the know- 
 ledge of Him; the eyes of our understanding being enlightened, 
 that we may know what is the hope of His calling, and what the 
 riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is 
 the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe, 
 according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought 
 in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His 
 own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, 
 and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is 
 named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come; 
 and hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be HEAD 
 over all things to THE CHuRcH, WHIcH Is His Bopy, the fulness 
 of Him that filleth all in all.” Ὁ 
 
 1 Epb. i, 16—23. 
 
CHAPTER Iz. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS CATHOLICITY. 
 
 The Church not always used in the same Sense—The Election—Rom. ix.—Mr. 
 Faber’s View of the Primitive Doctrine of Election Examined—Eph. 1. 3—5 
 —Dr. Graves on Predestination—Our Lord’s Language—St. Paul to the 
 Thessalonians—Bishop Jewell on ditto—Dogmatic Theology of the Church 
 of England on this Point—The Purpose of God perfect—The Performance 
 Progressive and still Unfinished—The Constituent Parts of the Church of 
 
 God in Christ—Its true Catholicity—The Head—The Members—One 
 Body. 
 
 Ir cannot be denied by any unprejudiced reader of holy Scrip- 
 ture that the expression “Church” is used in a variety of 
 senses in the sacred volume. In the part of the subject now to 
 come under immediate consideration, I of course use the word 
 only in one of those scriptural senses. If, therefore, some other 
 sense of the word should suggest itself to the mind of any 
 reader, Ihave to request the exercise of a little patience. If 
 any man think that surely the Church is used in Scripture in a 
 very different sense from that in which I shall now use it, let 
 him think again, that as it is used in a different sense, so also 
 it is used in this sense ; let him remember that the Truth 
 himself when urged by the saying, “It is written,” answered, 
 “Tt is written again” (St. Matt. iv. 6, 7); and let not his con- 
 victions concerning one scriptural meaning of the word interfere 
 with his candid acquiescence in another meaning equally scrip- 
 tural, 
 
 - ' Dr. Barrow, in his Discourse on the Unity of the Church, enumerates tl, 
 meanings of the word under the following five heads :— 
 “1, Sometimes any assembly or eompany of Christians is called a Church : 
 
16 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 We shall advance in due time to the uses of the word as it is 
 applied to various communities among men, each of them com- 
 posing a church, and all of them together comprising the whole 
 state of Christ’s Church militant here on earth. But at present 
 we are to contemplate the Church of God, not as dwelling 
 upon earth in any of the successive generations of mankind, but 
 
 as when mention is made of the Church in such a house; (whence Tertullian 
 saith, ‘Where there are three, even laics, there isa Church,’) (Tert. de Exh. 
 Cast. cap. 7.) 
 
 “2, Sometimes a particular society of Christians, living in spiritual com- 
 munion, and under discipline, as when the Church at such a town; the 
 churches of such a province; the churches; all the churches are mentioned : 
 according to which notions St. Cyprian saith that there is a Church where 
 there is a ‘ people united to a priest, and a flock adhering to their shepherd ;’ 
 (Cypr. Ep. 69;) and so Ignatius saith, ‘That without the orders of the clergy a 
 Church is not called.’ (Ignat. ad Tral.) 
 
 “3, A large collection of divers particular societies combined together in 
 order, under direction and influence of a common government, or of persons 
 acting in the public behalf, is termed a Church; as the Church of Antioch, of 
 Corinth, of Jerusalem, etc., each of which at first probably might consist of 
 divers congregations, having dependence of less towns annexed to them; all 
 being united under the care of the bishops and presbytery of those places; but, 
 however, soon after the apostles’ times it is certain that such collections were, 
 and were named churches. , 
 
 ‘4. The society of those who at present, or in course of time, profess the 
 faith and gospel of Christ, and undertake the evangelical covenant, in dis- 
 tinction to all other religions, particularly that of the Jews, which is called the 
 synagogue. 
 
 “5, The whole body of God’s people that ever hath been, or ever shall be, 
 from the beginning of the world to the consummation thereof, who having 
 (formally or virtually) believed in Christ, and sincerely obeyed God’s laws, shall 
 finally, by the meritorious performances and sufferings of Christ, be saved, is 
 called the Church. 
 
 “Of these acceptions the-two latter do only come under present consider- 
 ation, it being plain that St. Paul doth not speak of any one particular or 
 present society; but of all, at all times, who have relation to the same Lord, 
 faith, hope, sacraments, etc. 
 
 «‘ Wherefore. to determine the case between these two, we must observe that 
 to the latter of these (that is, to the catholic society of true believers and faith- 
 ful servants of Christ, diffused through all ages, dispersed through all countries, 
 whereof part doth sojourn on earth, part doth reside in heaven, part is not yet 
 extant; but all whereof is described in the register of divine pre-ordination, 
 and shall be re-collected at the resurrection of the just; that, I say, to this 
 Church) especially all the glorious titles and excellent privileges attributed to 
 the,Church in holy Scripture do agree,” 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 17 
 
 
 
 as composing the body of Christ in its completeness from the 
 first to the last, “according to the eternal purpose of God, which 
 He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Eph. iii. 11). 
 
 It is easy, and I regret to say it is common, with some promi- 
 nent writers of our own times, to treat this branch of divine truth. 
 with little short of contempt ; to affix, without proof, some com- 
 paratively modern name upon it as its originator, and thereupon 
 to turn away from it in scorn, as from a Calvinistic or Lutheran 
 invention, unworthy of their catholic consideration.’ 
 
 I have said this is easy ; and doubtless it is found much more 
 convenient than a refutation of the doctrines of Calvin or Luther, 
 not to mention St. Augustine, or a fair examination in their 
 contexts of the broad and reiterated statements of the apostles 
 and prophets. I observe that one of the immediate consequences 
 of so foreclosing this branch of the subject is, that the writers 
 who do so proceed to apply to other branches of truth those 
 passages of Scripture which in their contexts do of right belong 
 to this, thereby introducing confusion, and of course obscurity ; 
 and they seem to feel themselves perfectly justified in so doing, 
 if they can produce a few citations from some ancient writers, 
 fallible like themselves, in which, without proof or context or 
 argument, the scripture is so used. 
 
 But we must not allow this part of the subject to be fore- 
 closed. It is vital. Had it not been spoken by the Lord 
 
 1 Bishop Horsley, in a charge delivered to the clergy of St. Asaph, August 
 1806, gives the following caution; it is far from obsolete :—‘“ Take special 
 care, before you aim your shafts at Calvinism, that you know what is Calvinism 
 and what is not; that in the mass of doctrine which it has of late become the 
 fashion to abuse under the name of Calvinism, you distinguish with certainty 
 between that part which,is nothing better than Calvinism, and that which 
 belongs to our common Christianity, and the faith of the reformed churches.” 
 
 And Archbishop Magee said to the assembled clergy of Raphoe, in 1821, “The 
 true Christian teacher should not be deterred from setting forth the great fun- 
 damental doctrines which the Articles contain, by the imputation of particular 
 names which ignorance may attach to these doctrines... .. Thus, for example, 
 nothing is moretommon at the present day than to hear a person pronounced 
 to be a Calvinist, because he holds the doctrine of original sin, or of justification 
 by faith ; whereas he might with equal justice be so denominated for holding 
 the doctrines of the Trinity or the Atonement.” 
 
 2 
 
18 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 Jesus, and written by the apostles, “ being witnessed by the law 
 and the prophets,” nothing would have been revealed deserving 
 the emphatic name of Gospel,—glad tidings to guilty and 
 helpless men ; and had it not been revived after long neglect 
 by the Reformers, (when the Bible became their study,) nothing 
 would have been achieved deserving the name of reformation. 
 It is strictly in character that those who reject this portion of 
 divine truth should depreciate by every art in their power the 
 character and works of the Reformers, and elevate the traditions 
 of men into the chair of authoritative interpretation of Scripture, 
 even where those traditions are plainly condemned by the 
 sacred contexts, or by the articles of their own Church, derived 
 from those contexts. 
 
 I am altogether prepared for the ready retort, “ Plainly 
 condemned in your opinion!” and for the plausible question, 
 ‘Where is the modesty of setting your private judgment in 
 opposition to the voice of the Church catholic?” My answer 
 is, “I am guilty of no such presumption. The Church catholic 
 has uttered no voice upon the subject. Individual writers in 
 various ages of the Church’s history have uttered their own 
 convictions, and given their own opinions; they could do no 
 more ; and the modern writer who coincides in opinion with 
 Chrysostom or Cyprian, exercises his private judgment as 
 freely as another who coincides in opinion with Jerome or 
 Augustine, or a third, who, perceiving that it is at least as 
 difficult (and much less profitable) to interpret the fathers as it 
 is to interpret the apostles, exclaims, “ Unus Paulus pre mille 
 Augustinis.” 
 
 If it be alleged that the fathers are all plainly of one and the 
 same opinion on the subject now to be eonsidered, and that, 
 therefore, their united voice should be received as a catholic 
 judgment, the answer simply is, that the allegation is un- 
 founded. The fathers differ as widely as their successors.1. In 
 
 ! What the Bishop of Meaux said upon the subject of prophetic interpretation, 
 may with equal truth be said concerning the doctrine of election. ‘ Quand 
 quelques docteurs, méme Catholiques, font trop hardiment des traditions con- 
 stantes et des articles de foi, des conjectures de quelques Péres; on peut, et 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 1g 
 
 
 
 
 
 the full foresight, however, of having a bond jide appeal to the 
 Scriptures condemned by some even of those who have subscribed 
 our 6th Article, but in the earnest prayer aud humble hope of 
 being useful to many others, I proceed. 
 
 Tue CuurcH oF Gop In Carist is “ the election of grace.” 
 There is a strong repugnance in the human mind to admit, 
 without abusing, this branch of truth; and the seat of it: 
 appears to be an intuitive dread of interfering, by the admis- 
 sion, with the moral perfections of the divine character. Con- 
 sidered in itself, it is far from unreasonable ; nay, rather sound 
 reason seems to demand it as inseparable from infinite wisdom 
 and infinite power. 
 
 “We say usually, that where this is little wisdom, there is 
 much chance; and comparatively amongst men, some are far 
 more foresighted, and of further reach than others; yet the 
 wisest and most provident men, both wanting skill to design 
 all things aright, and power to act as they contrive, meet with 
 many unexpected casualties and frequent disappointments in 
 their undertakings. But with God, where both reason and 
 power are infinite, there can be neither chance, nor. resistance 
 from without, nor any imperfection at all in the contrivance 
 of things within Himself, that can give cause to add, or 
 abate, or alter anything in the frame of His purposes. The 
 model of the whole world, and of all the course of time, was 
 with Him one and the same from all eternity ; and whatsoever | 
 is brought to pass, is exactly answerable to that pattern, for 
 with Him there is no change nor shadow of turning (James i. 
 17). There is nothing dark to the Father of lights ; He sees 
 at one view through all things, and all ages, from the beginning 
 of time to the end of it, yea, from eternity to eternity.”’? 
 
 Against this, viewed directly, no reasonable objection can be 
 
 Von doit, répondre, que les autres docteurs n’y consentent pas ; que les Péres ont 
 
 varié sur tous ces. sujets, ou sur le plupart, qu'il n’y a donc point de tradition 
 
 constante et uniforme en beaucoup de points, ot des docteurs méme Catho- 
 
 liques ont pretendu en trouver ; en un mot, que c’est ici une affaire, non de 
 
 dogme ni d’autorité, mais de conjectures.”—Bogsuet, Pref, sur ? Apoc., No. 13. 
 ' Archbishop Leighton. 1 Peter i, 20. 
 
20 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 urged: but the application of it to men in their varying 
 characters and final destinations to either happiness or misery, 
 brings it into contact with other truths ; and there it presents 
 itself to the human mind as so arbitrary on the part of God, so 
 partial towards the elect, so unjust and cruel towards the non- 
 elect, and so utterly subversive of the foundations of true 
 morality in man, that all sorts of attempts—learned and un- 
 learned—have been made to evade it, and explain away the 
 words of holy Scripture which expressly assert it. 
 
 But why need this be? May we, must we, not reasonably 
 admit that many things may be true concerning God and His 
 ways, which are far above and beyond our understandings? Is 
 not such admission indispensable towards the production and 
 maintenance in our minds of right feelings of reverence and 
 solemnity in our meditations on God? Is there not in man a 
 craving for mystery? And if God were divested of mystery— 
 either in the mode of His existence in Himself, or of His deal- 
 ings with His creatures—could He continue to be all-sufficient 
 for man? Our reasonable admissions concerning God’s infinite 
 perfections in Himself, and our moral instincts as to what fair- 
 ness and impartiality seem to demand in His dealings with us, 
 invite to conflicting conclusions: and it is man’s littleness to 
 attempt to simplify the problem by denying or evading either 
 set of premises. The fairness and impartiality of God as a moral 
 Governor are undoubted—shall not the Judge of all the earth do 
 right? The absoluteness of God as a Sovereign is of equal 
 authority : “He hath made all things for Himself, yea, even 
 the wicked for the day of evil.” (See also Dan. iv. 35.) Let 
 both stand unabated, uncompromised ; and in the full dise of 
 the Lorp Gop Atmicury so revealed, man finds an adequate 
 object for all his powers both of mind and action. In some 
 features he discovers the elements of all moral activity and dili- 
 gence : in others, of all prostration in veiled adoring worship. 
 
 In their attempts to extract “the heart of the mystery,” some 
 writers endeavour to separate election from any certainty of 
 salvation, and so represent it as an election to outward national 
 and ecclesiastical opportunities. These persons do not deny the 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 21 
 
 
 
 absoluteness of election in itself, as the act of God; but they 
 limit its results to such present opportunities as may not be im- 
 proved ; so that the elect in this sense may after all be lost, 
 and thus all appearance of arbitrary partiality for eternity seems 
 to be removed. 
 
 Others, seeing that election is connected, by the apostles, with 
 obedience, and holy love, and eternal life ; and that consequently 
 its results cannot be fairly limited to present and possibly abor- 
 tive opportunities ; endeavour to explain away its absoluteness 
 by saying that the individuals elected to salvation are so elected 
 because of their foreseen faith, and obedience, and love. 
 
 There is a truth in each of these. With the former, we agree 
 that election is absolute ; and with the latter, we agree that 
 election is of individuals to eternal life. In meeting the objected 
 difficulty, as St. Paul did not avail himself of either of these 
 explanations, neither do we ; but with the apostle resolve the 
 matter into the good and supreme pleasure of God, the helpless- 
 ness and ignorance of man. The reader’s earnest attention is 
 requested to the following brief exposition of Rom. ix. 
 
 Having declared and lamented the “casting away’ of the 
 Jews, the apostle is met by the objection, that to represent the 
 people of God as thus cast away seems to amount to an assertion 
 that the word of God had taken no effect among them ; and as 
 this would be contrary to the gracious promise made to that 
 word, he immediately meets it, saying, “ Not as though the word 
 of God hath taken none effect.” It has indeed taken effect in 
 strict accordance with the promise, not on all the nation of 
 Israel, but on all the election out of that nation. “ For they are 
 not all Israel” (the election) “who are of Israel” (the nation). 
 True, they are all the descendants of Abraham, but what then ? 
 “Neither because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all 
 children ;” but “in Isaac shall thy seed be called.” That is, 
 they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the 
 children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for 
 the seed, For this is the word of promise: “ At this time will 
 I come, and Sarah shall have a son.”’ The separation which had 
 just taken place in the apostle’s days, between Jews cast away 
 
wo The Church and the Churches. 
 
 and Jews converted, had been illustrated, and therein typically 
 predicted, by the facts which had taken place in the house of 
 Abraham. Those cast away had been represented by Ishmael, 
 born after the flesh, and not the children of God: and those 
 converted, of whom Paul himself was one, had been represented 
 by Isaac, born according to God’s promise, and by God’s secret 
 supernatural interference. “The children of the promise are 
 counted for the seed.” 
 
 “ And not only this.” For on this branch of the argument, 
 illustrated by reference to this portion of the patriarchal history, 
 an objector may still urge that the separation and selection of 
 Isaac arose not from any absolute purpose in God, but from the 
 misconduct of Ishmael justly provoking God to cast him off. 
 This objection, however, is fully met and answered by a further 
 illustration derived from the next important clause in the patri- 
 archal history. The case of Isaac illustrates the special inter- 
 ference of God, above and beyond the ordinary course of nature 
 The case of Jacob illustrates the absoluteness of God’s choice, 
 irrespective of man’s works, whether good or evil. The apostle, 
 therefore, having referred to the case of Isaac for its appropriate 
 lesson, adds, “ And not only this :’’ but when Rebecca also had 
 conceived by one, even by our father Isaac, (for the children 
 being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that 
 the purpose of God, according to election, might stand, not of 
 works, but of him that calleth,) it was said unto her, “ The elder 
 shall serve the younger, as it is written, Jacob have I loved, 
 but Esau have I hated.” This teaches an additional lesson in 
 Christian doctrine. It is vain to say that the predicted supe- 
 riority of Jacob over his elder brother consisted in temporal 
 prosperity. This is granted as a matter of fact: but the ques- 
 tion is, what did this signify? What point of Christian doctrine 
 did this fact illustrate? It is mere evasion to fasten attention 
 here, on the details of the history, instead of attending to the 
 use made by the apostle of the single historical fact, that before 
 the children were born, and of course before they could have 
 given occasion by their conduct for any such thing, God had 
 determined and announced that the elder should serve the 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 23 
 
 
 
 younger. ‘This fact, viewed as the apostle viewed it, supplies 
 a proof of the election of grace, and gives rise to an apparent 
 objection which would be wholly uncalled-for but for this appli- 
 cation of the fact. ‘‘ What shall we say, then? Is there un- 
 righteousness with God?” Such a notion would never have 
 been suggested by the mere temporal history of Jacob and Esau, 
 considered in itself; but if that history be referred to, not 
 simply for its own facts considered in themselves, but because 
 those facts were significantly typical, illustrating the election of 
 grace, not of works; the casting away of the Jews in the 
 apostle’s time, and the gracious conversion of others ; then, the 
 objection does seem to arise, and this is, in truth, what gave rise 
 to it. 
 
 The apostle’s answer to it is not one of reasoning, addressed 
 to the human understanding, but one of authority, appealing to 
 the sovereign will of God. “Is there unrighteousness with 
 God? God forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy 
 on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on 
 whom I will have compassion.” This high and absolute declara- 
 tion from Him who has a right to do what He will with His 
 own, was conclusive in the apostle’s mind. ‘ So then,” he adds, 
 “it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of 
 God that showeth mercy.” ; 
 
 Neither is this all. As far as the sovereign exercise of special 
 mercy is concerned, this is indeed abundantly sufficient for 
 every humbled mind; but the great truth before us wears 
 another and still more solemn aspect ; and another historical fact, 
 significantly typical, is referred to in illustration of it. “ For 
 the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose 
 have I raised thee up, that EF might show my power in thee, 
 and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.” 
 Whatever may be said of the history of Pharaoh in other re- 
 spects, or whatever explanations may be offered of one remark- 
 able fact recorded in it, the fact itself is undeniable, viz., that 
 God hardened Pharaoh’s heart: To this it is evident the 
 apostle specially refers, because the conclusion he draws from 
 
 TPHXOd:: Vil, 51 Louis: LO 20027 pe. 10; 
 
24 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 the whole is, “ Therefore hath He mercy on whom He will 
 have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth.” 
 
 Here, of course, the objection recurs, though not exactly in 
 the same form, because of His arbitrary mercy : here, it sup- 
 poses non-responsibility in man, because of God’s arbitrary 
 hardening. And the fact that the objection assumes this aspect 
 amounts to a proof that the apostolical doctrine eliciting it, and 
 without which it could have had no appearance of force, and 
 would never have been started, had in the preceding passage 
 assumed this aspect. The objection is, “Thou wilt say then 
 unto me, Why doth He yet find fault? for who hath resisted 
 His will?’ On the supposition that the apostle’s reference to 
 the history of Pharaoh, as an illustration of Christian doctrine, 
 is here correctly interpreted ; this is precisely the objection 
 which seems to arise so strongly against it. Does he then meet 
 the objection by a different interpretation of that history? By 
 no means. He meets it by another and still more overwhelm- 
 ing reference to the rightful majesty and absolute sovereignty of 
 Almighty God, contrasted with the ignorance and insignificance 
 of His creature: “ Nay, but, O man, who art thou that repliest 
 against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed 
 it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power 
 over the clay, to make one vessel unto honour and another unto 
 dishonour?” It must be confessed that, to the reasoning faculty 
 in man, there is not much satisfaction in this answer, and that 
 in order to be satisfied with it, man’s will must be subdued under 
 God’s authority. 
 
 If it be asked again, How, then, indeed is man responsible ? 
 I answer, not because of any doubtfulness, or indecision, 
 or absence of fore-ordination in the mind of God; _ but 
 because of man’s own ignorance. This is capable of a 
 simple, and, as it appears to me, a very striking illustration. 
 St. Peter informs us, that the atoning death of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, a 
 sacrifice for the sins of men, was verily foreordained before the 
 foundation of the world.! Suppose this truth to have been 
 
 1 1 Peter i, 19, 20. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 25 
 
 made known to Adam before his fall, viz., that previous to his 
 creation or the foundation of the world, God had foreordained 
 a sacrifice for. his sins—this information would have greatly 
 embarrassed him. He might have said, What! mus¢ I sin, 
 then? Must I give opportunity for the fulfilment of this fore- 
 ordained purpose? His liberty and responsibility would thus 
 have been invaded by his knowledge. But was it not true, al- 
 though Adam knew it not? The Holy Ghost, by St. Peter, has 
 assured us that it was; and so we see, that to keep Adam free 
 and morally responsible, it was necessary to keep him in some 
 degree of ignorance. We are very ignorant. If we feel and 
 acknowledge this, and bow before all the revealed truth of God, 
 however apparently irreconcilable, we are wise ; but if we 
 exalt our own wisdom, or supposed wisdom, so as to make its 
 deductions a ground for denying, or evading, or explaining 
 away any portion of holy Scripture, we are fools, and know 
 nothing yet as we ought to know. Has any man all the case in 
 all its bearings, clearly before him when he decides on any given 
 question? Surely not. There remains in the wisest man some 
 ignorance of something connected with the case before him. 
 An ignorant understanding will, or at least may, lead to a false 
 or erroneous determination, though that determination be made 
 without anything approaching to compulsion. This is the fact, 
 and thus the will is free and not free: free, inasmuch as it acts 
 without compulsion ; not free, inasmuch as it acts in the dark. 
 It is not tied, and therefore it may go: but it is in some measure 
 blind, and therefore cannot be depended upon to go right. Hence 
 the petition of the psalmist, in which every true Christian will cor- 
 dially unite—ENLIGHTEN me, Ὁ Lord! Tracu me to do Thy will! 
 
 In further illustration of these statements, I refer to one of 
 the most distinguished of modern writers upon this subject: a 
 reverend brother in our national Established Church, to whose 
 clear exposition of Scripture on many points, and logical 
 arrangement of his practical deductions therefrom, I gladly 
 avow myself to be much and gratefully indebted. I mean the 
 Reverend George Stanley Faber, Master_of Sherburn Hospital, 
 and Prebendary of Salisbury. ‘ 
 
26 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Mr. Faber, in his work on the “ Primitive Doctrine of Elec- 
 tion,” writes as if the term election could have but one scriptural 
 meaning and application: and having ascertained what he con- 
 siders the primitive and true one, he concludes to his own satis- 
 faction, that every other is erroneous. He rejects, as alike 
 untenable, because alike comparatively modern, three several 
 systems. 
 
 (1.) The absolute election of individuals to eternal salvation. 
 This, although now very generally called by the name of Calvin, 
 he pronounces to be an invention of Augustine in the fifth cen- 
 tury (pp. 74, 75), and wholly opposed to the primitive doctrine. 
 It may be fairly questioned whether some of the citations 
 adduced by Mr. Faber in support of his own view, do not prove 
 that the early ecclesiastical writers advocated what Mr. Faber 
 condemns. His first testimony is that of Clement of Rome, 
 from whom he quotes the following amongst other passages 
 (pp. 292, 233) :— 
 
 Μακάριος ἀνὴρ & οὐ μὴ λογίσηται Κύριος ἁμαρτίαν' οὐδὲ 
 ἐστιν ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτοῦ δόλος. Οὗτος ὁ μακαρισμὸς ἐγένετο 
 ἐπὶ τοὺς ἐκλελεγμένους ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ" 
 Epis. ad Cor. i. § ὅ0, “ Blessed is the man to whom the Lord 
 shall not impute sin: neither is there craft in his mouth. This 
 blessing is upon those who have been elected by God through 
 Jesus Christ.” And again: Φησὶ yap ὁ ἐκλεκτὸς AaPid: 
 ᾿Εξομολογήσομαι τῷ Κυρίῳ. Ibid. i. § 52. “The elect David 
 saith : I will confess unto the Lord.” 
 
 In the former of these passages, the great primary and dis- 
 tinguishing blessing of Christianity, the non-imputation of sin, 
 is declared to belong to those, and by fair implication to those 
 only who have been elected by God, through Jesus Christ : and 
 in the latter, an individual is specified and called elect. 
 
 Mr. Faber’s second witness is Ignatius, the disciple of St. 
 John. From him the following passage is adduced (pp. 233, 
 234) :— 
 
 ᾿Ιγνάτιος, ὁ καὶ Θεοφόρος, τῇ ἐὐλογημένῃ ἐν μεγέθει Θεοῦ 
 Πατρὸς πληρώματι, τῇ προωρισμένῃ πρὸ αἰώνων διὰ παντὸς ἐις 
 δόξαν, παράμονον, ἄτρεπτον, ἡνωμένην, καὶ εκλελεγμένην, ἐν 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 27 
 
 
 
 πάθει, ἀληθινῷ, ἐν θελήματι tod Πατρὸς καὶ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
 τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡμῶν, τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ τῇ ἀξιομακαρίστῳ τῇ οὔση ἐν 
 ᾿Εφέσω τῆς ᾿Ασίας, πλεῖστα ἐν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστῷ καὶ ἐν ἀμώμῳ 
 χάριτι χαίρειν. Epis. ad Ephes. ὃ 1. “Ignatius, who is also 
 Theophorus, to the Church which is in Ephesus of Asia, de- 
 serving beatification, blessed in the greatness and fulness of God 
 the Father, ALWAYS PREDESTINATED BEFORE THE WORLDS TO 
 GLORY,’ —lI adopt Mr. Faber’s translation ; these capitals also are 
 his—“ that it should be permanent, and unchangeable, and united, 
 and ELECTED in true suffering, according to the will of the Father 
 and of Jesus Christ our God, wisheth most abundant joy in 
 Jesus Christ, and in blameless grace.” 
 
 Here, the Church addressed by Ignatius, is expressly described 
 as always predestinated before the worlds to glory—to glory! Yet 
 this is precisely what Mr. Faber denies, identifying election with 
 present ecclesiastical privileges, but not with glory or eternal 
 life. He says (p. 249), “The ideality of the word election, with 
 a Calvinist and an Arminian, is an election of certain indivi- 
 duals to eternal life ; for widely as they differ in their views of 
 the principle of causation, they equally make eternal life the im- 
 mediate and direct object, or purpose, or business of election. 
 But with the primitive Christians, anterior to the time of Augus- 
 tine, the ideality of the word election was an election of certain 
 individuals from all nations into the Church, with the object and 
 -intention, indeed, of their attaining to eternal life through the 
 powerful instrumentality of those means of grace which consti- 
 tuted their high ecclesiastical privileges ; but still, through sin and 
 perverseness, with a possibility of their not attaining to it: for, 
 with the primitive Christians, the immediate purpose or business of 
 election was not eternal life itself, but an entrance into the 
 visible Church, in order to a thus mediate attainment of eternal 
 life.” 
 
 I must confess that this statement, instead of being a legiti- 
 mate exposition of the words of Ignatius, appears to me to be in 
 direct opposition to them. It is laboured, and, to my mind, not 
 successfully—at once admitting and evading the truth. I do 
 not suppose for a moment that the writer designed any evasion ; 
 
 
 
 ~ 
 
28 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 yet the attempt here made to recognise a connexion between 
 election and eternal life, and still to deny any immediate or 
 necessary connexion, seems to me to avoid, rather than explain, 
 the real question at issue. I greatly prefer the simplicity of the 
 primitive father, who describes the Church as “always predes- 
 tinated before the worlds, to glory.” 
 
 The next primitive witness is Hermas, from* whom, after 
 giving several passages in which the holy Church and the elect 
 seem to be used as synonynis, Mr. Faber quotes the following 
 (Ὁ. 236) :— 
 
 “Alba autem pars superventuri est seculi, in quo habitabunt 
 electi Dei: quoniam immaculati et puri erunt electi Dei in 
 vitam zternam. Tu ergo ne desinas loqui hee auribus sanc- 
 torum.” (Herm. Past. lib. i. vis. 4, § 3.) Which he thus 
 translates : “The white part represents the age about to come, 
 in which shall dwell the elect of God : for the elect of God shall 
 be pure and immaculate to eternal life. Cease not thou, there- 
 fore, to speak these things in the ears of the saints.” 
 
 Here, again, election is distinctly declared to be unto eternal 
 life ; in verbal and pointed contradiction to Mr. Faber’s con- 
 clusion. He says (p. 247), “ By the Church of the elect they 
 (the primitive Christians) understood, not an invisible and mys- 
 tical Church, every member of which was irreversibly elected 
 and predestinated to eternal life, but the visible Church catholic, 
 which comprehended a mixture both of good and bad, and of 
 which the elect members might fall away to eternal perdition.” 
 Yet one of his own selected witnesses say plainly, “ The elect 
 of God shall be pure and immaculate to eternal life.” 
 
 This, be it observed, is not said in the way of exhortation, 
 describing what the elect of God ought to be, and must be, if 
 they would attain to eternal life: it is said in the way of pro- 
 phecy, describing the world to come in which the elect shall 
 dwell, and describing the elect as distinct from the men of this 
 world among whom they dwell at present. The section from 
 the beginning is thus translated by Archbishop Wake :— 
 
 “Then I asked her concerning the four colours which the 
 beast had upon its head. But she answered me, saying, ‘ Again 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 29 
 
 
 
 
 
 thou art curious in that thou askest concerning these things.’ 
 And I said unto her, ‘ Lady, show me what they are. ‘ Hear,’ 
 said she; ‘the black which thou sawest denotes the world in 
 which you dwell. The fiery and bloody colour signifies that 
 this age must be destroyed by fire and blood. The golden part 
 are ye who have escaped out of it ; for as gold is tried by fire, and 
 is made profitable, so also are ye in like manner tried who dwell 
 among the men of the world. They, therefore, that shall endure 
 to the end, and be proved by them, shall be purged. And as 
 gold by this trial is cleansed and loses its dross, so shall ye also 
 cast away all sorrow and trouble, and be made pure for the 
 building of the tower. But the white colour denotes the time 
 of the world which is to come, in which the elect of God shall 
 be pure and immaculate unto life eternal.’ ” 
 
 Τὸ is, 1 think, obvious that the writer of this, a Millennarian, 
 speaking of the expected kingdom of Christ as “the world to 
 come ” (see Heb. ii. 5), applies the term, elect of God, not to all 
 who profess the religion of Christ in this world, but only to 
 those who shall eventually dwell in the kingdom of Christ in 
 the world to come : in other words, not, as Mr. Faber concludes, 
 to the visible Church catholic, in virtue of her ecclesiastical 
 privileges, but only to those who through grace stand the trial, 
 and endure to the end. 
 
 (2.) The system of Arminianism is thus defined by Mr. 
 Faber : “The election of certain individuals, out of the great 
 mass of mankind, directly and immediately to eternal life : the 
 moving cause of that election being, God’s eternal prevision of 
 the future persevering holiness and consequent moral fitness of 
 the individuals themselves, who thence have been thus elected ” 
 (p. 14). And in a note afterwards, he says, “ Arminianism 
 makes the divinely foreseen holiness of particular individuals to 
 be the cause of their election” (p. 16). 
 
 This scheme he rejects as “a mere human invention, which, 
 haying been introduced subsequent to the original delivery of 
 the gospel, can only be deemed an authoritative adulteration ” 
 (p. 17). 
 
 I do not think that the cause of truth requires any defence of 
 
30 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 this scheme. Those who think otherwise, and deem the inquiry of 
 sufficient consequence, may endeavour to rescue it from Mr. 
 Faber’s historical condemnation." 
 
 (3.) The third system examined and rejected by Mr. Faber 
 
 1 The scheme, thus discarded by Mr. Faber, was advocated by Chrysostom 
 with his usual amplifying and sonorous eloquence: while the opposite scheme, 
 distinguished by Mr. Faber as Calvinistic, was advocated by Jerome. 
 
 Ἐνταῦθα πρός τοὺς λέγοντας, ὄτι οὐδὲν ἡ mloris ὠφελεῖ. καὶ ἀπιστοῦντας TH ἀθρόᾳ 
 μεταβολῇ. Καὶ ὅρα πῶς ταχέως αὐτοὺς ἐπεστόμισεν ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀξιώματος τοῦ ἐκλεξαμένου. 
 Καὶ οὐκ εἶπε, τὶς ἐγκαλέσει κατὰ τῶν δούλῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ, οὐδὲ κατὰ τῶν πιστῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ. 
 ἀλλὰ, Κατὰ τῶν ἐκλεκτῶν τοῦ Θεοῦ: ἣ γὰρ ἐκλογὴ ἀρετῆς σημεῖόν ἐστιν. Hi yap 
 ἐπειδὰν πωλοδάμνης πώλους ἐκλέξηται ἐπιτηδείους πρὸς τὸν δρόμον, οὐδεὶς ἐπισκῆψαι 
 δυνήσεται, ἀλλὰ καταγέλαστος ἔσται, κἂν ἐγκαλέσῃ Tis’ πολλῴ μᾶλλον ὅταν ὁ Θεὸς 
 ἐκλέγηται ψυχὰς; κ. τ. λ. 
 
 5 * * * * 
 
 Eldes πῶς οὐκ ἐπὶ τοὐ ᾿Αβραὰμ τοῦτο μόνον συμβαίνει. ἀλλὰ Kal ἐπ᾽ αὐτοῦ τοῦ παιδὸς, 
 καὶ πανταχοῦ πίστις καὶ ἀρετή ἐστιν ἣ διαλάμπουσα, καὶ τὴν ἀκριβῆ συγγένειαν 
 χαρακτηρίζουσα ; ᾿Εντεῦθεν γὰρ μανθάνομεν, ὅτι οὐ μόνον διὰ τὸν τρόπον τῆς γεννήσεως. 
 ἀλλὰ καὶ διὰ τὸ ἄξιοι εἶναι τῆς ἀρετῆς τοῦ γεγεννηκότος, οἱ παῖδες καλοῦνται παῖδες 
 ἐκείνου. El γὰρ ἀπὸ τοῦ τρόπου τῆς γεννήσεως μόνον, ἔδει καὶ τὸν Ἡσαῦ τῶν αὐτῶν 
 ἀπολαῦσαι τῷ ᾿Τακώβ' καὶ γὰρ καὶ οὗτος and νενεκρωμένης μήτρας ἣν, καὶ στεῖρα ἣν ἣ 
 μήτηρ abrév. ᾿Αλλ οὐ τοῦτο ἣν τὸ ζητούμενον μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ ὁ τρόπος, ὅπερ οὐ τὸ 
 τυχὸν καὶ εἰς βίου συμβάλλεται διδασκαλίαν ἡμῖν. Kat οὐ λέγει, ὅτι ἐπει δὴ ὁ μὲν 
 ἀγαθὸς, ὁ δὲ πονηρὸς, διὰ τοῦτο προετιμήηθη, ἵνα μὴ εὐθέως ἀντιπέσῃ αὐτῷ τούτο" τί 
 οὖν; ἀγαθοὶ οἱ ἐξ ἐθνῶν μαλλον, ἢ οἱ ἐκ περιτομῆς; Ei γὰρ καὶ οὕτῶς εἶχεν ἡ τοῦ 
 πράγματος ἀλήθεια, ἀλλ᾽ οὔπω αὐτὸ τίθησι: καὶ γὰρ ἐδόκει φορτικώτερον εἷναι" ἄλλ᾽ 
 ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ Θεοῦ γνῶσιν τὸ πᾶν ἔῤῥιψεν, ἥτινι μαχέσασθαι οὐδεὶς ἂν ἐτόλμησεν, οὐδὲ 
 εἰ σφόδρα μαινόμενος ἦν. Μήπω γὰρ γεννηθέντων, φησὶ, μηδὲ πραξάντων τι ἀγαθὸν, 
 ἐῤῥήθη αὐτῇ, ὅτι 'Ο μείζων δουλεύσει τῷ ἐλάσσονι" καὶ δεικνυσιν, ὅτι ἡ κατὰ σάρκα 
 εὑγένεια ὀὐδὲυ ὠθελεῖ, ἀμλὰ ψυχῆξ ἀρετὴν δεῖ ζητεῖν ἢν καὶ πρὸ τῶν ἔργων ὁ Θεὸς olde. 
 Μήπω γὰρ γεννηθέντων, φησὶ, μηδὲ πραξάντων τι ἀγαθὸν ἢ κακὸν, ἵνα ἡ κα τ᾽ ἐκλογὴν 
 πρόθεσις τοῦ Θερῦ μένῃ, ἐῤῥέθη αὐτῇ, ὅτι “Ο μείζων δουλεύσει τῷ ἐλάσσονι. 'Ῥοῦτο 
 yap προγνώσεως, τὸ καὶ ἐξ ὠδίνων αὐτῶν ἐκλέγεσθαι ἵνα φανῇ, φησὶ, τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡ 
 ἐκλογὴ ἡ κατὰ πρόθεσιν καὶ πρόγνωσιν γενομένη" ἐκ πρώτης γὰρ ἡμέρας καὶ τὸν ἀγαθὸν. 
 καὶ τὸν οὐ τοιουτον καὶ olde καὶ ἐκηρυξε; Μὴ τοίνυν μοι λέγε, ὅτι νόμον, φησὶν, ἀνέγνως 
 καὶ προφήτας. καὶ τοσοῦτον ἐδούλενσας χρόνον. ‘O γὰρ εἰδὼς ψυχὴν καὶ δοκιμάζειν, 
 οὗτος οἷδε καὶ τίς ἄξιός ἐστι σωθῆναι, κ. τ. X.—Chrysost., in Rom. viii. and ix, 
 
 “Quod autem electos nos, ut essemus sancti et immaculati coram ipso, hoe 
 est, Deo ante fabricam mundi testatus est, ad prescientiam Dei pertinet: cui 
 omnia futura jam facta sunt, et antequam fiant universa sunt nota. Sicut et 
 Paulus ipse preedestinatur in utero matris suze, et Jeremias in vulva sanctificatur, 
 eligitur, roboratur, et in typo Christis propheta gentibus mittitur.” 
 
 * * * * * 
 
 “ Quod autem est, ut essemus sancti et immaculati coram eo, inter sanctum 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 31 
 
 
 
 is what he calls Nationalism. His introductory description of it is 
 thus given : “ By the Nationalists, the idea of election is deter- 
 mined to be, the election of certain whole nations into the pale of the 
 visible Church catholic, which election, however, relates purely 
 to their privileged condition in this world, extending not to their 
 
 et immaculatum hoe interest, quod sanctus et immaculatus quoque intelligi 
 potest; immaculatus vero non statim et sanctus. Parvuli quippe immaculati 
 sunt, quia integro corpore nullum fecere peccatum, et tamen non sancti, quia 
 sanctitas voluntate et studio comparatur; et quod immaculatus dici potest ille 
 qui peccata non fecit ; sanctus autem is qui virtutibus plenus sit; juxta illud 
 quod in quodam Psalmo scribitur ‘qui ambulat sine macula, et operatur justitiam.’ 
 Kt in cantico canticorum, ‘ Tota speciosa es proxima mea, et macula non est in 
 Tes, 
 
 “Queritur quomodo, sanctus quis et immaculatus sit coram Deo, quum 
 propheta testetur, dicens, ‘Non justificabitur in conspectu tuo omnis vivens.’ 
 Aut enim sancti immaculati coram Deo Ephesii sunt, et falsum est hoc quod 
 dicitur—non justificabitur in conspectu tuo omnis vivens,—aut si nemo justifi- 
 catur in conspectu Dei, falsum est quod precessit, sanctos et immaculatos esse 
 in conspectu Dei. 
 
 “ Ad quod bifariam est respondendum : non enim ait Paulus: elegit nos ante 
 
 constitutionem mundi guwm essemus sancti et immaculati: sed eligit nos wt 
 essemus sancti et immaculati, hoc est, qui sancti et immaculati ante non fuimus, 
 ut postea essemus. Quod et de peccatoribus ad meliora conversis dici potest ; 
 et stabit illa sententia—non justificabitur in conspectu tuo omnis vivens—id est 
 in tota vita sua, in omni quo in mundo isto conversatus est tempore. Quod 
 quidem ita intellectum, et adversum eum facit qui ante quam mundus fieret, 
 animas dicit electas esse propter sanctitatem et nullum vitium peccatorum. 
 Non enim ut ante jam diximus, eleguntur Paulus, et qui ei similes sunt, quia 
 erant sancti et immaculati: sed eliguntur, et preedestinatur, ut in consequenti 
 vita, per opera atque virtutes, sancti et immaculati fiant. Deinde et sic sentien- 
 dum est, quia non dixerit—non justificabitur in conspectu suo quispiam vivens, 
 sed omnis vivens: id est, non justificabuntur omnes, justificabuntur vero aliqui.”» 
 —Jerome, in Eph. i. 4. 
 _ Thus, according to Chrysostom, God chooses His people as a charioteer does 
 his horses, on account of their foreseen qualifications for his service, as if those 
 qualifications originated in something else, independent of God’s purpose. 
 While, according to Jerome, the people of God are chosen in order to be 
 rendered (non quum essemus, sed ut essemus) suitable for His holy service; all 
 their qualifications being vesuits of that choice in order to its holy fulfilment ; 
 not original and independent causes of that choice. 
 
 In making this observation on these two celebrated fathers, I would be under- 
 stood as grounding it solely on the two above-cited passages. 1 do not pretend 
 to deny that counter-passages might be found in their writings, seeming to 
 place them respectively on the opposite sides. 
 
32 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 collective eternal state in another world. And the moving cause 
 of that election is pronounced to be, that same absolute good 
 pleasure of God, which, through the exercise of His sovereign 
 power, led Him to choose the posterity of Jacob rather than the 
 posterity of Esau, that upon earth they should become His 
 peculiar people, and be made the depositaries and preservers of 
 the true religion” (p. 20). 
 
 To this, as evolved into a regular system, Mr. Faber assigns 
 no higher antiquity than Mr. Locke ; and after a brief inquiry, 
 concludes thus concerning it: “ On the whole, for the general 
 reception, or even for the bare existence of the scheme of 
 Nationalism in the primitive Church, as I understand that 
 scheme to be developed by Mr. Locke, I am unable to discover 
 any evidence. What evidence we have is, in truth, hostile to 
 it. Therefore, like the scheme of Arminianism, I conceive that 
 it must be dismissed as a novelty, and thence (in the language 
 of Tertullian) as an adulteration ”’ (p. 29). 
 
 (4.) Having dismissed all these, Mr. Faber proceeds to give 
 his own view of what the primitive Christians taught. Who 
 will question his right—or, to speak more properly, his duty— 
 to exercise and express his private judgment on the teaching of 
 antiquity ? And who can claim, for the conclusion he comes to, 
 any higher authority than his private judgment? I feel assured 
 that Mr. Faber would be among the last to be guilty of the 
 petitio principii of asserting that any of his brethren, in opposing 
 his view of the teaching of the primitive Church, were therefore 
 opposing the voice of antiquity. 
 
 He says (pp. 222, 223), “ As contradistinguished both from 
 the doctrine of Calvinistic Election, from the more plausible 
 doctrine of Arminian Election, and from the present (I believe) 
 somewhat popular doctrine of National Election, the primitive 
 Christians, anterior to the time of Augustine, held, in point of 
 ideality, the doctrine of an election of certain individuals out of 
 all nations into the pale of the visible Church, with the merciful 
 purpose and intention, on God’s part, that through faith and 
 holiness they should attain to everlasting life ; but (since the 
 immediate notion of their election respected only an admission 
 
The Church of God tn Christ. 33 
 
 into the Church, not an admission into heaven) with a possibility, 
 through their own perverseness, of their not making their call- 
 ing and election sure, and of thus failing to obtain the condition- 
 ally promised reward.” 
 
 That such teaching as is here described may be found in the 
 extant writings of some of the primitive Christians, I feel no 
 disposition to question ; but that the statement here made, and 
 elaborately made, contains an adequate description of all the 
 
 teaching of the primitive Christians upon this subject, may, I 
 hope, be questioned without any presumption. 
 
 I have already assigned some reasons, derived from the lan- 
 guage of Mr. Faber’s own chosen witnesses, for demurring 
 against his conclusions, as an adequate exposition of their senti- 
 ments. And I have now to notice that Mr. Faber himself 
 seems to feel that his conclusion does not embrace the whole 
 subject. 
 
 Having referred to the Jewish people as a sample of what he 
 calls ecclesiastical individual election, he perceived that their 
 ecclesiasticism became identified with nationalism, at least in its 
 extent. Then he writes (p. 292), “ Henceforth, ALL the descend- 
 ants of Israel were severally elected into the Levitical Church, 
 while the great mass of mankind was left in the darkness of 
 pagan error ; and the consequence was, that the title of God’s 
 chosen people became the property, not of a few Israelites only 
 as contradistinguished from the main body of the Israelites, but 
 of all the Israelites collectively as contradistinguished from the 
 great body of the Gentiles who had not been thus elected.” 
 
 Doubtless the Jewish people collectively—that is, the whole 
 nation—are again and again called the chosen people of God ; 
 and this is one undeniable scriptural application of the term 
 election. But it is not the only one. Mr. Faber seems to have 
 felt this, and betrays a consciousness of the disturbing force 
 upon his theory, of the language of the apostle, which separates 
 Jews from Jews, and gives the title of an election of grace to a 
 “few Israelites as contradistinguished from the main body of 
 the Israelites.’’ Instead, however, of recognising this inner and 
 closer application of election (equally apostolical with the other), 
 
 3 
 
34 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Mr. Faber endeavours to parry the intrusion by appending the 
 following note :— 
 
 “ This view of the matter, depending simply upon facts, is not 
 at all affected by these passages, which justly distinguish, in 
 regard to their individual state and character, between the holy 
 and unholy of the generically elected house of Israel. With 
 reference to God’s general decree of election, all the Israelites 
 collectively are, again and again, denominated God’s chosen 
 people; though spiritually, and with reference to individual 
 character, as the apostle assures us, and as common sense itself 
 requires, he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, and they are not 
 all Israel which are of Israel (Rom. ii. 28; ix. 6). Nevertheless, 
 the fact still remains unimpeached, that the whole house of 
 Israel is designated by the title of the chosen people of the Lord” 
 (p. 292). 
 
 This fact is not denied; but another is equally asserted ; 
 namely, that St. Paul does what Mr. Faber seems determined 
 not to do: he applies the terms elect and election, not only 
 unto all the Israelites collectively as contradistinguished from 
 the Gentiles, but also to a few Israelites only, as distinguished 
 from the remainder of their own nation. Of course, this latter 
 application of the terms is in a different sense from the former. 
 Mr. Faber recognises the difference between the house of Israel 
 “ generically,” and certain individuals within that house con- 
 sidered “ spiritually and with reference to individual character.” 
 Of this, he says, the apostle assures us; and he adds, “ common 
 sense itself requires it.” It is of much importance, I think, to 
 add further, that the apostle plainly and pointedly calls those 
 spiritual individuals “the election.” He refers to a remarkable 
 period in the history of the house of Israel—the days of Elias 
 the prophet—when these spiritual individuals, not to be distin- 
 guished from those around them by men, not even by the in- 
 spired prophet, but known unto God, who had by His secret 
 grace reserved them to Himself, amounted to seven thousand. 
 Then applying the reference to his own times, he says, “ Even 
 so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to 
 the election of grace.... What then? Israel hath not obtained 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 35 
 
 that which he seeketh for : but the election hath obtained it, and 
 the rest were blinded” (Rom. xi. 5, 7). 
 
 With this explanation, I can very cordially coincide in Mr. 
 Faber’s general conclusion, that “ the view of election taken by 
 the primitive Christian Church, perfectly corresponds with the 
 doctrine of election as exhibited in the Old Testament” (p. 293). 
 The doctrine of election, as exhibited in the Old Testament, is 
 twofold—first, a collective election to ecclesiastical privileges, 
 including all the circumcised, as distinguished from the Gentiles ; 
 and secondly, an individual election to eternal life, including 
 those whom God reserved to Himself by special grace, as distin- 
 guished from the rest of the circumcised nation. To this cor- 
 responds the view of election taken by the apostles, and by the 
 primitive Christian Church—viz., first, a collective election to 
 ecclesiastical privileges, including all the baptized as distinguished 
 from the heathen ; and secondly, an individual election to eternal 
 life, including those whom God “hath constantly decreed by 
 His counsel secret to us, to bring by Christ to everlasting salva- 
 tion,” as distinguished from the rest of the baptized nations. 
 
 Under the Old Testament, “all were not Israel who were of 
 Israel.” There were two Israels. The one—national and visible, 
 including subdivisions of Pharisees and Sadducees, who differed 
 in many things one from another, but were identical in this, 
 that they were all separated openly and avowedly from the 
 Gentiles by the ordinance of circumcision. 
 
 The other—personal and spiritual, not certainly distinguish- 
 able by men, but seen and known of God, who had in special 
 grace circumcised their hearts, as well as their flesh. 
 
 Under the New Testament, all are not Christ’s who are of 
 Christendom. There are two Churches. 
 
 _ The one—collective and visible, including many subdivisions, 
 
 who differ in many things one from another, but are identical 
 in this, that they are all separated openly and avowedly from all 
 the rest of mankind by the ordinance of baptism. These are the 
 churches of Christ visible and militant here on earth; and the 
 aggregate of them all, at any one time, is the visible Church 
 catholic. 
 
36 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 The other—personal and spiritual, scattered among the bap- 
 tized communities, not certainly distinguishable by men, but 
 seen and known of God, who has, in spiritual grace, baptized 
 their hearts, making them “ new creatures” in Christ Jesus. 
 This is the Church of God in Christ; and the true ideal of its 
 catholicity ranges not only throughout the aggregate of visible 
 churches at any time, but also throughout the history of them 
 all, at all times: from the distinction between Abel and Cain, 
 till the separation between believer and unbeliever, at the second 
 coming of the Son of man. 
 
 In the spiritual sense here referred to, which I hope has been 
 satisfactorily shown to be one—not the only one, but I think 
 undeniably one—of its true scriptural senses, THE CHURCH 
 signifies the special election of God out of all the churches, 
 including in one aggregate all the men, women, and children, 
 from among all mankind who. have been and who shall be 
 saved. These were all chosen of God in Christ before the 
 foundation of the world, or as Ignatius expressed it “ predesti- 
 nated before the worlds;to glory.” 
 
 Concerning some of these St. Paul writes in language 
 applicable to them all ; for the body is one: “ Blessed be the 
 (tod and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed 
 us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ : 
 according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of 
 the world, that we should be holy and without blame before 
 Him in love: having predestinated us into the adoption of 
 children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good 
 pleasure of His will” (Eph. 1. 83—5), 
 
 Now, what has the Church catholic said upon these words ? 
 Anything to’ prevent our attempting to understand them as we 
 would any other“words, in the exercise of the intellectual and 
 ioral powers ‘of our common nature, and the spiritual teaching 
 of our common Christianity ? If we must wait for a unanimous 
 consent of the Fathers, and not presume to interpret Scripture 
 bat in accordance with that consent, we must render this, in 
 common with other portions of the same word, practically 
 useless ; and:if we interpret in agreement with some Fathers, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 37 
 
 and in opposition to others, we must exercise our private judge- 
 ment. 
 
 Clearly we must ; and what then shall we say on the words 
 before us? St. Paul, writing to the Christian believers at 
 Ephesus, expresses his thanksgivings to God for the spiritual 
 blessings bestowed upon himself and his converts. Those 
 blessings, he says, God had given them in Christ. And not 
 content with this statement, he proceeds with the sublime 
 announcement, that the blessings so given were given in 
 accordance with a design that it should be so: a design 
 existing in the mind of God before the foundation of the world. 
 The apostle’s statement is not merely that before the foundation 
 of the world God designed to send His Son Jesus Christ into 
 the world ; this is true, as written by St, Peter, “ Jesus Christ, 
 as a lamb without blemish and without spot, was verily fore- 
 ordained before the foundation of the world” (1 Peter i. 19, 20). 
 But the statement now before us is that God had chosen them 
 —them, Paul the Jewish writer of the epistle, and the Chris- 
 tians at Ephesus, the Gentile receivers of the epistle—them as 
 individuals. What other conceivable meaning can be fairly put 
 upon Us in this passage? When a man, writing to two or 
 more friends or acquaintances, says US, who can he mean but 
 himself and them? And as his language leaves no reasonable 
 doubt as to the persons he intended, so also it is explicit as to 
 the nature of the blessings designed for them. He does not say 
 that God had chosen them that they should hear His word, but 
 that they should be holy and without blame before Him in love. 
 He does not say that God had predestinated them to the privi- 
 lege of having the means of grace, but to the adoption of chil- 
 dren. 
 
 The distinction here marked is deserving of the more careful 
 attention, because the opponents of this doctrine, (viz., the 
 election of individuals to salvation,) finding the words elect and 
 election in frequent use by the sacred writers, and being of 
 course compelled to assign some meaning to them, have en- 
 deayoured to show that the election so spoken of in the Scrip- 
 ture is an election to religious privileges in the present life, not 
 
38 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 to eternal happiness in the next. In this sense the Jewish 
 nation are admitted to have been the elect people of God, 
 because to them were given religious privileges such as no other 
 nation enjoyed. But when the Lord commanded His apostles 
 to carry the gospel to all nations, then the Gentiles also became 
 the elect people of God, being called to the enjoyment of equal 
 or even superior religious privileges. 
 
 One of the most amiable of modern controversialists, whose 
 name I cannot recall without affection, and to whose book 
 (although compelled to differ trom it) I cannot refer without 
 respect, writes thus: “I am very far from denying that many 
 passages of Scripture show that the supreme God, the moral 
 Governor of the world, following the dictates of His own free 
 choice, and the counsels of His unfathomable wisdom, justice, 
 and mercy, has conferred, and still confers, on different nations, 
 or collective bodies of men, and consequently on the individuals 
 of which they are composed, greater degrees of moral and 
 religious advantages than those which He has conferred upon 
 others ; advantages which, if improved aright, are calculated to 
 send the individuals possessed of them to higher exaltation in a 
 future world than those who are not possessed of them ; and in 
 this sense each individual may truly be said to be called or 
 elected, while others, to whom these advantages are not extended, 
 may be said to be comparatively excluded or rejected ; and as 
 this admission or exclusion must take place according to the 
 predetermination of God, and the final orders of His providential © 
 dispensations, they may be said to be predestined or decreed ; 
 but due attention to the doctrine of the Scripture on this subject 
 will prove that the election implies no security of unconditional 
 salvation to the elect.”’* 
 
 Then, having applied this principle to the Jews in their 
 enjoyment of their peculiar distinctions, the writer adds, “True 
 it is, the selection of any particular family for such a purpose 
 must have been to them a gift of free unmerited grace, and to 
 the rest of mankind must have exhibited the appearance of 
 exclusion and comparative rejection; hence it sometimes is 
 
 " Graves on Predestinat'on, pp, 280, 281. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 39 
 
 spoken of in terms easily misunderstood and misinterpreted, but 
 this election referred to religious privileges in the present life, 
 not to eternal happiness in the next.”’? 
 
 And again, “ This extension to all nations of the privileges 
 which the chosen people hitherto had almost exclusively enjoyed, 
 combined with the rejection of the Jews for their obstinate 
 incredulity, is dwelt on by the great apostle of the Gentiles, 
 who was the most effective agent in this ministry, with singular 
 emphasis, as a distinguished era in the dispensations of Provi- 
 dence, a wonderful and mysterious display of divine wisdom 
 and energy, which those to whom this new calling and election 
 was extended should receive with the most prompt submission 
 and the most heartfelt gratitude.” ? 
 
 It would be easy to multiply citations from this and similar 
 works, wherein this view of the subject is largely and elaborately 
 defended, but enough has been transcribed to set it with fairness 
 and candour before the minds of my readers. 
 
 I have no intention or wish to dispute the general statements 
 contained in these quotations, or to deny that they express a 
 scriptural truth; but I am compelled. to feel that there is 
 another truth revealed in Scripture which they do not express, 
 but rather reject. 
 
 Our Lord Jesus Christ, inviting attention to a combined view 
 of the dispensations of God, with especial reference to religious 
 privileges, and passing, on the easy narrative of a parable, from 
 what was history when He spoke to what was then prophecy, 
 but has since become history in the calling of the Gentiles, 
 describes the called under a variety of characters, both good 
 and bad ; and, instead of identifying the called with the elect, 
 as the above quotations do, concludes His startling description 
 of the final separation among them, with the well-known words, 
 ““ For many are called, but few are chosen.” All to whom the 
 servants carried the invitation were called, and are described as 
 guests among whom the king’s servants were not competent 
 accurately to distinguish ; but the king himself distinguishes, 
 and orders one of the called to be cast into outer darkness, 
 
 ' Graves on Predestination, p. 289, % Ibid., p. 312, 
 
40 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 where shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth; and then he 
 adds, “For many are called, but few are chosen.”+ How is 
 this to be harmonised with the interpretation which limits the 
 scriptural meaning of election to religious privileges in the 
 present life, and denies its application to eternal happiness in 
 the next? 
 
 All the “called” are chosen to religious privileges. This is 
 not denied. But some among them are “ chosen” to something 
 more, or our Lord’s distinction has no force of application. 
 
 If it be alleged that all the called were equally chosen at the 
 time, but that some only availed themselves of their oppor- 
 tunities \so as to improve them to salvation, while others so 
 neglected them as to incur ruin, I answer, that to mark such a. 
 distinction as this, our Lord’s words are inappropriate. Had 
 this been His meaning, He should have said, ‘ For many are 
 called and chosen, but few are saved ;’ what He did say, how- 
 ever, was very different, “ Many are called, but few are 
 chosen.” 
 
 On another occasion, when speaking of Himself as the good 
 shepherd, and the members of His Church, His chosen ones, as 
 His sheep, He said to the Jews who surrounded Him, “I told 
 you, and ye believed not: the works that I do in my Father's 
 name, they bear witness of me. But ye believe not, because ye 
 are not of my sheep, as I said unto you.” The persons so ad- 
 dressed were called to the enjoyment of religious privileges in 
 the present life ; they heard the words and saw the works of 
 the Son of God ; yet they believed not, because they were not: 
 of His sheep. Thus a distinction is marked between some who 
 were in the enjoyment of religious privileges, and His sheep. 
 Whom, then, are we to understand by His sheep? He continued, 
 “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow 
 me ; and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never 
 perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My 
 Father which gave them me is greater than all ; and no man is 
 able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. I and my Father 
 are one” (John x. 24—30). Surely these words were intended. 
 
 1 Matt. xxii. 1—14,. 
 
Lhe Church of God in Christ. 41 
 
 
 
 
 
 to express, concerning these persons, something more than their 
 election to religious privileges in the present life. Do they not, 
 with a plainness difficult to be evaded, declare their eternal 
 election by God the Father, who gave them to Jesus, and their 
 eternal salvation by Jesus, who says, “ I give unto them eternal 
 life, and they shall never perish”? If anything can add to the 
 force of such language, it is the contrast between it and what 
 He says at the same time to persons who were, equally with 
 His sheep, in the enjoyment of religious privileges in this life, 
 “ Ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep.” 
 
 To the same purpose He said again to the Jews who possessed 
 the Scriptures and other religious privileges, “ Search the Scrip- 
 tures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are 
 they which testify of me: and ye will not come to me that ye 
 might have life.”* And in contrast with this, He said, “ All 
 that the Father giveth to me shall come to me, and him that 
 cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” And reiterating the- 
 remarkable truth of the Father’s gift of some to Him, as a 
 thing essentially different from the possession of religious: 
 privileges, and as inseparably connected with widely different 
 results, He said, “ This is the Father’s will which hath sent me, 
 that of all which He hath given me I should lose nothing, but. 
 should raise it up again at the last day.”* And again, “ Glorify 
 Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee; as Thou hast. 
 given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life’” 
 —(He says not, to all who receive and improve religious privi-- 
 leges, but) “to as many as Thou hast given Him.” 4 
 
 To the Christians at Thessalonica, St. Paul addresses similar 
 language. Distinguishing between the means of grace, and. 
 grace itself, he says, “Our gospel came not unto you im 
 word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost and. 
 in much assurance.” In word it had come to them in 
 common with-all their fellow-citizens: to many it had come in 
 word only ; but to them it had come not in word only, but 
 also in power. The nature of the power is specified ; it had 
 
 1 John vy. 39, 40. * John vi. 39. 
 * John vi. 87. « John xvii; 1; 2. 
 
42 The Church and the Churches. 
 come in the Holy Ghost. The effect of such power is described ; 
 it produced much assurance. And all this, connected with 
 his conviction that the blessing so bestowed upon them was in 
 pursuance of God’s electing love towards them. “ Knowing, 
 brethren beloved, your election of God” (1 Thess. i. 4,5). In 
 his second epistle to the same Church he says, “ We are bound 
 to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the 
 Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to sal- 
 vation,’ through sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the 
 truth : whereunto he called you by our gospel, to the obtain- 
 ing of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”? But all who 
 were chosen to the hearing of the word, were not “chosen to 
 salvation :” for to many the gospel came “in word only,” as 
 distinguished from its saving power ;* and concerning these we 
 read (Acts xvii. 1—8), that instead of believing what they heard, 
 and consorting with Paul and Silas, they abused to their own 
 ruin the same religious privilege, by means of which the elect 
 from among them were saved : they rejected and resisted the 
 word, and stirred up a violent opposition against the apostles. 
 Among the Jews, God’s chosen nation, who were all called to 
 
 
 
 *“*God hath chosen you from the beginning, His election is sure for ever. 
 The Lord knoweth who are His. You shall not be deceived by the power and 
 ‘subtlety of Antichrist: you shall not fall from grace; you shall not perish. 
 This is the comfort which abideth with the faithful when they behold the fall 
 of the wicked ; when they see them forsake the truth, and delight in fables ; 
 when they see them return to their vomit, and wallow again in the mire.’”— 
 Bishop Jowell, on 2 Thess. in loco, 
 
 * 2 Thess, ii, 13, 14. 
 
 * “ The words of the preacher enter in at the ear; the Spirit of God conveyeth 
 them into the heart. Augustine saith, ‘The gospel is declared ; some there are 
 which believe ; some there are which believe not : they which believe hear it in- 
 wardly by the Father, and so learn it ; they which believe not, hear it only with 
 their outward sense, and not with inward feeling, and therefore learn it not.’ As 
 much as to say, to them it is given to believe; to the other it is not given. In the 
 Acts of the Apostles (xvi.), Lydia,a woman of the city of Thyatira, heard the 
 preaching of the apostle Paul, (but it is said) whose heart the Lord opened, that 
 she attended to the things that Paul spake. The people which said unto Peter 
 and the other apostles, ‘Men and brethren, what shall we do?’ did hear all the 
 words of Peter; but they had another teacher, that gave force unto the word, 
 and made it faithful to them, and therefore it is said, ‘ They were pricked in 
 their hearts.’ ”—Dishop Jewell, 1 Thess, i. 5. 
 
The Church of God in. Christ. 43 
 
 the special enjoyment of religious privileges in the present life, 
 there was—as has been, I think, already proved—an election 
 altogether distinct from the bulk of the nation ; there was an 
 Israel elect unto salvation, in the midst of an Israel elect unto 
 religious privileges. All were not Israel in the one sense, who 
 were of Israel in the other. It was so in the days of Elijah the 
 prophet, when—amidst the idolatrous nation—the remnant, 
 according to the election of grace, consisting of seven thousand 
 men, were kept by the secret power of God from bowing the 
 knee to the image of Baal. It was so in the days of St. Paul, 
 when on the eve of the apostasy of the nation, a remnant ac- 
 cording to the election of grace, including the apostles, the three 
 thousand converted on the day of Pentecost, and we know not 
 how many more, were quickened from death unto life, and made 
 the mustard-seed of the Christian Church. It was so among 
 the Gentiles where the gospel was preached, at Hphesus, at 
 Corinth, at Thessalonica, at Rome, “Some believed the things 
 which were spoken, and some believed them not,” and “as many 
 as were ordained to eternal life believed ;”’! and for as many as 
 believed, the apostles gave thanks, because God had from the 
 beginning chosen them to salvation.” It has continued so, and it 
 is so this day, in every place where the gospel is preached. To 
 some it comes in word only, and their characters and pursuits 
 continue substantially what they were ; to others (of the same 
 family very often) it comes in power also, and in the Holy 
 Ghost, and in much assurance, and their characters and pursuits 
 are altered. A separation is effected, and the Lord’s prediction 
 is fulfilled ; “ Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on 
 earth? I tell you, Nay ; but rather division : for from hence- 
 forth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, 
 and two against three,” etc. (Luke xii. 51—53). 
 
 And thus it must continue, as long as the Scriptures con- 
 tinue to be truly descriptive of Christ's Church,—that is, until 
 He shall “ accomplish the number of His elect, and hasten His 
 kingdom.” 
 
 
 
 1 Rom. ix. 6, and xi, 1—5; Acts xiii, 48, and xxviii. 24. 
 2 2 Thess, ii. 13. 
 
44 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 The aggregate of the elect, from the first and to the last, 
 inclusive, is the Church of God in Christ. “The Church,” says 
 Bishop Jewell, “ heareth the voice of the Shepherd ; it will not 
 follow a stranger, but flieth from him, for it knoweth not the 
 voice of strangers. It is the pillar of the truth, the body, the 
 fulness, and the spouse of Christ; it is the vine, the house, 
 the city, and the kingdom of God; they which dwell in it 
 are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens 
 with the saints, and of the household of God, and are built 
 upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ 
 Himself being the head corner-stone, in whom all the building, 
 coupled together, groweth into an holy temple in the Lord. 
 ‘This church Christ loved, and gave Himself for it, that He 
 might sanctify it, and cleanse it by the washing of water throug]: 
 the word, that He might make it unto Himself a glorious 
 church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that 
 it should be holy and without blame’ (Eph. v.) Such a Church 
 was the Church of God at Thessalonica. Such a Church are 
 they, whosoever in any place of the world truly fear the Lord 
 and call upon His name.” 1 
 
 This is a fruitful theme with the sacred writers, presented 
 under a great variety of figures, while onr Lord Jesus Christ 
 Himself is presented under corresponding figures. Thus, when 
 we read of the vine and the branches, the bridegroom and the 
 bride, the husband and the wife, the head and the body, the 
 shepherd and the sheep,—under all this variety of figurative 
 language we are reading one and the same truth. That truth 
 is the unchangeable relationship which exists according to the 
 eternal purpose of God the Father, between Jesus Christ, God 
 manifest in the flesh, ahd the whole company of the elect, the 
 faithful, the saints, the Church, or by whatever other name 
 those persons, considered in the aggregate, may be called, who 
 are chosen of God in Christ out of mankind, and predestinated 
 to everlasting salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit, 
 and belief of the truth, working by love. 
 
 Concerning this body, our reformers taught, and our Church 
 
 ' Jewell on 1 Thess, i. 1. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 45 
 
 
 
 adopted, and we have subscribed, thus, “ Predestination to life 
 is the everlasting purpose of God, whereby (before the founda- 
 tions of the world were laid) He hath constantly decreed, by 
 His counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation 
 ‘hose whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to 
 Dring them by Christ to everlasting salvation, as vessels made 
 to honour. Wherefore they which be endued with so excellent 
 2 benefit of God be called according to God’s purpose, by His - 
 Spirit working in due season; they through grace obey the 
 <alling ; they be justified freely ; they be made sons of God by 
 adoption; they be made like the image of His only-begotten 
 Son Jesus Christ; they walk religiously in good works, and at 
 length by God’s mercy they attain to everlasting felicity,” (Art. 
 XVii.) 
 
 In contemplating more closely and clearly the constituent 
 parts of the Church of God in Christ, it is necessary to dis- 
 tinguish between the purpose of God as it exists in His mind, 
 and the performances of God as they are progressively developed 
 in His providence. 
 
 In the purpose of God there is no succession, no variableness 
 or shadow of turning. All is perfect. All was always perfect. 
 All that shall stand forth as perfected performance throughout 
 «ternity to come, is nothing more than a true and faithful echo 
 or reflection of what was perfectly purposed from eternity past. 
 No new thing can arise; not a movement of an insect or an 
 atom. If the smallest fraction of any occurrence ‘of any kind 
 he unprovided for, it might happen to jostle against and disturb 
 the whole framework. And therefore it has been well said, that 
 if “anything be contingent, nothing can be certain.” It follows 
 irresistibly, that if anything be certain, nothing can be con- 
 tingent with God. Jehovah can never in anything be surprised; 
 “* He is God, and there is none like Him, declaring the end from 
 the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not 
 yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my 
 pleasure ”* (Isa. xlvi. 9, 10). Considered in the divine purpose, 
 
 * “ ΑἹ] things which God in their times and seasons hath brought forth, were 
 eternally and before all times in God, as a work unbegun is in the artificer who 
 
46 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 therefore, Christ and His Church are perfect. He was set up 
 in all His mystical fulness from eternity, and the union of each 
 member in Him, unto the accomplishment of them all, belongs 
 to the selfsame determinate counsel and foreknowledge by which 
 the Head was delivered into wicked hands, crucified, and raised 
 again from the dead (Acts ii. 23, 24). 
 
 But in the performances of God among men there is progress. 
 These are imperfect—that is, anfimisheds and being unrevealec 
 in their details as regards times and persons, iho. are invested 
 with all the practical elements of uncertainty, and all the prac- 
 tical results of responsibility, to the mind and conduct of every 
 
 afterwards bringeth it unto effect. Therefore whatsoever we do behold now, in 
 this present world, it was inwrapped within the bowels of divine mercy, written 
 in the book of eternal wisdom, and held in the hands of omnipotent power, the 
 first foundation of the world being as yet unlaid. So that all things which God _ 
 hath made are in that respect the offspring of God; they are in Him as effects 
 in their highest cause; He likewise actually is in them, the assistance and in- 
 fluence of His deity is their life. Let hereunto saving efficacy be added, and it 
 bringeth forth a special offspring amongst men, containing them, to whom God 
 hath Himself given the generous and amiable name of sons, We are by nature 
 the sons of Adam. When God created Adam, He created us; and as many as 
 are descended from Adam, have in themselves the root out of which they spring. 
 The sons of God we neither are all, nor any one of us, otherwise than only by 
 grace and favour. The sons of God have God’s own Son, as a second Adam 
 from heaven, whose race and progeny they are by spiritual and heavenly birth. 
 God, therefore, loving eternally His Son, He must needs eternally in Him have 
 loved and preferred before all others them which are since spiritually descended 
 and spring out of Him, These were in God, as in their Saviour, and not as ip 
 their Creator only. It was the purpose of His saving goodness, His saving wis- 
 dom, and His saving power, which inclined itself towards them. They which 
 were thus in God eternally by their intended admission to life, have, by vocation 
 or adoption, God actually now in them, as the artificer is in the work which his 
 hand doth presently frame. Life, as all other gifts and benefits, groweth origi- 
 nally from the Father, and cometh not to us but by the Son; nor by the Son to 
 any of us in particular, but through the Spirit. For this cause the apostle 
 wisheth to the Church of Corinth the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the 
 love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost. Which three St. Peter 
 comprehendeth in one, the partieipation of the divine nature. We are there_ 
 fore in God, through Christ, eternally, according to that intent and purpose 
 whereby we are chosen to be made His in this present world, before the worl 
 itself was made. We are in God, through the knowledge which is had of us, 
 and the love which is borne towards us from everlasting.” —ZZooker, Eccl, Pol.. 
 b. v., sec, 56. 
 
 ΄ 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 47 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 man. The theory of them, however, in the aggregate, as far as 
 the Church of God in Christ is concerned, is revealed. And 
 being revealed, it presents itself to every true Christian with all 
 the unchangeable certainty which belongs to the great revealer, 
 the faithful and true God, who keepeth His promise for ever. 
 
 To have clear views of the constituent parts of the Church of 
 God in Christ, we must contemplate them with reference to this 
 progress of God’s performances among men, and this revealed 
 promise that the progress shall not be interrupted till the pur- 
 pose be completely performed. Thus viewed, the body of Christ 
 may be said to consist of four distinct classes. 
 
 The first class consists of those who have fallen asleep in 
 Jesus, whose bodies have returned to dust, and whose spirits, 
 the spirits of just men made perfect, being delivered from the 
 burden of the flesh, are “present with the Lord” in joy and 
 felicity. The second class consists of those on the earth, in all 
 climes and nations, who are quickened into spiritual life by 
 divine grace, in whom the Holy Spirit dwells and acts, who 
 trust in Jesus, and walk with God, not by sight, but by faith. 
 These are what we understand by real Christians. The third 
 class consists of those on the earth, in all climes and nations,’ 
 who are foreordained of God to be converted into real Christians 
 at His appointed time, but who are not yet effectually called 
 and quickened into spiritual life. These may be appropriately 
 designated elect to be saints, though as yet unconverted sinners. 
 At the time of Stephen’s martyrdom, Saul of Tarsus belonged 
 to this third class: he was a chosen vessel of grace, though as 
 yet in point of fact an unconverted sinner. Afterwards, as he 
 went to Damascus, he was transferred into the second class: he 
 became a real Christian. The fourth class consists of those who 
 are not yet born into this world, but are foreseen of God in the 
 loins of their parents, or their parents’ parents, and foreordained 
 to be born, and in due time to be “ born again.” 
 
 These all, viewed in the aggregate, constitute the catholicity 
 of the Church of God, extending over all the ages of the world’s 
 history, and all the countries of the world’s geography. This is 
 the only true and genuine catholicity. There cannot be a more 
 
48 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 egregious misnomer than the application of that expression to a 
 section of the whole, limited in its extent, and temporary in its 
 duration. The Church of God existed on earth, and members 
 of it were translated to heaven during successive generations, 
 for above four thousand years, before there was the name or 
 thought of a Church in either Italy or England. And at this 
 moment there are multitudes of members of it, who are utter 
 strangers to both Rome and Canterbury. How, then, can any 
 one, with common regard to accuracy of language, apply the 
 term “ Catholic” to either the Latin or the English Church? 
 How, indeed, except in the way of accommodation, to any Church, 
 or combination of Churches, at any one time upon earth? 
 
 In the way of accommodation it is commonly applied to the 
 general society of those who at any one time profess the faith of 
 Christ “throughout all the world.” Thus Bishop Pearson? 
 says, “The most obvious and most general notion of this 
 catholicism consisteth in the diffusiveness of the Church.” In 
 this sense it includes “all who in every place call upon the 
 name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours” (1 Cor. 
 i. 2), and therefore Greeks, Moravians, Waldenses, Lutherans, 
 Zuinglians, Scots, and Americans, as well as Romans and 
 Anglicans. Differences in proportions of numbers constitute no 
 difference in principle ; and while all these varieties exist in the 
 general society of those who profess the faith of Christ, it is 
 plainly an unwarrantable usurpation in any one of them to 
 arrogate a title which by implication absorbes all the rest. 
 ‘The Zuinglians said well in their Helvetic Confession, “ There is 
 -only one Church, which we therefore call catholic, because it is 
 universal, and diffused through all parts of the world, and 
 extends to all times, being included within no particular locali- 
 ties or ages. Therefore we condemn the Donatists, who 
 restricted the Church to some corners of Africa ; nor do we 
 approve the Roman clergy, who vaunt of the Roman Church 
 -alone as the catholic.” ® The former part of this passage, taken 
 
 1 This will be proved in the next chapter. ? On the Creed. 
 3. “ Consequitur unam duntaxat esse ecclesiam: quam propterea catholicam 
 muncupamus, quod sit universalis, et diffundatur per omnes mundi partes, οἱ ad 
 
᾿ 
 
 The Church of God in Christ. | 49 
 
 
 
 y+ -- a 
 
 absolutely to include all ages as well as all parts of the world, 
 does indeed describe the genuine catholicity of the Church of 
 God, the body of Christ. ; 
 
 The apostle Paul having declared the resurrection and 
 exaltation of Christ by the power of God, adds, that God 
 gave Him (Christ) to be head over all things to the Church, 
 which is His body ; and then, in an amplifying description of 
 that body, he includes all the foreordained members thereof, 
 from the first to the last, calling it “the fulness of Him who 
 filleth all in all;’’? the fulness, mystically speaking, of Him 
 whose human nature is the head of the body, and who in 
 his Godhead filleth all in all. Christ considered in the purpose 
 of God is not alone. He is “the first-born of many brethren,’’” 
 the Head of a body consisting of many members. The aggregate 
 of these members constitutes the fulness of the whole body. 
 “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the ' 
 members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also 
 is Christ’ (1 Cor. xii. 12). So long as any of these members 
 are absent, (not. yet born, or not yet born again,) there remains 
 a degree of imperfection, ἴ.6., of what may in contrast be called 
 emptiness about the body. Thus the Church, in the sense here 
 described, is the fulness of Christ. Neither is the head without 
 ‘the body, nor the body without the head ; but the head and the 
 body, Christ and the Church of God in Christ, are one. The 
 language of David in spirit concerning the members of his 
 natural body is the language of Christ concerning His Church. 
 “For Thou hast possessed my reins: Thou hast covered me in 
 my mother’s womb. I will praise Thee ; for I am fearfully and 
 wonderfully made: marvellous are Thy works; and that my 
 soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from Thee, 
 when 1 was made in secret and curiously wrought in the lowest 
 parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, vet being 
 
 omnia se tempora extendat, nullis vel locis inclusa, vel temporibus. Damnamus 
 ergo Donatistas, qui ecclesiam in nescio quos Afric coarctabant angulos. Nec 
 Romanensem approbamus clerum, qui solam prope Romanam ecclesiam 
 venditant pro catholica.”—Conf. Ielvetica, cap. xvii. 
 
 1 Eph. 1. 23. 2 Rom. viii. 29. 
 
50 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 unperfect ; and in Thy book were all my members written, : 
 which in continuance were fashioned when as yet there was 
 none of them ” (Psalm cxxxix. 183—16)." 
 
 With a few observations of a more practical character, on the 
 figure here used by the Holy Ghost in the apostle, I will con- 
 clude this chapter. The head of the natural body is the seat of | 
 wisdom and counsel,:in compliance with the decisions of which \ 
 the whole body is governed. Concerning the Church, it is 
 written, Jesus Christ is made unto us wisdom. It is His, pre- 
 rogative to decide for us in all things, without any possibility of 
 mistake, and without any possibility of appeal ; and it is our 
 high privilege to find obedience perfect freedom. This is the 
 basis of much and precious experimental truth. He who is our 
 Head for guidance is also our Head for protection ; and in His 
 exaltation over all things for His Church, we have the best 
 assurance of. that protection being all-sufficient. Our own — 
 treacherous hearts within; a tempting and ensnaring world 
 without ; the powers of darkness under their great leader 
 Beelzebub, the chief of the devils, who goeth about as a roaring 
 lion, seeking whom he may devour : all these things are against 
 us. Butover all things Jesus is supreme, and we are ‘‘ members 
 of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones.” 
 
 Again, in the natural body, the head is the receiver of appro- 
 priate food, and the communicator of strength and nourishment, 
 and increase thereby, to all the ἌΡΝΕΣ And concerning 
 the Church it is written, that from Jesus Christ, the Head, “ all 
 the body by joints and bands having nourishment riiniatanes 
 and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God.” Or, as 
 is elsewhere expressed by the same apostle, “from Him which 
 is the Head, even Christ, the whole body fitly joined together, 
 and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according 
 
 1 It is easy to dismiss all this by applying to it what is considered an éppros 
 brious name, and calling it Calvinism. It is easy to plead against it what is 
 supposed and asserted to be the gencral tenor of Scripture: a phrase descrip- 
 tive of that compromise between the two sides of divine truth which spoils 
 both; but it isnot easy to grapple with the numerous passages of Scripture 
 here quoted in their contexts, and to show what is their true meaning, if what 
 is here asserted be not true, 7 
 
oe The ‘Church of God in Christ. 51 
 
 
 
 to the effectual. working in the measure of every part, maketh 
 increase of the body, unto the edifying of itself in love.” 
 
 The nourishment ministered is the Holy Spirit. Our great 
 Head, haying led captivity captive, is exalted in our nature to 
 the right hand of the Father, and has received gifts for 
 
 men, that the Lord God, the Holy Ghost, may dwell among 
 
 us. The Spirit thus received without measure into Christ, 
 
 overflows like the ointment upon the head, even Aaron’s head, 
 diffuses itself amongst the members, joining, compacting, 
 
 - supplying, and efucially working in the measure of every part, 
 
 unto the power and increase of life and godliness which is in 
 
 love. Here also personal experience is our holy privilege : 
 “ Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell 
 together in unity. It is like the precious ointment upon th» 
 head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron’s beard ; that 
 went down to the skirts of his garments.”+ But how so? 
 There is no natural similitude ἘΠ τὴ unity amongst brethren, 
 
 and the flowing down of ointment from the ena upon the 
 
 ᾿ members. The similitude does not lie in the natural image, 
 but in the combination of the type of the High Priest, and the 
 doctrine now before us. Unity amongst brethren, in the sense 
 
 of the Psalmist, is given and maintained by the Holy Ghost, 
 and by Him alone. Aaron stood a type of the whole body of 
 Christ : his head representing Christ, and his garments to their 
 skirts representing the members of Christ. The precious 
 
 ointment was a type of the unction of the Holy Ghost, by the’ 
 penetrating, softening, enlightening, and sanctifying enorgy of 
 _which the brethren dwell together in unity. 
 
 Behold, how good, and, oh! taste how pleasant, how un- 
 speakable and full of glory, is the joy of putting on as the elect 
 of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humble- 
 ness of mind, meekness, long-suffering ; forbearing one another, 
 and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel agains: 
 
 any ; endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of 
 "peace. 
 Again, in the natural body, the -head responds in quick 
 
 1 Psalm exxxiii. 
 
52 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 instinctive sympathy to the enjoyment or the suffering of any 
 or ‘every member. When. acute pain in any member or 
 members forces a cry from the body, it is the head that gives 
 utterance. Concerning the Church, Jesus said, “ Inasmuch as 
 ye have done it”? (shown kindness or the contrary) “to one of 
 the least of these, ye have done it unto Mz,” And on one 
 remarkable occasion, when a few of the members were perse-, 
 cuted unto bitter endurance by the frantic, misguided zeal of 
 Saul of Tarsus, the Head gave utterance to their cry, and in - 
 ‘the touching oneness of genuine sympathy, said, “ Saul, Saul, 
 why persecutest thou Mz?” | 
 _ This leads us to consider the unity of the Church of God 
 in Christ. 
 
CHAPTER IIL 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS UNITY. 
 
 Uniformity not essential to Unity—Our present Position—Archdeacon Hare 
 quoted—In what true Unity consists—Mr. Palmer’s Statement examined 
 —Old Testament Believers, though differing in Ordinances. included in 
 the Unity of the Church—Luke x. 23, 24, no Objection—Nor Matt. xi. 11— 
 One Spirit—No Entrance into the Church but by Him—External Nature 
 opens no Door—Christ is the only Door—No Entrance through Christ but 
 by the One Spirit—No Gift of the Spirit but by Christ—Yet the Spirit was 
 given, and Members of the Church saved for 4000 Years before Christ 
 came—True Unity thus proved to be inclusive of much Diversity—Among 
 those who so differ, mutual Recognition as Christians a Duty—Co-operation 
 an Impossibility. 
 
 Great and manifold are the lamentations uttered by good and 
 pious men over the existing divisions in the Church of God, and 
 earnest are their longings after unity. It may, however, be 
 fairly questioned whether much that is complained of as division 
 be really division; and whether much that is longed for as unity 
 be indeed essential to unity. For in what—let it be asked, 
 and let it be thoughtfully and carefully answered—in what 
 consists the true unity of the Christian Church ? 
 
 Is it that all who profess and call themselves Christians should 
 pray in the same language, thus reversing the great miracle of 
 Pentecost? Or is it that they all should worship in the same 
 forms ; all their ministers wearing the same dresses, and using 
 the same postures? Or is it that while reverently obedient in 
 observing the outward ordinances of Christianity instituted by 
 the Lord, they should all ascribe exactly the same kind and the 
 same degree of efficacy to those ordinances? Or is it that they 
 should all interpret exactly in the same way those intimations 
 
 
 
‘ ΄ 
 
 54 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 of Scripture and those records of antiquity which: deseribe 
 Church government and discipline ? 
 
 If uniformity in these things, and such as these, be indeed 
 essential to Christian unity, then it must be confessed that great 
 are our divisions ; and it must be confessed further, by all who 
 will take the trouble to think, that a remedy is utterly hopeless. 
 Uniformity in such things’ is amongst the absolute impossibilia. 
 Human nature recoils from it. Christianity nowhere enjoins 
 it. The authority which enjoins and then proceeds to enforce 
 it is at once anti-human and anti-Christian. Such authority is 
 first the originator of separations, and then the punisher of one 
 or more of the separating bodies. 
 
 But if Christian unity consist in the relation which every 
 member bears to Jesus Christ, the Head, and the affection 
 which they all should bear and manifest to one another ; if it 
 be a “unity of the Spirit,” as the apostle calls it (Eph. iv. 3); _ 
 and if its “‘ bond of peace” be a bond not of universal sameness, 
 but of mutual forbearance; then, although our position is not 
 what we could wish, it is far from being so deplorable as many - 
 imagine, and there is some hope of successful amendment. 
 
 The question is obviously one of primary importance: In 
 what consists the true unity of the Christian Church? Is 
 external uniformity indispensable towards it ? 
 
 Within our own national Church there has arisen of late, or 
 rather perhaps it would be more correct to say that. cireum- 
 stances have lately elicited a strong expression of, a craving 
 after external uniformity, extending to the most minute par- 
 ticulars connected with Christian worship. The letter of the 
 rubrical directions in our Book of Common Prayer is cited, 
 as if there could be but one mode of understanding it. The 
 terms of our subscription are reiterated, as if one only view of 
 them were consistent with common honesty; and rigid unifor- 
 mity with that view is proclaimed to be so essential, that to 
 those who differ from it, the name of true churchman is denied, 
 and participation in our common Christianity is scarcely con- 
 ceded. 
 
 Such language on one side is unfortunately, though too 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 55 
 
 
 
 naturally, resented by parallel intemperance of denunciation and 
 exclusion on the other side. 
 
 How then can there be agreement? Ordinary men, on either 
 side, wish each to have his own way imposed upon others. 
 Each laments our divisions very feelingly, and warmly expresses 
 his love of, and desire for, unity ; and in the simplicity of his 
 heart thinks it easy, since nothing more is necessary for the 
 attainment of this millennium of agreement than that every one 
 should adopt fis view of things, ee of course he conscien- 
 tiously believes to be the best Unfortunately, however, his 
 neighbour is equally conscientious in himself, and equally in- 
 considerate of the feelings of others, and jis aspirations after 
 unity all go forth in a very different direction. These forces 
 are simply and interminably antagonistic. 
 
 Superior men on either side, men of large and loving hearts, 
 who desire to yield their own way, and sacrifice their own pre- 
 ferences, for the sake of brotherly union and consequent Chris-— 
 tian influence, are powerless here. ἄνθη their genuine charity 
 is neutralised by the adverse elements which now surround them. 
 They cannot take a step calculated to win those on the one side 
 without finding that in so doing they have—though wholly un- 
 intentionally—offended and alienated those on the other side. 
 They cannot aim at enlarging their Christian influence on the right, 
 without finding that in the act they have abridged that influence 
 on the left. They cannot co-operate with Dissenters—though 
 for a high Christian purpose and with truly Christian men— 
 without seriously widening the gulf which separates them 
 from their High Church brethren. And they cannot recognise 
 the truth and importance of Church authority and Church 
 order without incurring from Dissenters, and some others, the 
 charge of semi-popery, or worse. They are in a strait ; anxious 
 for union, and willing to yield their own preferences both ways; 
 but finding that even self-sacrifice, instead of joining the wall, 
 widens both breaches. 
 
 What can be done to abate this evil, and introduce harmony ? 
 15 not the conviction forced upon every reflecting mind, that 50. 
 long as it is taken for granted—as it seems at present ‘very 
 
 
 
56 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 generally to be—that external uniformity is indispensable, 
 nothing can be done ? 
 
 Were our country differently circumstanced okie power, 
 might interpose and enforce uniformity. But what then? The 
 pressure of the tyrant, and the prostration of the slave, are not 
 the elements of Christian unity ; a uniformity so introduced 
 would embrace everything except what was Christian. True 
 Christianity would escape from it by the avenues of exile - 
 and martyrdom. 
 
 The question recurs, What can be done? Is external 
 uniformity indispensable? If not, there may still be hope. 
 With unfeigned diffidence, yet with the honest frankness of 
 matured conviction, it is here suggested that the idea of external 
 uniformity being indispensable should be dismissed by all parties, 
 and for ever. This asks no triumph for either party over’ the 
 other. This does not require of either to give up even their 
 personal preferences. Though we might ask, and from real 
 Christians expect, mutual self-sacrifice, all we here ask is mutual 
 forbearance. And all we ask from those in authority over us 
 in matters ecclesiastical is, that they skould declare with au- 
 as generally and simultaneously expressed 
 as is practicable under their circumstances—the lawfulness of 
 diversities in external matters." 
 
 This would indeed be a healing step. This would put an 
 end to accusations and recriminations. And it is not going too 
 far to say that there can be no healing in any other way than 
 this, because in no other way can the real seat of the disease be 
 reached. Everything short of this is but palliation. The most 
 approved mode of palliation at present seems to be to do nothing 
 
 1 The heavenly-minded Archbishop Leighton said, ‘* Perfect and universal 
 consent in all, after all industry bestowed on it, for anything we know, is not 
 here attainable, neither betwixt all Churches, nor all persons in one and the 
 same Church; and therefore, though Church meetings and synods, as the 
 fittest and most effectual way to this unity, should endeavour to bring the 
 Church to the fullest agreement that may be, yet they should beware lest the 
 straining it too high in all things rather break it, and an over-diligence in ap- 
 pointing uniformities remove them farther from it. Leaving a latitude and 
 indifferency in things capable of it, is often a stronger preserver of peace and 
 unity.’—Commentary on 1 Peter iii. 8. 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 57 
 
 
 
 and say nothing upon the subject. This of course cannot be 
 relied on. Men will speak, and the sore will and must be more 
 and more probed and exhibited. Nothing that deserves the 
 name of real healing can be accomplished till men shall arise 
 with courage to dare, and with power to accomplish, and with 
 wisdom to give a true Christian direction to their courage and 
 their power, in a thorough remodelling, if not a total removal, 
 of the real delinquent, the prolific source of our divisions—the 
 Act of Uniformity. | 
 
 I am aware of the necessity of some rule for the maintenance 
 of “decency and order ;” but surely when the nature of that 
 necessity and of the great end in view are fairly considered, the 
 rule should be prescribed with the elastic tenderness of a nurse 
 who takes into account the varying temperaments and disposi- 
 tions of the children, and not with the rigid recklessness of an 
 imperious taskmaster, who would prostrate into a Procrustes’ 
 bed all the varieties of human feeling and human conscience ; 
 cutting short to its own arbitrary standard all the outgoings, 
 musical, architectural, and otherwise decorative, of a devotional 
 imagination ; and torturing out to meet the same standard all 
 the simplicity of that abstract spirituality of mind which un- 
 feignedly shrinks from decorations in religion, as from the 
 precincts of an idolatrous temple. 
 
 With unfeigned admiration, I transcribe the following pas- 
 sages from a pamphlet which cannot, I think, be too widely 
 circulated, or too carefully perused." 
 
 After an instructive reference to the uniformalism of Arch- 
 bishop Laud, and its genuine results, Archdeacon Hare proceeds . 
 (p. 32): “The Church was overthrown, and her fall was 
 hastened, to say the least, by the stubborn policy of her primate, 
 as it was mainly occasioned from the first by her narrow- 
 minded love of uniformity. As one proof how the very attempt 
 to compress men’s minds makes them fly asunder in all direc- 
 tions, I will cite a few words from Sanderson’s Visitation 
 Sermon in 1641: ‘I cannot dissemble my fear that it is but too 
 true, by the proportion of what we almost daily hear or see, 
 
 Δ The Unity of the Church. By Archdeacon Hare. 
 
58 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 that, within the little more than this one twelvemonth last past, 
 there have been more false and superstitious doctrines vented in 
 the pulpits and presses of England than have been, in so open 
 and daring a manner, in the whole space of almost fourscore 
 years before—I mean, since the first of Queen Elizabeth of 
 blessed memory.’ 
 
 “This was the immediate effect of the futile attempt to : 
 repress such opinions by force. In order that the fiery spirits 
 thus kindled should burn themselves out, the monarchy and the 
 Church of England were swept away, and a free licence and 
 scope were granted to all manner of opinions by Cromwell. 
 Hereby men were taught ‘to feel the weight of two much 
 liberty,’ and to long for what they had lost,—for the ancient 
 government, for the Liturgy, for the Church. At the same 
 time, the king’s declaration of October 1660, one of the wisest 
 state-papers ever issued, laid down principles which, if they had 
 been acted upon in a candid, conscientious, peace-loving spirit, 
 would have done much for the pacification of our Church, and 
 would have raised it to a power, and dignity, and efficiency, far 
 beyond what it ever has or seems ever likely to attain. 
 
 “A strange voice passed through England, a voice which 
 spake of unity, but it was soon stifled by the tumultuous cries 
 of opposite parties clamouring in rivalry for uniformity. And 
 ere long all hope was blasted by that second, most disastrous, 
 most tyrannical, and schismatical Act of Uniformity ; the 
 authors of which, it is plain, were not seeking unity, but divi- 
 sion. With evident design its provisions were made so stringent, 
 the declaration required by it was’ worded with such exactive 
 precision, that it was scarcely possible for an honest Presby- 
 terian to make it: here and there one, whose habits of thought 
 and temper had preserved him from strong opinions, might ; but 
 for the great body no alternative remained except to belie their 
 conscience, or to cut themselves off from the National Church ; 
 and one can hardly doubt that this must have been the purpose 
 of the framers of the Act. The excuses which may be urged 
 fer the first Act ”’—under Queen Elizabeth—“ have no place 
 here ; and though it is often pleaded in ‘palliation of political 
 
 ΄ 
 
~The Church of God in Christ. 59 
 
 
 
 parties, that their measures have been taken under the exas- 
 peration of suffering and the intoxication of victory, this would 
 be a sorry apology for the conduct of an ecclesiastical govern- 
 ment. No question could now be entertained about the pre- 
 valence and permanence of the scruples which it was resolved 
 to set at nought ; they had been handed down for three genera- 
 tions, and had become more and more widely diffused, not 
 among the rabble, but among men of exemplary holiness and 
 zeal. Yet, with a full knowledge of all this, it was required 
 that every minister, not only such as might be ordained thence- 
 forward, but all who at that time had any beneficence or 
 promotion, should solemnly declare their ‘ unfeigned assent and 
 consent to all and everything contained and prescribed in and 
 by the Book of Common Prayer. This was enjoined, it is 
 stated, ‘to the end that uniformity in the public worship of God 
 —which is so much desired—might be speedily effected.” The 
 previous canonical declaration, that the Prayer Book ‘contained 
 nothing contrary to the Word of God,’ was hardly more than 
 was implied in the engagement to make use of the Prayer Book 
 in public worship. But this strait-waistcoat for men’s con- 
 sciences’ could hardly have been devised except by persons 
 themselves of seared consciences and hard hearts, by persons 
 ready to gulp down any oath, without scruple about more or 
 less. Verily, when I think of that calamitous and unprincipled 
 Act,—of the men by whom it was enacted, Charles the Second 
 and the aristocracy and gentry of his reign,—of the holy men 
 against whom it was enacted,—it seems almost like a prologue 
 to the profligacy and infidelity which followed closely upon it. 
 But what were its direst effects with regard to the unity of the 
 Church? It bore the name of uniformity on its forehead : can 
 
 1 There is a wide difference between disapproving of this Declaration our- 
 selves, and disapproving of its enforcement upon others. It is not because of 
 any personal repugnance to it that we deprecate its enforcement. In fact, it 
 exercises no force upon us; we make it with perfect freedom, so far as our own 
 individual feelings are concerned. But others, and truly devoted Christians, 
 cannot view it as we do, and we most highly disapprove of compelling such men 
 either to submit to it with wounded consciences and injured self-respect, or to 
 separate themselves from the National Church. 
 
60 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 there have been any who persuaded themselves that uniformity 
 so ‘enforced could be a means to unity! The only unity that 
 could have ensued from it would have been that of a dead level ; 
 and full of woe as have been the consequences of this Act in its 
 failure, they would have been still more terrible had it sue- 
 ceeded. Therefore even we, who love and revere our National 
 Church above every earthly institution, may bless God that it 
 did not sueceed. We may bless God for that He has given such’ 
 grace and ‘power to weak, frail, human hearts, that meek and 
 humble men, where strengthened by His Spirit, are not to be 
 driven out of the path in which their conscience commands them 
 to walk, by the leagued forces of king and parliament and con- 
 vocation, by the severest penal enactments, or even by the bitter 
 pang of having to leave their loved flocks. Yes, we may join in 
 giving God thanks for the work He has wrought in such men— 
 for they are the true salt of the earth—even though we may 
 deem that there was much of error in their judgments and 
 opinions, almost as much as in our own. Yet how grievous was 
 the wound to the Church at the time! how grievous is it still at 
 this day in its enduring effects !.. Some two thousand ministers, 
 comprising the chief part, it seems scarcely questionable, of the 
 most faithful and zealous in the land, were silenced in one day, 
 were severed in one day from their flocks, were cast in one day 
 out of our Church, for the sake of maintaining uniformity. On 
 that our English Bartholomew’s day, the eye wandered over 
 England, and in every fifth parish saw the people scattered 
 abroad as sheep that had no shepherd: From that day do we 
 date the origin of that constituted dissent and schism which is 
 the peculiar opprobrium and calamity of our Church, by which, 
 in almost every parish, we find ourselves grievously crippled in 
 our efforts to build up our people into a holy temple acceptable 
 to the Lord; and which, in this very year, by its frantic uproar, 
 is rendering it impossible for our legislature to take any efficient 
 step towards the moral and religious education of the people,* 
 ' This was written in 1843, when the educational clauses of the Factory Bill 
 
 were so violently opposed by the Dissenters, because of the influence they were 
 calculated to give to the clergy of the Established Church. The extent and 
 

 
 The Church of God in Christ. 61 
 
 ~ although the disclosure of the frightful condition of huge masses 
 
 of our population seemed for a moment to have allayed the con- 
 
 tentions of political parties. So terribly is the sin of our 
 
 forefathers, who formed the Act of Uniformity, visited upon 
 
 - England at this day ; nor can any human foresight discern 
 Ὁ either how or when these evils are likely to terminate.” 
 * * * * * 
 
 “ Are all such men to be debarred at once from the ministry 
 of the Church, because they entertain conscientious scruples on 
 certain points acknowledged to be indifferent ? The Act of Uni- 
 formity says, Yes: the spirit of true Catholic Christianity says, 
 No. The Church that does so exclude them maims herself by 
 forfeiting the services of numbers who would have served her 
 faithfully ; many of these, feeling an inward call to the ministry, 
 which they cannot follow within the pale of the Church, join 
 the ranks of schism; and while the Act of Uniformity thus 
 casts out many of the best fish from the net, all the bad, all the 
 careless, all the unscrupulous, all the unprincipled, may abidé in 
 it unmolested.” 
 
 Ἃ * * * * 
 
 “1 do not mean that the Nonconformists ought to have been 
 allowed to remodel the Prayer Book at will, or to expunge or 
 alter any parts of it that were dear to the rest of the Church. 
 But how easy would it have been to have introduced a few more 
 double forms, leaving it to the discretion of the minister to 
 choose which he preferred! In fact, this very course, which 
 otherwise would doubtless be branded as a device of modern 
 liberalism, is pointed out explicitly in the king’s declaration 
 above referred to.” * 
 eaperiess of that opposition may be, in some degree, estimated by comparing it 
 with the more recent demonstration against the endowment of the Roman 
 College of Maynooth. The former movement was exclusively of Dissenters; 
 
 the latter was mixed, many and zealous Churchmen having joined in it; yet it 
 appears by the Report of the Select Committee on Public Petitions, that there 
 were presented to the House of Commons—in 1845, against falsehood, by both 
 Churchmen and Dissenters, 10,235 petitions, with 1,287,136 signatures; in 
 1843, against the Church of England, by Dissenters alone, 13,369 petitions, with 
 
 ; 2,068,059 signatures. 
 * Pp, 52—41. 
 
62 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 I make no apology for these lengthened extracts. I find it 
 difficult to give adequate expression to the intensity of my agree- 
 ment with them. The last passage I have transcribed is similar 
 in spirit, and the suggestion contained in it would, if acted upon, 
 be similar in practice, to the proposition which I ventured to 
 make on another occasion in the following terms :— 
 
 “To apply a remedy here, to minister to this secret tremor, so 
 as to remove its cause, and give steadier confidence to our 
 friends in their several advocacies of our general system—this 
 would be to strengthen beyond calculation the forces of the 
 Church. Iam tremblingly alive to the delicacy of the ground . 
 on which I have now ventured to tread. I have surveyed the 
 hosts of armed opponents, ready on every side to be roused to 
 active hostilities by the slightest attempt at the addition, omis- 
 sion, or alteration of even a single word in our venerated ritual. 
 I am thoroughly convinced that at this moment no proposal, 
 even of inspired wisdom, if we could: have it, would secure 
 unanimity of adoption, and give entire satisfaction to all parties. 
 Nevertheless, strong in the confidence of honest attachment, 
 deeply feeling the necessity of some movement in this matter, if 
 we are to be prepared for the gathering conflict, and believing 
 that true Christian love, however it may cause momentary pain, 
 can never give to Uhristian brethren permanent offence, I will 
 suggest what has occurred to me, and scatter it from this place 
 as a seed, either to fructify or to decay, as seemeth best to our 
 heavenly Father. The suggestion which I venture to make has 
 this advantage, that it would not erase a word, nor add a word, 
 nor alter a word, in any of our services ; and yet, if introduced 
 by the proper and competent authorities, it would gladden many 
 a heart that trembles, and strengthen many a hand that hangs 
 down, among conscientious and devoted churchmen. 
 
 “Tt is simply this: that the passages referred to, as they 
 stand in our services, be placed by authority between brackets, 
 and the clergy authorised to read, or not to read, those bracketed 
 clauses, according {o their varying judgment and convictions. 
 The consequence would be, that no change at all would take 
 place in the practice of some of the clergy. They would read 
 
“The Church of God in Christ. 63 
 
 on all occasions, as they do now, the entire service as it stands. 
 Others would avail themselves of the conceded option, and omit 
 the bracketed passages, or some of them. And many, perhaps, 
 would read or not read the passages in question, according to 
 the circumstances of the particular case. Neither would our 
 uniformity sustain any serious injury thereby. Already we are 
 in the practice of quite as great an amount of deviation from 
 rigid uniformity, grounded upon a similar liberty of choice. Of 
 the opening sentences of our public service, the officiating 
 minister may read only one, and any one he pleases, out of 
 eleven, or he may read all the eleven, or any varying portion of 
 the eleven, according to his preference on any particular occa- 
 sion. Also there are certain collects which may or may not be 
 added, in reading the accustomed service, at the option of the 
 clergyman ; or, as the Rubric expresses it, ‘The same-may be 
 said also as often as occasion shall serve after the collects, either 
 of morning or evening prayer, communion, or litany, by the 
 discretion of the minister.’ 
 
 “Tn point of fact, varieties do now occur in the reading of 
 our services, at different times, and by different ministers, to the 
 extent of the introduction or omission of whole sentences, nay, 
 of entire prayers, and no want of uniformity is felt. So it would 
 be in the case now suggested. No congregation would be in 
 the least degree disturbed ; no clergyman, who prefers the 
 entire services as they now stand, would be deprived of one , 
 valued expression ; while many would be relieved by the option, 
 and a vast accession of cordiality in support from the religious 
 laity would be gained, by the testimony thus borne to the differ- 
 ence between prescribing as indispensable, and suggesting as 
 preferable.”’ * 
 
 I am increasingly impressed with the absolute necessity of 
 some movement in this direction for the preservation of our 
 Church. I fear none will be made. Dread of alteration is as 
 intense as it could be—and as it ought to be—if all our ritual, 
 in its most minute details, were of express divine appointment. 
 While for the sake of details of human origin, and of at least 
 
 1 Lectures on the Church of England, 1840, Eighth Edition, pp. 258, 259, 
 
64 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 questionable wisdom, we are involved in a continual violation, 
 towards many Christian brethren, of that loving forbearance 
 which is indeed of divine appointment. 
 
 “1 know,” says Archdeacon Hare, “ that they who desire to 
 act in the manner here recommended, are sure to be met with 
 those stupid and mischievous saws, that one concession brings 
 on another, and that, when you have once begun to give way 
 and to change, you can never tell. where you will be able to 
 stop. Harmless as these sayings may seem in their utter fatuity, 
 it is difficult to estimate the mass of injury they have done to 
 mankind. By means of them, pride, and indolence, and ob- 
 stinacy have bolstered themselves up in their favourite inertness, 
 gaining the too ready concurrence of the timid ‘and feeble- 
 minded good. Nor have these sayings, when listened to, ever 
 failed to justify themselves. For they withhold men from con- 
 ceding, until the concession is extorted from them, and then it 
 “is yielded grudgingly, reluctantly ; it does not come as an act of 
 grace, and thus carries no grace to the receivers, who, initiated 
 by long contention, and having learnt their own strength from 
 the constraint they have exercised over their adversaries, have 
 been prepared to crave for more, and emboldened to insist upon 
 it. Surely a wise man will say, If a concession ought to be made, 
 let me make it forthwith, and thus gain that only real strength which — 
 arises from being in the right. 'Then, should a concession which 
 ought not to be made, be demanded of me, the very strength 
 accruing to me from this act will better enable me to refuse i. 
 Oh that people could be brought to believe that right is always 
 might, and that wrong is always weakness!” * 
 
 All this is of course written under the conviction that external 
 uniformity is nowhere enjoined by divine authority; or, in other 
 words, is nowhere commanded in Holy Scripture. The nature 
 of the unity therein deseribed and enjoined is of a very different 
 character. It consists— 
 
 1. In the relation with every true Christian bears to the Lord 
 Jesus Christ ; and, 
 
 2. In the sifoctian which they all reciprocate amongst each 
 
 other. 
 1 Pp, 58, δΆ. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 65 
 The relation is perfect. The affection is imperfect. In 
 the former they are “kept by the power of God through faith 
 unto salvation.” ! In the latter they are “endeavouring to keep 
 the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” ? 
 
 Considered in their relation to Christ, there is one body. 
 The apostle does not say there ought to be, but there is, one 
 body. The Head is one: so distinctly so, so immeasurably 
 separated from all others, that on that point there can be no 
 mistake. And as the Head, so also the body is one; and there 
 are no divisions, and can be no divisions. The analogy with a 
 natural body is pursued by the apostle. .“ As the body is one, 
 and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, 
 being many, are one body, so also is Christ. Now ye are the 
 body of Christ, and members in particular” (1 Cor. xii. 12, 27). 
 
 Christian unity, in this its first and highest sense, does not 
 present itself in the aspect of a duty for us to perform, or endea- 
 your.to perform ; it is a revealed fact for us to believe. This 
 is the truth which we have just considered, in the preceding 
 chapter. The body of Christ is one in the eternal purpose of 
 God, which includes every member “ of His flesh and of His 
 bones,” and “not a bone of Him can be broken ” (Eph. v. 20 : 
 compare Exod. xii. 46 with 1 Cor. v. 7 and St. John xix. 36). 
 
 It is on the strength of this oneness in their relation to Christ, 
 which cannot be broken, that the apostle expostulates with the 
 Corinthian Christians against breaches of affection and harmony 
 _ among one another (1 Cor. i. 11—13). There were contentions 
 among them; one saying, I am of Paul, another, I am of 
 Apollos, upon which the apostle exclaims, Is Christ divided ? 
 As if he had said, Why should there be divisions among you in 
 any respect, seeing that in the highest of all respects ye are one ; 
 one in Christ? Is Christ divided? Are you divided as touch- 
 ing your relation to Christ? Certainly not. Then since you 
 are one in Him—of this there can be no question—be ye har- 
 monious among one another. 
 
 In this second aspect of Christian unity, where it consists in . 
 1] Peter i. 5. 2 Eph. iv. 3. 
 5 
 
66 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the affection which all true believers in Christ ought to bear and 
 manifest one towards another, it does present itself as a duty, 
 and we are plainly instructed in Eph. iv. 2, 3, how to aim at the 
 successful discharge of it. If we would walk worthy of the 
 vocation wherewith we are called, as members of Christ’s body, 
 it must be in the practical remembrance that each has its own 
 appropriate function, and that each being imperfect in himself, 
 and requiring forbearance from others, should be also lowly in 
 his own eyes, and ready in the practice of forbearance. This is 
 the way, “ With all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, 
 forbearing one another in love, nde to keep the unity 
 of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” 
 
 Was the Act of Uniformity an exercise of quae and long- 
 suffering, forbearance in love? Or was it not rather an exercise 
 of coercive tyranny? Instead, therefore, of being in harmony 
 with the apostolical instructions for the preservation, if possible, 
 of the unity of the Spirit, it was an act of reckless rebellion, in 
 defiance of those instructions, and well calculated to engender 
 strifes and divisions. 
 
 On this point, we have further the instructive tana of 
 apostolical legislation. The Jewish converts to the gospel in 
 the infancy of the Christian Church, clamoured for external 
 uniformity, and insisted on all their customs being imposed on 
 the converted Gentiles. The Gentiles clamoured for uniformity, 
 and insisted on their liberty from such customs being adopted 
 by the Jews. The Jew, who observed days and meats with 
 rigid exactness, despised the Gentile converts as licentious in 
 the neglect of such observances. The Gentile, who looked more 
 exclusively to the spiritual nature of the Christian religion, 
 judged or condemned the Jewish brethren as superstitious. 
 
 Then what course did the apostle adopt? Did he, under the 
 guidance of the Holy Ghost, pronounce an act of uniformity, 
 and command a sameness of practice? No; emphatically no. 
 He proclaimed the lawfulness of diversities ! in external matters. 
 He said, “ One believeth that he may eat all things ; another, 
 who is weak, eateth herbs. One man esteemeth one day above 
 another ; another esteemeth every day alike.” Then to settle 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 67 
 
 
 
 such differences, he said, first as to personal sincerity, “ Let 
 every man be fully persuaded in his own mind ;” and thenas to 
 relative forbearance, “ Let not him that eateth despise him that 
 eateth not; and let not him which eateth not judge him that 
 eateth : for God hath received him. He that regardeth the day, 
 regardeth it unto the Lord ; and he that regardeth not the day, 
 to the Lord he doth not regard it. Let us not therefore judge 
 one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put 
 a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way ”’ 
 (Rom. xiv. 1—19). 
 
 Is external uniformity, then, essential to Christian unity? I 
 rejoice to think that assuredly it is not ; though in coming to 
 this conclusion I am compelled to resist. the well-intended, but, 
 as I feel convinced, disastrous attempts made, and in our own 
 days repeated, to represent external uniformity as indispensable. 
 
 Mr. Palmer, in his “Treatise on the Church,” announces his 
 design to prove “that external visible communion between all 
 Christians in matters of religion, was instituted and commanded 
 by God” (vol. i., p. 46). His promised proof, however, turns 
 out to be no more than an inference. He says, “The general 
 duty of religious communion among Christians is to be inferred . 
 from their mutual relations, from the duty of charity enjoined 
 by Christ and the apostles, from the practice of the Church insti- 
 tuted by them; and, finally, from universal tradition, and the 
 general consent of professing Christians” (p. 47). On the first 
 of these heads he writes thus : “All Christians are the children 
 of God by faith in Christ Jesus, who is the first-born among 
 many brethren.. As brethren they are bound to all the duties of 
 the fraternal relation in religion, and this necessarily infers a 
 visible communion and amicable intercourse in religious matters. 
 Christ is described in Scripture as “the head of the body, tke 
 Church ;” and Christians are “one body in Christ, and every 
 one members one of another.’ This implies the very closest tics 
 and strongest mutual interest between all Christians, and ther: - 
 fore, as a necessary consequence, their external communion” 
 
 (p. 47). 
 It is against what is here called a necessary consequence tl at 
 
68 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 I feel compelled to demur. It is doubtless a fair and legitimate 
 inference from their relation as brethren, that all Christians 
 should maintain amicable intercourse ; but the force of the fur- 
 ther inference, that they should therefore maintain a unity, or 
 even a similarity, in eaternals, may fairly be questioned. That 
 brethren should love one another requires no proof ; but there 
 appears no cogency in the inference that therefore they should 
 be like one another. The just inference seems rather to be that, 
 although differing in many things, as brethren both in nature 
 and in the Church do and always have done, yet their sincere 
 love and amicable intercourse ought to survive such differences. 
 Their features, their complexions, their statures, their gaits, 
 may differ exceedingly, yet their brotherly love should continue. 
 An attempt in nature to make evternal unity a necessary conse- 
 quence of the fraternal relation, would in every family prove 
 abortive ; and a similar attempt in the family of the Church 
 of God has led to breaches and estrangement, such as need 
 never have been, had the proper allowance been always made 
 
 for diversity of externals among brethren, the sons of one 
 mother. 
 
 / 
 
 As Mr. Palmer advances, he is forced to feel the inconvenience 
 of his own inference, and driven to what appears’ inconsistent 
 with his statement already quoted. Romanist writers adopting 
 the same inference have pushed it forward into consequences 
 such as Mr. Palmer can by no means assent to,. They absolutely 
 deny the possibility of the Catholic Church itself ever being - 
 divided in respect of external communion. Mr. Palmer, on the 
 contrary, desires to show that it may be, and in answer to their 
 arguments, which are but an extension of his own first inference, — 
 he writes, “If the essential unity of the Church is to be inferred 
 from its being spoken of in the singular number, as the ‘ king- 
 dom,’ ‘household,’ ‘body,’ and ‘spouse’ of Christ, it is probably 
 to be understood of a spiritual unity of relations to Christ, which 
 might exist, even if external unity were interrupted” (p. 74). 
 Exactly so; and the confusion arises from attempting to apply 
 to visible communities among men what is written in the Scrip- 
 tures concerning the Church of God in Christ. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 69 
 
 Mr. Palmer adds, “The field,” the “draw-net,” and “the 
 threshing-floor,” prefigure the Church as one; that is, as the 
 common and only way of trial and salvation. The same may 
 be said of the types of- the terrestrial paradise, the ark of Noah, 
 the temple of Jerusalem, etc., which are said to prefigure the 
 Church’s unity. They all relate to salvation in the Church 
 only; but they do not enable us to determine whether that 
 Church was always to be perfectly united in ewternal commu- 
 nion”’ (ibid.) 
 
 The history of the Church of God, as detailed in the Scripture, 
 enables us to determine that it has not been united in external 
 communion. The external ordinances enjoined by God Himself 
 
 - upon His Church at different periods have varied exceedingly, 
 
 without any interference with the enduring unity. of the Church. 
 And in the apostolical period various diversities as to external 
 observance are distinctly sanctioned, while the brethren are ex- 
 horted not to allow such diversities to interrupt their fraternal 
 affection and amicable, intercourse. Comparing the different 
 periods of the Church’s history, some members were circumcised, 
 
 some were baptized, some both, some neither. But in the true 
 
 unity of the Church of God, “ neither circumcision availeth any- 
 thing, nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love” 
 (Gal. v. 6). Abel had faith; he was righteous by faith 5 by 
 faith he offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain 
 (Heb, xi. 4). Abel was a member of the Church of God in 
 Christ, and Abel had neither circumcision nor baptism. Dayil 
 had faith, and was a member of the Church of God in Christ, 
 and David had circumcision, but not baptism. Paul was a 
 member of the Church of God in Christ, and Paul had. both 
 circumcision and baptism. The faithful brethren at Ephesus 
 were members of the “one body,” the Church of God in Christ, 
 and they had baptism, but not circumcision. And the apostle, 
 recognising the unbroken unity of the Church, as wholly un- 
 affected by this diversity even in her great initiatory ordinance, 
 repeats that “in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any- 
 thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature ” (Gal. iv. 15). 
 It will not, I presume, be denied that the distinguishing bless- 
 
ἣν : The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 ing of the Churel of God in Christ, that aah constitutes its 
 essential peculiarity in contrast with everything else, was be- 
 stowed upon Abraham and David, as fully as upon Paul or John. 
 
 So clearly and strikingly was this the case, that it is by 
 reference to the histories and language of these men that the 
 apostle illustrates his sublime argument on the subject of “ right- 
 eousness imputed without works” (Rom. iv.) The gospel was 
 preached to Abraham (Gal. iii. 8). Abraham beheld the day of 
 Christ, and was glad (John viii. 56). It is the blessing of 
 Abraham that is come upon the Gentiles through Jesus Christ 
 (Gal. iii. 14). “So then they which be of faith are blessed with 
 faithful Abraham ” (Gal. iii. 9) in one body. The tree of the 
 Church of God in Christ is one. Gentile branches, being grafted 
 in, become partakers of the root and fatness of the one olive-tree 
 (Rost. xi. 17). The city of the Church of God in Christ is one, 
 and the household is one. Gentile citizens being admitted, be- 
 come thereupon /ellow-citizens with the ancient saints, ahd of 
 the one household of God (Eph. ii. 19). The temple of the 
 Church of God in Christ is one. . Its foundation is the. founda- 
 tion of the apostles and prophets, and other foundation can no 
 man lay than that which is laid, namely, Jesus Christ. In Him 
 all the one building groweth unto one holy temple, and to the Gen- 
 tiles who believed the apostles say, “ Ye also, as lively stones, are 
 builded together for an habitation’ of God through the Spirit”’ . 
 (Eph. ii, 20—22,1 Peter ii. 5). This is the mystery which for 
 many ages was not made known, but is now revealed, “ That the 
 Gentiles should be fellow-heirs and of the same body, and par- 
 takers of His promise in Christ by the Gospel”? (Eph. iii. 5, 6). 
 The fold also of the Church of God in Christ is one, and that’ 
 one fold is undeniably inclusive of both Jew and Gentile. For 
 Jesus, addressing Jewish’ members of that fold, said, “ Other 
 sheep I have which are not of this fold "᾿.---αὐλὴ---“ them also I 
 must bring, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be ”— 
 not one fold, αὐλὴ is not repeated, the word is ποίμνη ; there 
 shall be—“ onE FLOCK,” including sheep of both folds, and “ onE 
 SHEPHERD ” (John x. 16). 
 
 Distinctions are indeed recognised in Scripture between the 
 
The Church of God in Christ. ay 
 
 
 
 
 
 condition of a believer in God’s promises prior to the incarna- 
 tion of the eternal Word, and that of a true Christian since the 
 day of Pentecost. But they are not such as to interfere with 
 the unity of the Church. 
 
 To the New Testament believers it was said by the Lord, 
 ‘Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see ; for 1 
 tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see those 
 things which ye see, and have not seen them ; and to hear those 
 things which ye hear, and have not heard them” (Luke x. 
 23, 24). 
 
 From this an essential inferiority in the condition of the Old 
 Testament saints has been concluded, and thereupon their unity 
 in the Church of Christ with the saints under the New Testa- 
 ment denied. 
 
 The words, however, prove nothing more than a difference in 
 the degrees of clearness with which the things connected with 
 the personal ministry of the Messiah were seen by those who 
 looked forward on the strength of the divine promise desiring 
 to see them, and those who stood present actually beholding 
 them. It is to be observed that the things themselves were the 
 same. The difference between the parties was not that they 
 _ saw or desired different things, but that the one actually saw 
 the same things which the others desired to see. Such a differ- 
 ence extends to nothing fundamental, and involves nothing to 
 interfere in the slightest degree with the essential unity of both 
 in one body. If differing degrees of knowledge concerning the 
 same great truths disturb the unity of the Church, it is obvious 
 that the claim to unity must be wholly and for ever relin- 
 quished, in whatever sense the Church may be understood : for 
 concerning what body of men, in any age, or under any cir- 
 cumstances, could it be predicated with truth that a part of 
 the unity subsisting among them was an identity in their de- 
 grees of knowledge? Certainly never concerning any baptized 
 ~ community upon earth. If, then, unity be claimed for the Chris- 
 tian Church, notwithstanding the prodigious diversity among the 
 members as to their degrees of sacred knowledge, upon what 
 principle shall a similar diversity (even if it could be proved 
 
72 The Church and the. Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 to exist in a still greater'degree) between the Old and New 
 Testament saints, be urged as an argument against their unity 
 in Christ ? 
 
 A similar argument has been grounded upon our Lord’s cele- 
 brated testimony to John the Baptist (Matt. xi. 11), “ Verily, I 
 say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath 
 not risen a greater than John the Baptist : notwithstanding he 
 that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” These 
 words are supposed to signify that none of the Old Testament 
 saints was greater than John, and yet that the least of the New 
 Testament saints is greater. And thus using John the Baptist 
 as a middle term, it is concluded that there must be an essential 
 difference between the two bodies, since the least among one of 
 them is greater than the greatest among the other. 
 
 If this were indeed the meaning of the text, it would, I think, 
 establish a diversity between the two bodies, so sweeping and 
 fundamental, as to be inconsistent with the unity I advocate, 
 and with the numerous and seemingly unequivocal declarations 
 of Scripture, on which it has been my aim to show that my 
 advocacy is grounded. Attention is thus called to the meaning 
 of this passage; and it is to be observed that the phrase, ‘ He 
 that is least,” in the superlative degree, is here given as the 
 translation of a Greek word in the comparative degree. “O 
 Mixpérepos signifies he that is lesser, not he that is least. The 
 kingdom of heaven, in the passage, is on all hands admitted to 
 signify the opening dispensation of the gospel. There was at 
 that time in the kingdom of heaven, so understood, an individual 
 - in many respects lesser than John. He was despised and re- 
 jected, while John was hailed as a burning and a shining light. 
 His ministry was scorned. “ Have any of the rulers or of the 
 Pharisees believed on him?” (John vii. 48), was the insulting ~ 
 question ; while, on the other hand, Pharisees and Sadducees, 
 Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about Jordan, 
 floaked to the baptism of John (Matt. iii. 5, 6). Yet, notwith- 
 standing all this, He who in the opening of the dispensation was 
 thus so much lesser than John, was really greater than He. 
 The distinction in the latter part of the verse is not between 
 
The Church of God in Christ... 73 
 
 
 
 John and all down to the least of the New Testament saints, but 
 between John and Jesus.’ And herein it corresponds with 
 John’s own testimony concerning Jesus. “ There standeth one 
 among you whom ye know not ; He it is, who coming after me 
 is preferred before me for He was before me. He must increase, 
 but I must decrease ” (John i. 26—30, and iii. 80). He who is 
 now the lesser must become manifestly the greater ; and I who 
 am now the greater must become the lesser. 
 
 It would appear, therefore, that this passage, rightly under- 
 stood, contains nothing to interfere with the unity of the 
 Church of God in Christ, considered as consisting of all who 
 have really “trusted in God” from the first and to the last. 
 
 Not in externals, then, whether of divine appointment or of 
 human addition, but in the Holy Ghost; in fellowship with the 
 Father, and with the Son; and in love one towards another, we 
 recognise the true unity of the Church of God in Christ. 
 
 “There is one Spirit’ (Hph. iv. 4), and but one, however 
 numerous and various his operations may be ; and the basis of 
 genuine Christian union is laid in the fact, that no man can 
 belong to the Church of God in Christ, except by the renewing 
 power and under the sanctifying teaching of this one Spirit. 
 “Tf any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His” 
 (Rom. viii. 9). 
 
 “The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, 
 of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the 
 Son, very and eternal God,” is revealed to our hearts and minds, 
 
 1 Mixpos, parvus, Beza. Vel refertur ad ztatem vel molem; sed prius ad 
 molem quam ad etatem. Sed Matt. xviii. 10, non videtur significare parvulum 
 zetate aut mole corporis, sed Mixpo: ibi sunt conditione et statu vite, illi quos 
 homines vulgo contemnunt.— Leigh, Critica Sacra. 
 
 ‘Qui autem minor est,” minor illo scilicet state, predicandi ordine, et preeser- 
 tim opinione vestra. Hoc de seipso loquitur Christus, modeste confirmans illud 
 Johannis testimonium (Mark i.7; John i. 27, 30).—Lucas Brugenses, apud P.S. 
 
 I believe that Mcxpos, and the classic equivalent of Mcxporepos μειων, will be 
 found invariably to imply either a moral or physical inferiority of stature. The 
 metaphorical use of inferiority of stature for inferiority in estimation is easy and 
 natural. 
 
74 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 as the promise of the Father to His incarnate Son (Isa. xlii. 1—8; 
 St. Matt. xii. 17—21); and the promise of the Son to His body 
 the Church (St. John xiv. 26; xv. 26; xvi. 7; Acts ii. 33). 
 This divine Spirit enters into, and energises in, every indi- 
 vidual member of that sacred body. It is by this power, and 
 by this alone, that any member of the body of Adam, the fallen 
 human race, can be made a member of Christ, or, in other words, 
 be delivered from the antagonist power of darkness, and trans- 
 lated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. There are indeed 
 powers, moral and intellectual, as well as physical, left in the 
 fallen race ; wonderful powers, capable of wonderful achieve- 
 
 ments ; but none adequate to eftect this glorious change. In 
 
 vain does intellect search and strive; in vain does conscience 
 tremble ; in vain do the senses range over external nature : all 
 these are indeed witnesses for something, for something greater 
 than man; but of what character, whether good or evil, or both, 
 they do not, they cannot distinctly testify. Had fallen man 
 been left to the unaided exercise of these powers, there never 
 could have been a Church of God upon earth, and there never 
 could have been a saved human being in heayen. 
 
 True it is that “the heavens declare the glory of God, and 
 the firmament showeth His handiwork ;”’ true, “their line is 
 gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of 
 the world” (Ps. xix.) ; true, “the invisible things of Him from 
 the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by 
 the things that are made, even His eternal power and god- 
 head” (Rom. i. 20); true, “ He left not Himself without wit- 
 ness, in that He did good, and gave us rain from heaven and 
 fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness” 
 (Acts xiv. 17). In all this, there was doubtless a glorious 
 witness to Adam in paradise. The glory of God shone on all 
 His beauteous works; and His holy, happy, intelligent crea- 
 ture, with unclouded intellect and unstained affections, rejoiced 
 in the ennobling manifestation. 
 
 _All this is true, and more in the same direction might be truly 
 added, but nothing of the kind reaches the present case. Be- 
 cause sin has silenced this witness. Man is fallen from God. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 75 
 
 
 
 And a curse has fallen upon the earth for man’s sake (Gen. iii. | 
 17—19). The consequence is, that what fallen man can now 
 read in {himself, or in the book of nature, conveys no true and 
 adequate information concerning God. It is, indeed, easy to 
 select a few convenient features from the face of nature, and 
 from these to draw a previously desired conclusion ; and this is 
 really the character of volume after volume of what is dignified 
 by the title of natural theology. An adequate and impartial 
 view of nature is not taken. The features which make for the 
 desired conclusion are selected most arbitrarily; and those 
 which would equally lead to a very different conclusion are 
 wholly omitted, as if they did not exist. 
 
 Life, the various organisations of life, suited to various func- 
 tions and various enjoyments, these all are laboriously exhi- 
 bited ; and sentiment, and even poetry, lend their aid to express 
 in glowing terms how full of love and mercy the Author of life 
 must be; but is this-a philosophical reading of the book of 
 nature? Alas! death reigns. And all the lovely objects, 
 selected and displayed as specimens and proofs of the love and 
 mercy of the Author of nature, become, without exception, the 
 tyrant’s prey. If life with its enjoyments speak of love in the 
 Creator, of what does universal death speak ? Creation groans 
 under the bondage of corruption. » Our philosophers—however 
 unconsciously—are indebted to Holy Scripture for their con- 
 clusions ; and even in this groaning creation there remain 
 sounds of softness sufficient to supply them with plausible pre- 
 mises. But taken as a whole, and viewed impartially, the book 
 of nature is a book of embarrassment rather than of satisfactory 
 information on the greatest of all questions. 
 
 Nor is man’s inquiry much advanced by looking within him- 
 self; because conscience—though not so far fallen as other 
 departments of his moral being—has ceased to be a safe guide, 
 even in its utmost sincerity. In some things, indeed, its testi- 
 mony is sure, accusing or else excusing (Rom. 11. 15): but this 
 testimony has reference to no fixed standard; it varies with 
 education and habit; and concerning the great question of 
 man’s true happiness, “ there is a way that seemeth right ”’—in 
 
 
 
76 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 all sincerity— unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of 
 death” (Prov. xiv. 12). 
 
 The most enlightened philosopher, left.to his unassisted dis- 
 coveries from nature around and within him, is lke a man 
 groping in. the dark, if haply he may find something which is 
 somewhere, but he knows not where. 
 
 “ There is a God, the universe exclaims,” 
 
 But does the universe distinctly tell that there is but one God ? 
 Or does it present apparent proofs of rival and conflicting 
 powers? If all its agencies, for good and evil, be under ONE 
 supreme control, why their continued conflict? Who, what, 
 where, is THE SUPREME? All is uncertainty. 
 
 Thus it was at Athens (Acts xvii. 23), and thus it was and 
 must have continued all the world over—except in Jewry ; but 
 God Himself has spoken, mercifully and distinctly spoken, and 
 made His words of mercy intelligible by deeds, expressive deeds 
 of love. A witness more suited to our fallen condition than the 
 voice of conscience or the book of nature, has come forth from 
 the Father’s bosom—a witness who is the brightness of the 
 Father’s glory, and the express image of His person (Heb. 
 ΠΣ ΘΝ 
 
 It is a species of profaneness to mention this in the mere 
 formal coldness of a passing branch of an argument. Our 
 hearts should burn within us while we read and meditate on this 
 wonder of wonders, this mystery of lovingkindness and tender 
 mercy. Our highest privilege, our best happiness on earth, yea, 
 our everlasting salvation, is to know and love this witness—to 
 look unto Him, to listen unto Him, to read, and mark, and 
 learn, and inwardly digest the glad tidings of great joy which 
 He has brought from the invisible world. Jesus Christ is the 
 true witness. Jesus Christ in His adorable person is “ God 
 manifest in the flesh” (1 Tim. iii. 16). Jesus Christ, in the 
 history of His life, sufferings, death, and resurrection in the 
 flesh, is a translation, into a language which may be read by 
 fallen man, of the heart and mind towards man of the living 
 and true God” (1 John iy. 9, 10). 
 
 ee ee 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 77 
 
 
 
 But even this is not sufficient to meet all the necessities of 
 the case, and gather a Church for God, out of this “naughty 
 world.” A faithful witness, indeed, and, as far as God is con- 
 cerned, an all-sufficient witness, is given in the Lord Jesus 
 Christ. The darkness which obscures the book of nature does 
 not obscure the face of the Son of God.. The uncertainty which 
 attends the verdict of conscience does not attend the word, 
 the written word, which testifies of Jesus. There shines the 
 light of the kiowledge of the glory of God, full of grace and 
 truth (2 Cor. iv. 6; St. John 1. 14), 
 But man’s rican vision is gone; and, although God now 
 holds up before him a perfect object, he will not see it to any 
 good effect. He discovers neither form nor comeliness in it 
 (Tea. 111. 1, 2). A change must be effected in the man himself, 
 or else even Jesus Christ, the true and faithful, the clear and 
 sufficient witness for God, will testify in vain. This is evident 
 from the history of the facts. The light shined in the darkness, 
 and the darkness comprehended it not. Jesus referred to, and 
 enumerated, the most unanswerable testimonies to prove who 
 and what He was, but in vain (St. John v. 833—40). As far as 
 reasonable evidence was concerned, this was complete ; but 
 reasonable evidence does not reach the true turning-point of 
 man’s character: there must be also spiritual discernment 
 (1 Cor. i. 14). 
 How, then, shall the great witness for God be rendered 
 effectual for the calling and salvation of a Church from amongst 
 fallen men? The answer, the only true and sufficient answer, 
 is—by the Holy Ghost. It is His revealed office, to open the 
 _ eyes of man’s understanding, and to quicken and engage the 
 affections of his heart, so that he may know and love Jesus 
 Christ, discovering and communing with God in Him, and so 
 advancing towards holiness and peace. Without this all would 
 be at a standstill. Though vain man would be wise (Job xi. 12), 
 there is a thick veil over his mind against the beginning of 
 wisdom (Psalm exi. 10), and the love of sin is rooted and 
 grounded in his affections ; and although clear, holy, lovely light 
 
 be come to him in Jesus Christ, he will not see; he loves dark- 
 
"8 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 ness rather than light, not because the light lacks evidence, but 
 because his deeds are evil (St. John iii. 19). “ Jesus was in the 
 world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew 
 Him not.” Alas for the spectacle here presented of fallen 
 man! So fallen, that he is not only incapable of penetrating 
 the cloud of external nature, and discovering Him who is 
 within; not only incapable of searching the depths of his own 
 spirit, and discovering Him who gave it being, but when God 
 Himself removes the cloud, and stands manifest in the flesh, 
 man cannot recognise Him. 
 
 Yet, there is in man a craving which only God can sane 
 What an appetite he has for enjoyment! See how, according 
 to his capacity, his education, his circumstances in society, he 
 toils and toils again, striving to fill himself with satisfaction. 
 But in vain! The student maturing into the philosopher, 
 advances with earnest and persevering labour from one acquire- 
 ment to another, and the climax of his wisdom is the knowledge 
 of his own ignorance, while his affections in the meantime linger 
 for this meagre happiness among objects which his reason has 
 pronounced to be vanity. The statesman, the soldier, the mer- 
 chant, the man of polite literature, the man of domestic endear- 
 ment, the man of dissipation in the frivolities of fashion, or the 
 brutalities of vice—why all so eager in their pursuit? Because 
 there is an immortal depth in each of them which craves filling. 
 And why so incessant ? for they never rest, no amount of attain- 
 ment ever seems to satisfy! Because their pursuits are among 
 creatures; and no creature, or combination of creatures, can fill 
 so as to satisfy a man. Poor wanderer! he knows not and 
 seeks not God. Poor disappointed wanderer ! a sort of indistinct 
 sound of what he desires to be rises at times in his bosom and 
 floats upon his ear, but just when he pauses in hope of hearing 
 it, it dies away ; and with an aching heart, baftled, discomfited, 
 unsatisfied, and craving still, he turns from one broken cistern 
 to another, and at last sinks into an eternity of thirst, of empti- 
 ness, because of separation from God. 
 
 Jesus Christ was in the world: “ God manifest in the flesh,” 
 (( for us men and for our salvation.” Here isa fountain opened 
 
 lee 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 79 
 
 
 
 
 
 of inexhaustible (because divine) fulness, for empty men; ἃ 
 haven of rest, a bosom of love, a home of peace! for the im- 
 mortal spirit.. Return, O wanderer, return. ‘Ho! every one 
 that thirsteth, come” (Isa. lv..1, 2). Can it be necessary to 
 urge or reiterate the call? Surely the bare authenticated state- 
 ment of the fact must be sufficient to attract all who hear it. 
 
 Alas! far otherwise. How evidence accumulates of man’s 
 ruined condition! The fulness of eternal happiness is brought 
 to his door ; and a voice from the fountain says sweetly,— 
 Drink and live for ever ; come unto me, ye weary ones and 
 heavy laden, and I will refresh you. But no! The accents of 
 inviting love are heard in vain, and the same voice is compelled 
 to utter the melancholy reproach, “Ye will not come to me, 
 that ye might have life.” 
 
 “ The world knew Him not.” Nay, more; He had selected a 
 nation out of the world, and called them by His nainé. They 
 were “ His own.’ Surely they at least, if none other men, will 
 hail His approach with joy. No, no ; there is no difference by 
 nature, and no external advantages can make this difference ; no 
 miracles, no revelation, no ordinances : He came to His own, and 
 His own received Him not. “ Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O 
 earth ; for Jehovah hath spoken, I have nourished and brought 
 up children, and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth 
 his owner, and the ass his master’s crib ; but Israel doth not 
 know, my people doth not consider ” (Isa. i. 2, 3). 
 
 He expostulated with them, and gave them every possible 
 opportunity. Their national expectations were appealed to. 
 They were looking for Elias as the predicted forerunner of 
 
 Messiah. John the Baptist was sent to them, in the outward 
 " aspect, as wellas “in the spirit and power of Elias.” They went 
 to John in crowds. All classes and ranks of the people, from 
 the country, the towns, the cities, the villages, congregated to 
 his ministry and his baptism. He referred them to Jesus. 7 
 am not He, he exclaimed, but behold there He is among you, the 
 Lamb of God (St. John i.) At that critical point, where his 
 ministry might have become saving, it failed of its effect. The 
 people forsook him, without joining Jesus. 
 
80 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 Their natural reason was appealed to, when Jesus, having — 
 performed such works before them as none other man did, having 
 healed the sick, and raised the dead with a word, said unto 
 them, ‘‘ Believe me, for the very works’ sake” (St. John xiv. 
 Iter s-24). 
 
 Their natural senses were still further appealed to. They 
 had ears to hear, and God uttered a voice from heaven, bearing 
 witness to Jesus as His beloved Son, in whom He was well 
 pleased (St. Matt. iii. 17). 
 
 Their religious education was appealed to. They gloried in 
 the Scriptures of Moses and the prophets, as their peculiar 
 privilege, and the charter of their salvation. To these they 
 were referred by Jesus, as to so many witnesses for Him (St. 
 John y. 39). 
 
 Allin vain! His own received Him not. But this rejection, 
 though general, was not universal! For thus it is added in the 
 sacred record, ‘ But as many as received Him, to them gave He 
 power to become the sons of God.” 
 
 Then there were some! But how was this? Who were 
 these persons? And how or by whom were they made to differ 
 from all the rest? The first answer, in’ what follows in the 
 gospel, is, “ Even to them that believe on His name.” But this 
 leaves the question still open. Believing on His name is indeed 
 declared to make all the difference. But who are they who so 
 believe? Or what is it that inclines and prevails upon some 
 persons to believe, while others, who hear the same words, and 
 have all the same opportunities, do not believe? This inquiry 
 is answered in the next verse, where this description of them 
 traces the blessing to its source. “They were born, not of 
 blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of 
 Grod”’ (St. John i. 10—13). 
 
 A great change is here described. It is not merely an exter- 
 nal improvement, or reformation of manners and conduct, but a 
 change of character so vital, so penetrating to every principle 
 and secret spring of life, internal as well as external, that He 
 who knows best what it is, and what man is without it, has 
 called it a new creation and a new birth, The source from 
 
Deitch if Ga δὲ Chr. 81 
 
 whence it springs is stated bees first negatively, and then posi- . 
 tively. 
 
 Negatively, not of blood—not of natural descent. It does not 
 flow from parent to child. Piety is not propagated as corrup- 
 tion is. 
 
 Negatively again, it is not of the will of the flesh; not of any 
 natural desire of the man himself. The will of the flesh is the 
 desire or choice or energy of what St. Paul calls the fleshly mind 
 (Rom. viii. 5—8). It is capable of wonderful conceptions in 
 natural things, but in spiritual things it is barren. The things 
 of the Spirit of God are foolishness unto it (1 Cor. ii. 14). 
 
 Negatively again, itis not of the will of man ; not by the exer- 
 tion, however well intended, of any human friend, or teacher, or 
 parent, or pastor. Whatever lessons they may give, whatever 
 ordinances they may administer, whatever entreaties they may 
 urge, whatever restraints they may impose, whatever external 
 order and’ regularity and formality they may secure, the change 
 here spoken of is out of their reach; they must let that aloes 
 for ever. 
 
 In saying εἰς let me not be misunderstood. From these 
 three sources, natural birth, personal effort, and human instruc- 
 tion, many truly valuable consequences may flow; and I have 
 no disposition to ‘disparage or depreciate these things in their 
 proper places, and for their proper ends; quite the reverse. 
 From the temperance and chastity of our parents we may inherit 
 many comforts. From our own resolute efforts and self-denial 
 we may derive many excellent fruits. And by the wise and 
 patient cultivation of our instructors, we may advance to many: 
 commanding attainments. From these, under the common bless- 
 ing of God in His providential mercies, which are over all His 
 works, we may derive a robust constitution, persevering industry, 
 and a highly cultivated mind and character. But all these are 
 “of the world” (1 John ii. 15, 16), and have their reward ‘in the 
 world. None of these reach to a believing on His name. This 
 is quite a different thing. And so the source of the blessing is 
 by the Evangelist at last stated positively —‘ But of God.” In 
 every instance where this change occurs among the children of 
 
 6 
 
82 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 men, it is effected by a special personal exercise of spiritual 
 power by God the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Thus we perceive that the agency of God, in the person of the 
 Holy Ghost, is as indispensable to the formation of a Church 
 among men as the revelation of God in the person of Jesus 
 Christ. Without this revelation all is darkness and ruin ; and 
 without this agency, even that revelation itself, though a bright 
 and beautiful light, will shine in vain. 
 
 If this be so, then, it may fairly be inquired, How could there 
 have been a Church of God among men previous to the incarna- 
 tion of Jesus Christ, and the consequent gift of the Holy Ghost? 
 And how is this to be reconciled with the unity of the Church 
 of God from the beginning of the world, for which I have been 
 contending ? 
 
 In reply to this inquiry, it is necessary to revert to the distinc-. 
 tion, already stated, between the purpose and the performances 
 of God. The purpose of God is one, universal, unchangeable, 
 grasping the end from the beginning, and comprehending all 
 things, and all persons, and all events, from the beginning to- 
 the end. In this purpose, therefore, there is no progress. But 
 the performances of God, as they regard creatures, do of 
 necessity partake of the properties, and condescend to the 
 weaknesses of those creatures, and therein become progres- 
 sive. 
 
 For four thousand years after the fall of Adam, members of 
 the Church of God were saved on the credit of what Jesus 
 Christ was to do. And for the last eighteen hundred years 
 other members of the same Church have been saved, for the 
 merit of what Jesus Christ actually did. The salvation, in 
 everything essential to it, as we have seen, has been the same 
 from the days of Abel unto this day. No descendant of Adam 
 ever drew nigh to God as a member of His Church, but by 
 Jesus Christ, the incarnate God, the link, the one only link, of 
 reunion between God and man. But many men drew nigh to 
 God by faith, and walked with Him in holy love, ages before 
 the birth of Christ. Because Almighty God, who calls things 
 that are not as though they were, acted on the purpose of the 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 83 
 
 
 
 incarnation of the eternal Son, as truly and efficiently as He did 
 on the incarnation itself. 
 
 Again, no descendant of Adam ever had forgiveness of his 
 sins, but by the blood of Christ. But many men had forgive- 
 ness of their sins, ages before the blood of Christ was shed, 
 Because God acted on the purpose of the great atonement, as 
 truly and efficiently as on the performance of that purpose. 
 
 Thus, in like manner, no descendant of Adam ever received 
 the Holy Ghost except as the gift of the risen and ascended 
 Saviour, God and man in one Christ, exalted to the Father’s 
 throne. But many men received the Holy Ghost, and so became 
 members of the Church of God, ages before the resurrection 
 and ascension of Jesus Christ. Because God acted on the 
 purpose of that ascension, as truly and efficiently as He does on 
 the ascension itself. 
 
 When, therefore, we hear our Lord, eighteen hundred years 
 ago, saying, “Il am the way; no man cometh to the Father but 
 by me” (St. John xiv. 6), we do not understand Him to mean 
 that no man, during the preceding four thousand years of the 
 world’s history, came to the Father. Such an interpretation 
 would be in palpable opposition to the facts of the case, as 
 recorded in the Old Testament; where we read of Enoch, 
 and Noah, and Abraham, that they “walked with God” (Gen. 
 ‘vy. 24; vi. 9; xvii. 1). 
 
 In like manner, when we hear our Lord, eighteen hundred 
 years ago, saying, “ It is expedient for you that I go away;, for 
 if I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if 1 
 depart, I will send Him unto you” (St. John xvi. 7); and 
 when we read the comment of the Evangelist in another place, 
 that “the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was ° 
 not yet glorified’? (St. John vii. 39), we do not understand the 
 words to mean that no man, during the preceding four thousand 
 years of the world’s history, received the Holy, Ghost. Such 
 an interpretation would be in palpable opposition to the facts of 
 the case; for, not to mention the ordinary operations of the 
 Holy Ghost, it is a fundamental truth that holy men of old spake 
 as they were moyed by the Holy Ghost (2 Peter i. 21), and 
 
84 ΣΝ ΧΑ Churches 
 
 that the Spirit of Christ was in the ancient prophets (1 Peter i. 
 11). 
 
 This is made stronger still by the fact that (with one excep- 
 tion, easily accounted for) all the miraculous operations of the 
 Holy Ghost, described, in the New Testament as His full witness 
 to the truth revealed in Jesus, are recorded to have taken place 
 among the Old Testament members of the Church of God. 
 
 In the thirty-first chapter of Exodus, we read of men to 
 whom the Spirit of God was given in supernatural wisdom and 
 knowledge, for the workmanship of the tabernacle ; all of which 
 bore witness to Jesus, who is the true tabernacle which the Lord 
 pitched, and not man (Heb. viii. 2; ix. 11). In the thirty- 
 eighth chapter we read of others, similarly endowed with the 
 spirit of wisdom, to construct the typical dress of the high priest, 
 thus again bearing witness to Jesus. 
 
 In the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, we 
 read of Old Testament members of the Church who, through 
 supernatural faith, “subdued kingdoms, stopped the mouths of 
 lions, quenched the violence of fire,” and wrought other similar 
 wonders. 
 
 We read also of supernatural healing (2 Kings v.); and 
 miracles (2 Kings iv.) ; and prophesying (Num. xi.) ; and dis-- 
 cernment of spirits (1 Kings xxii.) 
 
 These operations of the Holy Ghost constituted a complete 
 witness to the truth in the Church of God, so long as it was the 
 divine purpose to confine that truth and the members of His 
 Church to one nation, speaking one language. Supernatural 
 wisdom and knowledge sufficed to state the truth with infallible 
 correctness, whether in words or in the construction of types ;_ 
 supernatural faith sufficed to confide, without wavering, on 
 the veracity of the great revealer of the truth for the fulfil 
 ment of His promises, and so to glorify God (Rom. iy. 20); 
 supernatural healings, miracles, and prophesyings, sufficed to 
 demonstrate the divine origin of the truth so stated and 
 honoured ; and supernatural discernment of spirits. sufficed — 
 to preserve the truth pure from any mixture of falsehood. 
 
 But when the fulness of the appointed time was come for — 
 
 ¢ 
 
The Church of God in, Christ. 85 
 
 
 
 extending the knowledge of the truth, and: calling the members 
 of the Church, among other nations, an additional operation of 
 the divine Spirit was necessary to constitute a perfect witness, 
 Healings, and other visible miracles, speak alike to all men ; 
 but concerning what would they speak if the workers of them 
 could not proclaim God’s truth to the spectators? ΤῸ constitute 
 _a Jew an adequate witness, he must be able to announce divine 
 truth to the ear, as well as manifest divine power to the eye. 
 This being the case, when we turn to the New Testament, and 
 reach the period when it was God’s design to make Gentiles 
 “fellow-heirs and of the same body, and partakers of His promise 
 in the gospel,” we may expect to find the operations of the 
 ᾿ς Holy Ghost in the Church not only the same as those already in, 
 ' exercise under the Old Testament dispensation, but including 
 further (and this is the exception I referred to) a supernatural 
 speaking in the languages of the nations. And~such is the 
 fact. “To one is given, by the Spirit, the word of wisdom ; to 
 another the word of knowledye, by the same Spirit ; to another 
 faith, by the same Spirit ; to another the gifts of healing, by the 
 same Spirit; to another the working of miracles ; to another pro- 
 ες phecy; to another discernment of spirits; to another divers kinds 
 of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues” (1 Cor. 
 ‘xii, 8—10). 
 It thus appears that the unity of the Church of God in ἢ, 
 Christ, the “one body,” animated by the “one Spirit,” is a ἢ 
 unity inclusive of much diversity; a unity by comprehension, | 
 . including in its gracious émbrace the circumcision and the 
 uncircumcision (Eph. 11. 14—16,) the observer of days and 
 meats, and the non-observer of days and meats (Rom. xiv.); 
 those who followed with the disciples of Christ, and those 
 who honoured the name of Christ, yet followed not with His 
 disciples (St. Luke ix. 49, 50); all, in a word, who “hold the 
 Head” (Col. 1. 19), agreeing in primary truths, however 
 widely they may differ in the special peculiarities of inferential 
 interpretation, and, by consequence, in secondary ceremonies. 
 This is a variety such as no visible Church on earth ever 
 ἢ possessed. The unity of each visible Church is a unity by ex- 
 
ΒΟ: Ὁ The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 clusion, not by comprehension; a unity which maintains itself 
 by rejecting all who will not conform to its secondary speciali- 
 ties. The unity of the Church of Rome is by such exclusion, 
 rejecting all who will not submit to the assumed supremacy o 
 
 the Bishop of Rome, and conform to the various customs of the 
 worship and discipline adopted and sanctioned under him. 
 The unity of the Church of England is by such exclusion, 
 rejecting all who will not agree in the detailed arrangements 
 of her provincial and diocesan episcopacy, and her union with 
 the State, and’who will not conform to the use of her liturgy, 
 and other customs and forms of her worship. The unity of the 
 Church of Scotland is maintained by such exclusion, rejecting 
 all who will not agree in her Presbyterian form of Church 
 government, and extemporaneous mode of public worship. The 
 same may Bs said of all other bodies of men calling themselves 
 churches. It is of the characteristic littleness of aie churches 
 to exclude Nonconformists in visible things; to exclude all who 
 “follow not with us,” although they may be devoutly honouring 
 the name, and sincerely rejoicing in the truth and love of our 
 Lord and Master, Jesus Christ. 
 
 The unity of the Church of God knows nothing of these 
 artificial boundaries of man’s erection. True, it is ‘exelaagen 
 _but the boundary lines of its exclusion are traced in the 
 fundamental verities of God’s revelation, not in the fancied 
 improvements of human tradition. It is a unity of holy 
 sympathy in the relation which every member bears to Christ ; 
 a unity of mutual forbearance, and forgiveness, and charity, in 
 the relation which the members bear to one another. 
 
 We perceive, also, that it is produced and maintained by 
 “one Spirit,’ whose gracious influences are not confined within 
 any form, or custom,,or country. No man, whatever country 
 he may inhabit, whatever customs he may grow up in and 
 practise, whatever forms he may prefer and adopt, has, or can 
 have, any part or lot in this unity, but by the Holy Ghost. 
 “There is one Spirit.” And every man, of every land, and 
 custom, and form, in whom that Holy Ghost dwells, witnessing 
 for Jesus, and purifying the heart, is a member of Christ’s body, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 87 
 
 “ of His flesh and of His bones” (Eph. v. 30). “There is one 
 body.” 
 
 The patriarchs who believed God’s promises in Christ, and 
 embraced them, and saw the things promised afar (Heb. xi. 
 13), and who thereupon worshipped God with bleeding sacri- 
 fices, offered in any place, or every place, where they pitched 
 their tents, by the head of the itinerant family, who was in each 
 case his own priest; the Jews, who believed the same promises, 
 repeated with increasing clearness, and announcing the same 
 great Deliverer, and who thereupon worshipped God with 
 bleeding sacrifices, confined to one only place, solemnly 
 consecrated for the purpose, and by one only family, selected 
 and separated to be priests for the whole nation; Gentiles, who 
 believe that the promised Deliverer is come, the one all-sufticient 
 sacrifice of atonement, offered once for all, and no sacrificing 
 priest left upon the earth; and who therefore worship God 
 without blood-shedding, in spiritual sacrifices of praise and 
 prayer and almsgiving (1 Peter iii. 5; Heb. xiii. 15, 16),—all 
 these are included in the unity of the one body of Christ, 
 animated, and, as we shall presently proceed to show, sancti- 
 fied by that one and the selfsame Spirit, who divideth to 
 every man severally as He will. 
 
 But though differences in worship and discipline, and 
 national connexion, need not, and in point of fact do not, 
 interfere necessarily with true Christian unity, they do and 
 must interfere with manifest co-operation. Mutual recognition 
 of one another as Christian brethren, notwithstanding such 
 differences, is a duty. Co-operation, under such circumstances, 
 appears to me to be an impossibility. We may sincerely 
 recognise the saving Christianity of men, who lack many things 
 such as we consider very important, such as many among us 
 may consider fairly deducible from scriptural premises, but we 
 cannot cordially co-operate with such men. 
 
 Let the government of the Church, whether Episcopal or 
 Presbyterian, be the matter of difference. On each side there 
 is a strong conviction that the view entertained can be proved 
 from Holy Scripture. It is possible and easy for sincere 
 
88 The ΒΊΑΣ and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 men on each side to recognise the saving Christianity of the 
 others, though in error, as is supposed, on this point. But such 
 men cannot sincerely co-operate in any Christian mission or 
 enterprise, because the abstraction of essential Christian truth 
 in which they agree cannot be sent on the mission, or engaged 
 in the enterprise. Jen must be engaged, and men are not 
 abstractions ; they are either Episcopalians or Presbyterians. 
 Christian men are honestly so, and ought honestly to say so. 
 Surely, then, there is an essential difference between acknow- 
 ledging the Christianity, upon the whole, of persons who differ , 
 from us on this point, though we think them so far wrong, 
 and co-operating with them for the dissemination of what we 
 think wrong. We may talk together in unity, because we can 
 confine our talk, pro tempore, to those great truths in which we 
 are agreed ; but we cannot act together in uniformity, because 
 our acts inevitably involve matters in which we are conscien- 
 tiously at issue. Attempts at such co-operation engender 
 jealousies, lest unfair advantage may be taken on either side of 
 opportunities arising in the course of the proceeding. And 
 therefore our best hope οἵ maintaining ‘ the unity of the Spirit,” 
 which it is the duty of us all to “endeavour to keep,” in the 
 bond of peace, lies in refraining from all attempts at such 
 outward co-operation. When John said to Jesus, “ Master, 
 we saw one casting out devils in Thy name, and we forbade 
 him, because he followeth not with us,” Jesus neither issued 
 an interdict against the man’s work, nor an injunction that 
 he should follow and co-operate with “the twelve.” He 
 said, “ Forbid him not, for he that is not against us is for us.” 
 We hear nothing more of this good man in the gospel narrative; 
 but who can doubt that, though not in outward co-operation, he 
 was in true Christian union with the apostolical company ? 
 There must have been something about their procedure which 
 he did not like, though he was honouring the name of their 
 Master, else why not follow with them? While serving Christ 
 apart from them, that something, whatever it may have been, 
 was of no practical consequence. It was habitually lost sight 
 of. But had he been constrained into outward co-operation 
 
 ‘ 
 ‘ 
 
The Church of God m Christ. 80 
 
 with them, then that something would have been forced upon 
 his-attention and upon theirs, and in all probability would have 
 
 produced some estrangement of spirit. How rich in practical 
 
 instruction is the Lord’s conduct on the occasion ! 
 
 What meaneth the present demand for Christian union? Is 
 it mutual recognition of one another as Christians, on the 
 ground of oneness of spirit touching the great fundamental 
 truths of the gospel, and in united contrast with, and protest 
 against, the Romanist and Socinian heresies? Let it be 
 pressed, with affectionate earnestness, throughout the country 
 and throughout the world. 
 
 Is it not recognition only, but kindly and brotherly feeling 
 towards one another? Is it “unfeigned love of the brethren,” 
 -wherever found? Is it watchfulness against malice, and guile, 
 and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings? Oh, let it be 
 pressed with prevailing energy, and let every Christian devoutly 
 implore the God of all grace and mercy, “from whom all holy 
 desires, good counsels, and just works do proceed,” to fill him 
 and all his Christian brethren with this spirit of true unity and 
 ~ concord. 
 
 _ But is it outward co-operation even in Christian labours ? 
 Let men beware, lest in aiming at it they foment jealousies and 
 multiply estrangements. ἱ 
 
 And what can be effected by large conference meetings of 
 men of diverse denominations? Christian men, who hold, and 
 publicly advocate, the voluntary system to the suppression of 
 all religious endowments, and Christian men who form, and 
 rigorously carry: out, an “ Anti-Church and State Society,” 
 denouncing all religious establishments as the real hindrances to 
 the progress of the gospel, may meet with Christian men who 
 are sincere and attached members of our national Church; and 
 they may all talk, and read, and pray together in harmony, each 
 suppressing for the time some of the strongest convictions of his 
 heart. . 
 
 I will not venture to assert that such meetings are not 
 edifying tosome men. I believe there are Christian men of such 
 temperament of both mind and body as to derive a delightful 
 
90 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 quickening of all their emotions of brotherly love from such 
 meetings. Their sense of congruity is not offended by the 
 consciousness that the harmony around them is temporary, and 
 maintained by watchful management in every speaker to avoid 
 for the time—without the slightest notion of renouncing—certain 
 topics of known discord. They are excited, gratified, perhaps 
 truly edified, by the diversities of gifts in the speakers, and they 
 are content to enjoy the harmony, such as it is, while it lasts. 
 
 Other men cannot do so. Hxisting differences are forced 
 upon their attention by the presence of their known representa- 
 tives ; and seeing around them the living defenders of the most 
 antagonist positions, on many and grave questions, without 
 hearing a syllable from any of them on any controverted topic, 
 they cannot refrain from asking themselves,—Have these men 
 indeed given up their various positions of hostility, and is this 
 indeed Christian union? Alas, the answer is too obvious. Not 
 a thought of recantation has passed through any mind. Yet a 
 little while, and these very men will be again occupied as we 
 have seen them heretofore. And then, what becomes of the 
 recollection of such meetings? Is it ποῦ ἃ strong temptation to 
 harbour estranging suspicions, that the harmonious talk was 
 not the expression of sincerity and truth? 
 
 If the various bodies, or denominations, or Churches, into 
 which professing Christians are divided, were composed of 
 really Christian individuals, and of such only, the case would be 
 very different. Then the essential points of agreement would 
 so powerfully and practically outweigh all minor and collateral 
 elements of division, that the “unity of the Spirit” already 
 really subsisting between such persons, might become openly 
 and visibly a unity of action, as well as harmoniously a unity of © 
 speech. : 
 
 This is a state of things contemplated by the pious and eloquent 
 advocates of unity, whose speeches, and sermons, and essays 
 are now multiplying around us. This, or something approaching, 
 to this, was the state of things in the primitive Churches, when 
 the exclamation, ‘See how these Christians love one another,” 
 was extorted from heathen spectators. But is this the actual 
 
The Church of God in Christ. ΟΙ 
 
 
 
 state of things with which we have to do? Are the various 
 denominations composed of really Christian individuals, and of 
 such only? Are all the guests with whom the marriage is 
 furnished, clothed with the right and true garment? All the 
 fishes enclosed in the gospel net, good? All the virgins who 
 carry lamps, wise? These questions themselves suggest un- 
 avoidably the scriptural and fatal answer—No. 
 
 And here is the real seat of the difficulty. The true Christians 
 in each denomination are surrounded by,.and mixed up with, 
 those who are only professed Christians. Distressing as the 
 truth is, we may not shut our eyes, either to the fact, or to the 
 scriptural predictions of the fact, that till the Lord Himself shall 
 return, the proportions of professed Christians shall far out- 
 number the true ; the gate of profession being wide, and the way 
 broad, while the gate of real vital Christianity is strait, and the 
 way narrow. , The true Christians in each denomination are too 
 modest, too diffident, too distrustful of themselves ; and many 
 of the professors only in each denomination are too confident 
 and too plausible, to render a visible separation between the two 
 practicable. Consequently any visible movement towards visible 
 unity, must include persons who are verily and indeed destitute 
 of the only principle on which true Christian unity can safely 
 rest. These persons are impediments in the way, not only 
 personally considered, but also in the influences which they 
 never fail to exact, more or less, directly or indirectly, on the, 
 true Christians of their respective denominations. By these 
 persons collateral things on either side are magnified into 
 essential things ; what ought to be—and among real Christians, 
 left to themselves, would be—elements of mutual forbearance 
 in love, become, under such sinister influences, elements of 
 debate and division. Hence the disturbing ingredients in 
 every visible mixture, and hence the failure of every experiment 
 at amalgamation and co-operation. ἡ 
 
 Here is the painful but stubborn and I fear utterly un- 
 manageable answer to such animating and amiable effusions as 
 the following. 
 
 “And may there not,” it is exclaimed with holy enthusiasm, 
 
 
 
92 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 “be such a visibility of union, without, on the part of any, the 
 compromise of a solitary principle? Assuredly there may. No 
 principle—nothing worthy to be called a’ principle—nothing 
 that is essential to Christianity—nothing that enters into the 
 constitution of the Christian character, is or can be sacrificed, or 
 can be required to be sacrificed, in order to that union of which 
 we speak, and for which the Redeemer prays. For it is a 
 union, not of professed Christians merely, but of real Christians 
 —the true and genuine disciples of Christ. All that is essential 
 to Christianity, all that is necessary to the constitution of the 
 Christian character, must be embraced and possessed by each 5 
 and that which each possesses and regards as essential, as it 
 can be sacrificed by none, so,will the ἐπ τς not be req 
 by any.’ ; 
 
 This is lovely; and such union does, I think, truly and sub- 
 stantially exist among ‘real Christians, the true and genuine 
 disciples of Christ, each of whom embraces and possesses all that 
 is necessary to the constitution of the Christian character.” 
 Had-we visible denominations of such persons, we might and 
 soon would have “such a visibility of union.” 
 
 But where are such visible bodies to be found? And how is 
 such visible union to be manifested? In every denomination, 
 professed Christians, who are not true and genuine disciples of 
 Christ, abound. In every denomination, considered as a visible 
 body, men who have not embraced, and who do not possess all: 
 
 that is necessary to the constitution of the Christian character, 
 
 constitute the majority. In every denomination, men are found 
 so impractible as to be unwilling to make sacrifices themselves, 
 and so unreasonable as to expect that sacrifices shall be made _ 
 by others. 
 
 The difference between the “unity of the Spirit ” actually 
 existing among the members of the true Christian Church, and 
 this “visibility of union,” is felt by. the eloquent preacher to 
 whom I have referred. He says :— 
 
 “Thus, possessing all the great principles onda ae to Chris- 
 
 1 Sermons on Christian Union, by Dr. Raffles, p. 6. London: Hamilcon, 
 Adams, and Co, 1840. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 93 
 
 
 
 ΄ 
 
 tianity, recognised and acknowledged alike by all, whatever may 
 be said against it, and however by accidental circumstances it 
 may be unhappily obscured and rendered invisible to others, 
 there is UNITY and UNION in the Christian Church in their reality 
 and truth, What then should prevent the removal of those 
 accidental circumstances, that the union which is thus real, 
 and recognised by the eye of God, may become visible and 
 
 obvious to the eye of man? ‘There may be shades and phases 
 of sentiment, not affecting any fundamental truth—there may 
 
 be forms and methods of speech, differing from each other, 
 yet expressing the same important ὙΠ ie ees may be 
 diversities of discipline and modes of worship, all regarded as 
 correct and scriptural by those who practise them—but as these 
 things are confessedly non-essential to. Christianity, as it is 
 allowed on all hands that a man may be equally a Christian 
 and yet differ from other Christians in some, or many, or even 
 all of these respects—that these things affect in no degree the 
 reality of his state and character in the sight of God, and can 
 have no influence whatever either to diminish or augment that 
 essential unity which a participation in all the great fundamental 
 principles of the religion of Jesus must of necessity induce— 
 why ‘should they be allowed to interfere with the visible and 
 audible expression of that unity before the world?’ 
 
 Why? Because, alas! Christians on every side are mixed up 
 —and so mixed that no man can, separate—with men who do 
 not, and will not, confess that the things here enumerated, and 
 such-like things, are non-essential to Christianity ; by men who 
 do not, and will not, allow that a man may be equally a Chris- 
 tian, and yet differ from other Christians in some, or many, or 
 even all of these respects. These are the men who interfere 
 with the visible and audible expression of Christian unity. Arid 
 from such men no visible denomination on earth can effectually 
 free itself. 
 
 It is further asked, “ Are men held back from a visible union 
 and cordial co-operation with each other in the scenes of social 
 
 -and civil life, by a difference of figure, of feature, or of 
 
 1 Sermons on Christian Union, p. 6. 
 
94 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 stature?” And it is most truly observed, that “ the absurdity 
 of making such things as these grounds of alienation and dis-" 
 tance is apparent to all. Why then,” it is added, “should 
 things in connexion with religion, confessedly as non-essential, 
 operate to impede or prevent that visible union amongst the. 
 disciples of Christ, which is but the expression of a union that 
 actually exists already ?” * 
 
 It is taken for granted in this illustration, that all the men 
 visibly uniting and cordially co-operating in civil life, however 
 they may differ in figure, in feature, or in stature, are agreed in 
 truthfulness and honesty; in other words, that they are “true 
 and genuine disciples” of social order and civil contracts. And 
 in the application, it is taken for granted, that all the persons 
 invited to visible union, are genuine disciples of Christ, among 
 whom a true spiritual union actually exists already. This, as 
 we have seen, is not the case; and with reference to the illustra- 
 tion, I would ask—Suppose the various bodies of the moral and 
 social world to be situated as the various denominations of pro- 
 fessing Christians are; suppose the genuine disciples of social 
 order ‘and sound morality to be eed up—so mixéd’ that no 
 man could separate—with multitudes who are not scrupulous in 
 matters of truth and honesty, with multitudes differing, not 
 merely in figure and feature and stature, but in principle also ; 
 would not the visible union and co-operation of social and civil 
 life become matters of caution rather than of cordiality ὃ 
 Would not social intercourse require the jealous guards of intro- 
 ductions and recommendations? And would not civil contracts 
 partake of the character of legal security against mutual fraud, 
 rather than of spontaneous δἰ πα δάμο ἢ in eutael honour ? 
 
 But the question is put and answered by our warm-hearted 
 and devoted advocate of unity himself. 
 
 “How then, it may be asked, is the union to be demonstrated 
 and made apparent?’ His answer is—‘ By intercourse and 
 confraternity between the various sections of the Christian 
 Church. If there must be Hphraim and Judah still, and they 
 must dwell in separate tents—by Ephraim and Judah entering 
 
 ? Sermons on Christian Union, p. 7. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 95 
 
 
 
 
 
 each other’s tents, and reciprocating acts and deeds of sacred 
 hospitality and Christian friendship—by a combined and united 
 testimony, delivered in various ways, and as circumstances may 
 suggest and require, to great and confessedly important truths 
 —by cordial co-operation, so far as may be, in the promotion of 
 common interests and objects—by mingling in devotional ex- 
 ercises, and occasionally surrounding together the table of the 
 Lord.” * 
 
 This would indeed be delightful, if all the men of Ephraim 
 and all the men of Judah were men of God—each willing to 
 give up much that he would personally prefer for the coke of — 
 union with the rest, and all incapable, because of their relation 
 to Christ, of taking unfair advantage of reciprocating acts and 
 deeds of sacred hospitality and Christian friendship among one 
 another. Then might the two tents become one! But if the 
 men of God in each tent be surrounded by men of Belial, who 
 profess to be men of God, and who cannot be fully and per- 
 sonally detected, although they are daily aiding and abetting 
 unchristian mischief ;—men who will yield no opinion, neither 
 relinquish any practice, however hostile—men ready on either 
 side to take advantage, for party or personal purposes, of 
 friendly words or deeds of unsuspecting contidence on the other 
 side; how then are the brotherly intercourse and cordial co- 
 operation here described to be carried on? Alas! alas! it is 
 painfully true that the real disciples of Christ, instead of having 
 a ransomed world to themselves, where the unity that is in their 
 hearts might reign in open and heavenly triumph, are in this 
 fallen world “like sheep in the midst of wolves,” like turtle- 
 doves in the midst of kites. Is the Christian heart prompted to 
 ery, “Oh that I had wings asa dove, then would I flee away 
 and be at rest! I would hasten my escape from this stormy 
 wind and tempest”? Or is the wish breathed forth in holy 
 earnestness, Oh that all the true brethren could be separated 
 from the false, and made one happy family! Oh that all the 
 wheat could be divided from the chaff, and bound in one bundle 
 of life, and love, and joy ? 
 
 1 Sermons on Christian Union, pp. 7, 8. 
 
96 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Patience, patience; thus it shall be indeed, but not yet. As 
 yet, we must serve the Lord, not in a chorus of conscious and 
 happy union, but in the details of duty, which occupy: each 
 servant in his own place, studying to “ be quiet and mind his 
 own business.” ἢ 
 respects must, have a separating tendency for the present among 
 the servants; but all being conducted with reference to the 
 Master’s will, and the Master’s return, have a truly and per- 
 manently uniting tendency. True union is in labour—division 
 of labour: “ All "members have not the same office,” all servants 
 have not the same work, or the same sphere of work ; and the 
 
 The various businesses may, and in some 
 
 true enjoyment of union must, like every other true Christian 
 enjoyment, wait for Him who will call each servant from his 
 allotted station, saying, “ Well done,” and desiring all His 
 faithful servants, so called, to “enter into the joy of their 
 Lord.” ? ‘Till then they can have but faint glimpses of the glory 
 —small foretastes of the sweetness. | 
 An agricultural district is enjoying the best and truest unity 
 attainable among men, when every farmer is diligently engaged 
 on his own farm, though one prefer plough and another spade 
 husbandry. It is not by meeting to talk upon the subject, but 
 by each “ minding his own business,” that each is best consult- 
 ing for the best interests of his landlord, and for the best in-- 
 terests of himself and his family; and not only so, but it is thus 
 that each is most effectually advancing the cause of all against 
 acommon enemy. This is transferable to every ‘class of the 
 community, considered in their commercial, manufacturing, and 
 professional pursuits, and not less justly so to the Chretien 
 Church as comprising them all. The Church is enjoying the 
 truest and best unity she is capable of, while her great Head is 
 invisible, when every member in his vocation and ministry is 
 diligently employed in his own place, and at his own appointed 
 work. It is thus that each is most efficiently honouring his 
 Lord, serving himself and his immediate connexion, and 
 strengthening the hands of all against the common enemy. 
 “ Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given 
 + 1 Thess. iv. 11. 2 Matt. xxv. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 97 
 
 to us; whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the pro- 
 portion of faith; or ministry, let us wait on our ministering; or 
 he that teacheth, on teaching; or he that exhorteth, on exhorta- 
 tion; he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that 
 tuleth, with diligence; he that showeth mercy, with cheerful- 
 ness.”* And let us be more concerned about really loving 
 our brethren than about seeming to have co-operation with 
 them. 
 
 ' Rom. xii. 6—8. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS HOLINESS. 
 
 What Christian Holiness is—The Power by which Holiness is produced in the 
 Church of God—The State of Fallen Man—Mr. Ward's Statement on ‘this 
 Subject examined—Only by “the Truth” can Holiness be produced—No 
 Congruity in any Man—The Young Ruler, Mark x., no Objection—Cor- 
 nelius the Centurion no Objection—Sanctifying Truth—The Word of God 
 in its Completeness—Blessing, Guiding, Warning, Promising—The Nature 
 and Amount of Holiness to be expected—Sincere, Progressive, Imperfect 
 —Where is such Holiness to be found ? - 
 
 Among all classes of Christians, and of all who profess and call 
 themselves Christians, however differing in other respects, there 
 exists a very gratifying unanimity on this point, “that we 
 should be holy.” And indeed it is difficult to conceive how any 
 men, professing to derive their religion from the Holy Serip- | 
 tures, could hesitate concerning this. St. Paul says to the 
 members of the Church, “ This is the will of God, even your 
 sanctification ” (1 Thess. iv. 3). And again he says, “ Without 
 holiness no man shall see the Lord” (Heb. xii. 14). And St. 
 Peter, when pressing holiness upon the strangers and pilgrims 
 ‘in this world, whom he describes as “elect according to the 
 foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanchiRCanee of the 
 Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling BE the blood of Christ,” 
 recites the words of the Lord Himself, “Be ye holy, for I am 
 holy ” (1 Peter i. 15, 16). 
 
 But while all agree in saying that Christians should be holy, 
 the agreement polinppies is discovered to be only verbal. The 
 phrase does not possess a definite meaning, common to the 
 minds of all who use it. On the contrary, each uses it in his 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 99 
 
 
 
 own special meaning ; and on further examination we. discover 
 among them differences, not superficial merely, but fundamental, 
 in the opinions they entertain concerning the nature of holiness 
 itself, and consequently of course concerning the mode of its 
 production and increase in the Church. 
 
 In the present chapter I shall endeavour, first, to state briefly, 
 but I hope scripturally, what true holiness is. 
 
 Secondly, to point out the power bys which holiness is pro- 
 duced in the Church of God. 
 
 Thirdly, to describe ὑπὸ means by which that power is ordi- 
 narily exercised. 
 
 Fourthly, the nature and amount of the holiness to be 
 expected in the Church. 
 
 And so conclude with a few observations on the additional 
 proof to be derived from all this as to what the Church of 
 God is. 
 
 I. Holiness is conformity to the character of God. He is the 
 “Holy One ”’—the Holy Father—the Holy Jesus—the Holy 
 Spirit. To have fellowship with Him in His characteristic 
 feelings and principles ; to love what He loves; to hate what He 
 hates ; to desire what He promises ; to rejoice in His will in all 
 things, even where it crosses our own wills; on all such occa- 
 sions to find the ready instructive utterance of the heart to be, 
 “Ὁ my Father, not as I will, but as Thou wilt” (St. Matt. xxvi. 
 39); this is to be holy, and every nearer approach to this is an 
 advance in holiness. 
 
 As the holy will of God pervades the universe, and is ἬΡΘΗ 
 and unalterably sovereign over all; there can be no real happi- 
 ness or permanent safety in opposition to it. There may, for a 
 time, be an appearance of safety, and a delusion which is 
 mistaken for happiness, without any reference to the will or 
 power of God. But such delusion can endure at the longest 
 only for a little while, and to évery immortal creature it is most 
 solemnly true that there can be no real happiness except in 
 conformity to God. (God is loye—holy love. Love is the per- 
 fection of holiness and happiness in man. Man was made for 
 it; and herein it differs essentially from all positive institutions 
 
“100 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 which were made for man, in order to help him into the exercise 
 of this holy love. “ He that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, 
 and God in him” (1 John iv. 16). “This is the first and great 
 commandment of the law; and the second is like unto it.’ |‘ Let 
 us love one another, for love is of God, and every one. that 
 loveth is born of God, and knoweth God” (Matt. xxii. 836—39 ; 
 1 John iv. 7). “ Love is the fulfilling of the law.” “The end 
 of the commandment is love.” The end, object, or design of the 
 great redemption is love (Rom. xiii. 10; 1 Tim. 1. 5; John iy. 
 9, 10,19). The essence of holiness in man is love ; the love of 
 God reigning supremely in his affections, the love of his fellow- 
 men overcoming selfishness in his conduct. 
 
 It will be found important to keep this scriptural account οὗ. 
 what holiness is habitually in our view—that its seat in man is 
 the heart, not the flesh, and that it consists essentially in a state 
 of character, not in a round of performances. 
 
 II. We may now proceed, in the second place, to point out 
 the power by which holiness is produced in the Church of God. 
 
 The Church consists of fallen men; that is, of men who are 
 naturally alienated from God, so that they resist, and even 
 resent, His holy will to their own misery ; and selfish in them- 
 selves, so that they resist one another unto contention and 
 division. They present a perfect antithesis to holiness in the 
 description given of them by the apostle, “ Hateful, and hating 
 one another ” (Titus iii. 3). By what power, then, can holiness 
 be originated in such creatures ? | 
 
 The real state of moral character, with reference to God and 
 His holy law, into which man has fallen, is a fundamental topic 
 in the great controversy in which we are now engaged; because | 
 the Romanist and Romanising writers, against whose statements 
 we feel compelled to contend, represent fallen man as capable, 
 in his fallen state, of performing such actions, and cultivating 
 such dispositions and habits, as commend him to God, and 
 prepare him by a natural fitness or “congruity ’’ to receive holy 
 infusions of divine grace. I subjoin a statement in which the 
 gospel, or what the writer calls the Lutheran doctrine, is con- 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 101 
 
 
 
 trasted with the supposed orthodoxy and excellency of natural 
 religion. 
 
 “ Whether any heresy has ever infested the Church so hateful — 
 and unchristian as this doctrine (the Lutheran doctrine of 
 justification), it is perhaps not necessary to determine; none 
 certainly has ever prevailed so subtle and extensively poisonous. 
 It is not only that it denies some-one essential doctrine of the 
 gospel (as, e.g., inherent righteousness); this all heresies do; it 
 is not only that it corrupts all sound Christian doctrine, nay, 
 the very principle of orthodoxy itself—though this also it cer- 
 tainly does—but its inroads extend further than this : as far as 
 its formal statements are concerned, it poisons at the very root, 
 not Christianity only, but natural religion. That obedience to 
 the will of God, with whatever sacrifice of self, is the one thing 
 needful ; that sin is the one only danger to be dreaded, the one 
 only evil to be avoided,—these great truths are the very 
 foundation of natural religion ; and inasmuch as this modern 
 system denies those to be essential and necessary truths, yea, 
 counts it the chief glory of the gospel that under it they are no 
 longer truths, we must plainly express our conviction that a 
 religious heathen, were he really to accept the doctrine which 
 Lutheran language expresses, so far from making any advance, 
 would sustain a heavy loss in exchanging fundamental truth for 
 fundamental error.”’? 
 
 Much might be said; and it is difficult to refrain and say 
 nothing, on the gross misrepresentations contained in several 
 of these clauses ; but Ihave in this place cited the passage 
 merely as a specimen of the views entertained by Romanists and 
 Romanising theologians of man in his natural state. 
 
 We, on the contrary, represent “the condition of man after 
 the fall of Adam, to be such that he cannot turn and prepare 
 himself, by his own natural strength and good works, to faith, 
 and calling upon God.” And we say, that “works done by 
 man, in his natural unconverted state,” before the grace of 
 Christ and the inspiration of His Spirit, “are not eden to 
 God, forasmuch as they spring not of faith in Jesus Christ; 
 
 } Ward’s * Ideal of a Christian Church,” p. 304. 
 
102. The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 neither’ do they make men meet to receive grace, or (as the 
 school authors say) deserve grace of congruity ; yea, rather, for 
 that they are not done as God hath willed and commanded 
 them to be done; we doubt not but they have the nature of 
 sin” (Arts. x. and xiii.) 
 
 In answer to the inquiry, by what power holiness is produeed 
 in the. Church of God, much depends upon which of these views 
 of fallen man is correct; which is in accordance with the re- 
 vealed mind of God. 
 
 If man can prepare himself so as to deserve grace ; if what 
 are called the virtues of natural religion, the moralities of 
 unconverted men, be so acceptable to God as to attract His 
 favourable regard towards the men who perform them, in pre- 
 ference to their fellow-men; if the edifices of nature can thus 
 become a yestibule to the temple of grace ; and if grace be not 
 a reversal of the order of our fallen natute, but only the comple- 
 ment of nature’s labours;' then, although it be conceded that a 
 man is not able to succeed in making himself holy until he has 
 received the assistance of that grace, yet it follows from such 
 a view that he can begin the saving process by natural effort, 
 and on natural principles. And the inference is easy, that as he 
 goes on, he will be able, by a continuation of natural effort, and 
 on the same natural principles, to aid at least in his advance- 
 ment in holiness. And thus a door is opened for what St. Paul 
 condemns as “will-worship,” for a discipline on natural prin- 
 ciples, for a multiplication of self-imposed duties, such as find no 
 place in the commandments of God. ‘ Hence the man devises 
 ever fresh methods of self-denial, and subjects his lower nature 
 to rules more and more nearly inflexible; hence, in part, the - 
 unspeakable benefit of monastic and conventual institutions, of 
 holy resolutions, of solemn vows.’’” 3 
 
 On the other hand, if man in his natural state cannot please 
 God (Rom. viii. 8); if he cannot know God (1 Cor. i. 21; Rom. 1. 
 22, 23; St. Luke x. 21); if he cannot by natural efforts, how- 
 ever strenuous, invest himself with a congruity for grace; but 
 if all such efforts, however highly esteemed among men, yet 
 
 ' Ward, p. 294, * Tbid., Ὁ. 224, 
 ᾽ | 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 103 
 
 having self for their end, without any reference to the will of 
 God, do in truth partake of the nature of sin in His sight (St, 
 Luke xvi. 15); if the statements which I have just now tran- 
 scribed from our Articles, and which we think are grounded on 
 God’s sacred word, be really true,—then the process of man’s 
 acceptance with God must originate altogether with God Him- 
 self—not with man who willeth or man who runneth, but with 
 God who showeth mercy on whom He will show mercy (Rom. 
 ix. 15, 16); then every member of the Church of God from 
 among fallen men is His workmanship, created anew by super- 
 natural grace in Christ Jesus (Eph. ii. 10). He advances by 
 the same grace. The principle is quite a reversal of natural 
 law: it is a supernatural interference, rendering the love of 
 Christ a constraining motive, and producing holy love in return; 
 not resulting from a daily drill in self-denial, apart from the 
 temporal: duties of the man’s station in life, but resulting from 
 what Christ has done for him, known and believed; and lead- 
 ing him in the duties of his station, whatsoever he does, whether 
 he eats or drinks, to do all (however imperfectly at the best, 
 yet) with an ultimate design to please God, and “ worthily to 
 magnify His holy name, through Christ our Lord.” 
 
 Thus his holiness does not consist in special works self- 
 imposed (his works are the ordinary works of life imposed by 
 Divine Providence), but in the principle from which all his 
 works, even the most ordinary, proceed. And therefore he 
 does not “devise”’ duties for himself, or subject himself to rules 
 more and more nearly inflexible ;’’ he does not separate himself 
 from the activities of benevolence in the retirement of “‘ monas- 
 tic or conventual institutions ;” he does not lacerate his flesh, 
 or injure his health ; he does not say prayers by count, or prac- 
 tise meditations by the hands of his watch or clock. For the 
 performance of such works, to which God has not called him, 
 he could not expect the grace of God. They must be done, if 
 done at all, on natural principles. The true Christian does them 
 not. If it be pressed upon him that he ought to practise such 
 works, to habituate himself to hardship, in order that he may be 
 ready at once for any arduous undertaking to which he may be 
 
104 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 providentially called, his answer is, I trust in the Lord’s promise, 
 that “as my day is, so shall my strength be,” and ἴῃ the 
 gracious assurance given to us by St. Paul that “ God is faith- 
 ful, who will not suffer us to be tried above what we are able, 
 but will with the trial also make a way to escape, that we may 
 be able'to bear it”? (1 Cor. x. 18). Thus his practical object is 
 not to arrest attention by exaggerated works of supposed extra- 
 meritoriousness; but quietly, steadily, and unostentatiously, in 
 the appropriate duties of the state of life in which he is provi- 
 dentially placed, to keep the commandments of God ; or, as it is 
 expressed in our catechism, “to do his duty in ‘that state of life 
 to which it has pleased God to call him.” . 
 
 Which of these views, then, is the true one? which is in ac- 
 cordance with the mind of God, and therefore with real holiness 
 inman? ‘The question is momentous. How is it to be tried? 
 By what standard is examination to be conducted, and judgment 
 to be pronounced ? j 
 
 Our opponents in this controversy appeal to authentic bio- 
 graphy of sainted men, or to living examples, or to that nonde- 
 script something to be found nowhere,—catholice consent, as a 
 primary rule of faith. It is-in the following terms that Mr. 
 Ward commends what, in his opinion, is the only thread which 
 can guide the inquirer aright :— 
 
 “Tn the present profoundly disturbed and unsettled state of 
 theological sentiment, no one who has not the happiness of 
 resting with secure and undoubting confidence in some’ safe 
 harbour will allow himself wilfully to shut his eyes to any 
 exhibition of virtue and self-denial, from whatever quarter it 
 may present itself; by so doing, he incurs serious danger of 
 losing hold of that thread which can alone guide him safely 
 through the bewildering labyrinth of opinion which surrounds 
 us. "” 
 
 But how, it may be asked, is the inquirer to form his judgment 
 
 ' See Deut. xxxiii. 25. And for the Christian application of such promises, — 
 see Joshua i. 5, and compare the apostle’s appropriation of it, and confidence 
 derived from it, in Heb. xiii. 5, 6. 
 
 2 Ideal, etc., p. 208. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. ‘105 
 
 
 
 of the exhibitions before his eyes? How to distinguish between 
 exhibitions of virtue and self-denial, and exhibitions of pride 
 and self-conceit? May he not mistake the one for the other, 
 and so be involved in still more embarrassing labyrinths? By 
 what standard shall he test any exhibition set before his eyes, 
 whether in the histories of ascetic saints, or in the examples of 
 living members of some visible Church, to ascertain whether its 
 most striking features be those of virtue or vice, of real holiness 
 or subtle corruption, of genuine humility seeking God’s glory, or 
 self-complacent pride seeking its own glory, and name, and 
 fame, for austerity or singularity among men? [5 the private 
 judgment of the inquirer, on all such exhibitions, to be safely 
 depended upon for a just and true discernment between good 
 and evil? If not, Mr. Ward’s only guiding thread may lead 
 astray. It cannot possibly perform the valuable office he 
 assigns to it, except on the principle of private judgment 
 being safe and trustworthy. Again, we ask, by what standard 
 is the examination to be conducted, and judgment pronounced ? 
 If appeal be made to a supposed innate sense of right and 
 wrong in all mankind, our answer is a counter-appeal to ex- 
 perience. Some sense or feeling of right and wrong, at some 
 point of separation, is indeed universally found among men, but 
 it is not innate, as appears by the fact that it is not uniform; it 
 varies in different countries, and in different stages of civiliza- 
 tion, and is manifestly the creature of circumstances. Its verdict 
 is not to be depended upon, bemg much more frequently and 
 extensively false than true. “There is a way that seemeth right 
 unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.”} 
 
 But, thanks to God, we are not left without a genuine stan- 
 dard which may always and everywhere be depended upon. He 
 who is indeed infallible has spoken unto men, and has caused 
 to be written and preserved for our own use such an amount of 
 what He said as is sufficient to make every man who believes it 
 wise unto everlasting salvation (St. John xx. 31; 2 Tim. iii. 14— 
 17). Looking to the word of God, not to the exhibitions of 
 men, I would re-write the above paragraph thus:—In the 
 
 | 1 Prov, xvi. 25, 
 
106 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 present profoundly disturbed and unsettled state of theological 
 sentiment, no one who has not the happiness of resting with 
 secure and undoubting confidence in some safe harbour will 
 allow himself wilfully to shut his eyes to the Holy Scriptures, 
 which are given by inspiration’ of God; by so doing he incurs 
 serious danger of losing hold of the thread which alone can 
 guide him safely through the bewildering labyrinth of opinions 
 which surround us. 
 
 Appealing, then, to the Holy Scriptures, which of the above- 
 mentioned views of man in his natural state will be found in 
 accordance with our only infallible standard? Here, of course, 
 we must exercise our private jadgment on the texts of Scripture; 
 and is this unlawful? May an inquirer, with much advantage, 
 exercise his private judgment on exhibitions of men who may 
 possibly be hypocrites; and may he not do so on the word of | 
 the God of truth, who cannot deceive ? 
 
 It appears to me to be the doctrine of Scripture that man in 
 his natural state does not, and cannot, in anything, serve or 
 please the true God. There is no such being in his thoughts. 
 Whatever notions he may have of the physical attributes of a 
 great First Cause, he has, and can have, no correct idea of the 
 moral character of Jehovah, God in Christ, the only God who 
 has any real existence. Hvery man, therefore, in his natural 
 state, who has not become an infidel, is an idolater. So far as 
 he has religion at all, his mind and affections are engaged with 
 a phantom or phantoms of his own imagination. The character 
 ascribed to this idol, or idols, varies exceedingly, from the blood- 
 thirsty Juggernath, whose monster car crushes its thousands of 
 
 ' The part of Mr. Ward’s book which appears to betray the recklessness of 
 a partisan rather than the conscientiousness of a humble Christian, is that in 
 which he insinuates that the question of the inspiration of the Scriptures is a 
 doubtful one. Does he really mean this, in the face of the evidence adduced 
 and corroborated? Or is it only a new version of the old Roman Catholic 
 cavil which would deprive the mind of reasonable evidence altogether (even 
 for the origin of Scripture), thereby seeking to cast it prostrate-on the au- 
 thority of the Church? Ihave said for the origin of the Scripture, because I 
 know and feel that for many important contents of the Soripture we cannot have 
 
 reasonable evidence; but then, having such evidence for the divine origin, the 
 mind reposes for such contents on the authority of God, not of men. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 107 
 
 
 
 prostrate votaries on the banks of the Ganges, to the soft con- 
 niver at sin worshipped by the philosophical Unitarian or 
 Socinian in civilised Christendom. But the true God is no- 
 where discovered but in Jesus, and no man can say, or know, 
 or believe, that Jesus is the Christ but by the Holy Ghost (St. 
 John xiv. 6; 1 Cor. xii. 8). In other words, a man must be 
 taught by the Holy Ghost, that is, he must cease to be in his 
 natural state, before he can have a single correct thought of 
 God. “No man knoweth the Father, save the Son, and he to 
 whomsoever the Son ‘will reveal Him’ (St. Matt. xi. 27). 
 “The Gentiles walk in the vanity of their mind, having the 
 understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God 
 through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness 
 or hardness of their heart’ (Eph. iv. 17, 18). 
 
 And while their mental state is thus described as one of igno- 
 rance and blindness as it respects God, their moral state is de- 
 scribed as being accursed of Him. It, is only in the gospel that 
 any blessing is announced or given to the heathen. This was 
 promised to Abraham, and as many in all nations as hear and 
 believe the gospel are blessed with faithful Abraham. But as 
 many as are of the works of the law, that is (clearly by the 
 force of the contrast) all who do not hear, or, hearing, do not 
 believe, the gospel—to wit, all men in all countries who are in 
 their natural state—are “under the curse ;” for itis written, 
 “Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are 
 Written in the book of the law to do them ” (Gal. ili. 8—10). 
 
 This is precise; and who of the race of Adam has ever been, 
 able to extricate himself from this curse? “The Lord looked 
 down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were 
 any that did understand, and seek God.” And what was the 
 result of His search? Did He find any who had cultivated their 
 natural powers, so as to work themselves into a congruity for 
 His grace? The answer of truth is, “They are all gone aside 
 they are altogether become filthy : there is none that doeth good, 
 no, not one (Psalm xiv. 2, 3). When St. Paul cites this and other 
 similar passages, to prove concerning Jew and Gentile that they 
 are all under sin, in his application of the whole he prostrates all 
 
108 The Church wad the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 pretensions to congruity for grace in any, by the solemn decla- 
 ration that in respect of acceptance with God, which was his 
 
 subject, and is now ours, THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE, for that all 
 
 have sinned (Rom. iii. 9—22). St. James, also, estimating sin 
 by the principle and not the quantity of disobedience, says, 
 ‘“‘ Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one 
 point, he is guilty of all” (Jas. 11. 10). Every man, therefore, 
 who is not in Christ, is guilty of all in the sight of God, however 
 his character and conduct may exceed those of other men in the 
 sight and estimation of society. 
 
 “These and such passages of, Holy Scripture seem to me to 
 justify wholly the statements made in our Articles upon this 
 subject; and to exclude what Mr. Ward calls “the catholie doc- 
 trine of congruity,”! as a vain fiction and a dangerous flattery. 
 
 Objections are urged against the conclusion thus arrived at ! 
 
 Of course; where is the truth against which no objection is _ 
 
 urged? The most important, as being derived ngt from general 
 reasonings, neither from the dicta of Riese men in any age, 
 but from the Scripture itself, are those grounded upon the tide: 
 tories of the amiable young ruler maa Jesus loved, and the 
 Gentile centurion, Cornelius ? 
 
 I proceed to consider these. 
 
 First, the Ruler (St. Mark x. 17—27). 
 
 He came to Jesus, kneeled before Him, and asked Him, Good 
 Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? I sup- 
 pose this man to have been sincerely desirous to attain eternal 
 
 \ 
 
 life. He had done much for the purpose according to his own’ 
 
 principles. He had carefully, and, as he seems to have thought, 
 perfectly fulfilled all his moral duties ; and supposing he had 
 found in Jesus ‘a teacher, who could set him right if there was 
 anything still wrong, or anything defective, he came to Him. 
 His coming to Blige and calling Him Master, contained a pro- 
 fession at least, and in this case there is every reason to say a 
 sincere one, that he esteemed Him qualified to teach. His high 
 opinion of Jesus, indeed, led him to use an expression for wihied 
 he received a reproof—* Why callest thou me good?” 
 } Ideal, etc., p. 195. 
 
 ὄγε- ωνω 
 
The Church of God im Christ. 109 
 Absolutely considered, goodness implies essential excellence, 
 holiness in heart ; this is true of God only. The highest crea- 
 ture in its highest estate has nothing that can be really and 
 truly called its own. It is and must be dependent on the will of 
 another. It has and can have nothing but what is derived from 
 another. In this high sense, therefore, no creature is good. 
 Relatively, indeed, creatures may be said to be good when, and 
 as long as, they fully answer the purpose for which God designed 
 them to His own glory, and thus all this our lower creation is 
 called good, “ And God saw everything that He had made, and 
 behold it was very good”’ (Gen. 1. 31). 
 
 It might be urged that it was only in this relative sense the 
 man used the expression good, and that consequently the reproof 
 he received wears the aspect of being hypercritical, or captious. 
 But we shall see in the sequel that there was a most gracious 
 and benevolent object in calling such a man’s attention to the 
 difference between relative and absolute goodness. Relative 
 goodness was his idol, on the strength of which he was building 
 his hopes of acceptance with God, while in truth there was no- 
 love of God in his heart. 
 
 His question was—‘‘ What shall I do that I may inherit eternal 
 life?”’ And Jesus answered him, “ Why callest thou me good ἢ 
 there is none good but one, that is God. Thou knowest. the 
 commandments : Do not commit adultery ; Do not kill; Do not 
 steal; Do not bear false witness; Defraud not; Honour thy 
 father and mother.” 
 
 The apparent deficiency of this answer, compared with our 
 Lord’s language on other occasions, suggests an inquiry into his 
 object in giving such an answer on this occasion. He here confines 
 Himself entirely to the commandments ot the second table of the 
 law. Hlsewhere He combines the jist and great commandment, 
 saying, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 
 and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first 
 and great commandment. And the second is like unto it :. Thou 
 shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (St. Matt. xxii. 37—39). 
 The omission here proves some special design in the answer. 
 Had the Lord’s object been to refer the man directly and ulti- 
 
ITO The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 mately to the moral law, that by obedience thereto he might 
 attain eternal life as a reward of his moral merit, He would not 
 surely have omitted all mention of the first and greatest com- 
 mandment of the law. 
 
 His objeet in this first answer appears to have been to show 
 to the man himself, and in so doing to show to His disciples, 
 and by their record of it to show us all, for our instruction, how 
 far this man had gone, and how far he had not gone, or was 
 willing to go. To this end, He selected those commandments 
 with reference to which, in the letter of them, this young man 
 could give a satisfactory answer. Doubtless, taken in their 
 spiritual extent, according to our Lord’s interpretation of them 
 elsewhere, even these commandments would have condemned 
 
 him. He might have been convicted, as the lawyer was, by the 
 ~ extended application of the word “neighbour” (St. Luke x. 
 28—37). | 
 
 The lawyer came tempting Jesus—the young man now before 
 us did not do 80 : Jesus adopts a different course with him. He 
 admits his plea, and loves him. 
 
 This was an amiable man, valuable and lovely! We would 
 not undervalue such loveliness. Compelled as we are to deny 
 that it can save the soul, that it-can establish any justifying 
 claim upon, or cultivate any real congeniality with, Him who 
 alone is essentially good, we do not deny, nay, we are forward 
 to declare, that it can and does embellish the character of man 
 amongst his fellow-men, and endear the possessor of it to every 
 right mind. Jesus loved him. In the exercise of human com- 
 placency, He loved this man, even while, in His higher charac- 
 ter as a faithful Witness for God, He tried him so as to drive 
 him from His company. It was thus that in the exercise of 
 human affection and tenderness He wept for Lazarus, or rather 
 in sympathy with Mary and her sister, while, in His higher cha- 
 racter, He was about to call Lazarus out of his grave, and thus 
 remove the cause of the sisters’ sorrow (St. John xi. 33—44). 
 Jesus loved him! 
 
 So far well, and if Jesus had been content,with this in him, 
 we might well be content with the same. But He was not con- 
 
The Church of God in Christ. ee 
 
 
 
 tent. He said, “One thing thou lackest: go thy way; sell 
 whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt liase 
 treasure in heaven ; and come, take up thy cross, and follow me.” 
 
 Here the whole force of the first table of the law is brought 
 to bear upon him; not in a theory leaving room ἴον self- 
 deception, but in a practical result, testing sincerity to the core. 
 Had he been desired in words to love God, he would probably 
 have answered, and sincerely, though in self-ignorance, that he 
 did so ; or had he been desired to do something, in proof of his 
 love to God, which did not interfere with his love of money, he 
 would probably have done it, and never suspected the lurking 
 idolatry of his heart; but when the Master Teacher touched the 
 very idol itself, and desired ‘him in proof of his love of God to 
 cleanse the temple of his heart, cutting off the gilded mischief - 
 which tied its affections to the earth, he winced from the 
 probe, and could not bear the test. Had he been invited to 
 look to heaven, while his earthly footing remained firm, he might 
 have supposed he was doing so, and deceived himself ; but Jesus 
 directed him to cut away from under him all earthly dependence, 
 and look only to God for happiness. This could be done only 
 by grace. To have done it in this instance would have looked 
 very much as if his natural amiability had prepared in him a 
 congruity for grace ; but what are we to say to the fact that, 
 amiable as he was, and naturally diligent as he had been, no 
 sooner is he really tried between what is amiable among men 
 and what is acceptable to God, than he shows, instead of a 
 congruity for grace, an utter repugnance to it: “ And he was 
 sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great 
 possessions” (ver. 22). 
 
 What, then, had his natural amiability of disposition, and 
 exemplary morality of conduct, done for him? Pleased men ? 
 Clearly so. Prepared him for grace? ‘As clearly not so. Was 
 he not one of those whose reliance on their moral works (not the 
 works, but reliance on the works) had estranged from the hum- 
 bling principles of God’s dealings with men, and to whom Jesus 
 said, “ The publicans and harlots go into the kingdom of heaven 
 before you?” 
 
112 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 It is easy to exclaim, in “language of unbounded and indig- 
 nant reprobation,” against such doctrines; it is easy to profess 
 that “the* task even of specifying and reciting them seems 
 almost a pollution.””? But man’s indignation, whether real or 
 affected, cannot obliterate the unerring words of God. 
 
 Now the centurion. 
 
 In the tenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles we read of 
 this man. He had heard the word of the Lord in the preaching 
 of the gospel, previous to the circumstances mentioned in this 
 chapter. A Gentile he was, with reference to the Jewish nation, 
 but a heathen he was not, with reference to revealed truth. This 
 we learn distinctly by the address of the apostle Peter to him 
 and his household, as recorded in-verses 36, 47. “The word 
 which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by 
 Jesus Christ ; (He is Lord of all:) that word I say ye know,” 
 etc. It is of the utmost consequence to observe and remember 
 this.; indeed the force of the whole history in its application to 
 the question before us turns upon this very point. . 
 
 Cornelius was not a man who had never heard the gospel till 
 Peter came to him; for Peter’s first words in addressing him 
 declare that he already knew the gospel. This explains thé 
 secret of his character. The word had come to him, not in , 
 word only, but in power. In the power of the Spirit it had’ 
 touched his heart, and influenced his life. He was accepted of 
 God; he was a man of inward piety and prayer, and of outward 
 righteousness in almsgiving and other good works. Such is his 
 description in the second. verse of the chapter. This was the 
 
 -man of whom God made choice to show clearly to the Jews, in 
 a way that should convince their prejudices, that the blessings 
 of true religion were to be extended among the Gentiles. Cor- 
 nelius was commanded to send for the apostle Peter (verses 
 3—6). He did so (verses 7, 8). The manner in which Peter 
 was commanded to comply with this invitation from a Gentile 
 is singularly instructive (verses 9—16). The contents of the 
 sheet represented men of all nations, Jew and Gentile, clean 
 and unclean. The origin of this distinction was between those 
 1 Ward, p. 248. 2 Ibid., p. 196. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 113 
 animals which were pronounced fit, and those pronounced unfit 
 for sacrifice unto God; fit or unfit for food among the Jews. 
 The distinction came to be applied to nations consecrated or not 
 consecrated to God. The Jews esteemed themselves clean, and 
 all others unclean. The command to Peter to slay and eat, 
 signified that ceremonial and national distinctions were to be 
 observed no longer. His refusal shows that he was still under 
 the influence of Jewish prejudice. God’s reply announces the 
 precious truth that He had cleansed the Gentile heart. He had 
 consecrated to Himself a people hitherto considered unclean, but 
 now no longer to be called so. Peter was slow to apprehend 
 the meaning, and while he was doubting about it, the all- 
 directing hand of God had prepared the means for carrying His 
 gracious purposé into effect. And behold, the men which were 
 sent from Cornelius had made inquiry for the house, and stood 
 at the gate asking for Peter. The Holy Spirit commanded him 
 to go with them, doubting nothing. He went, and after two 
 days’ journeyings they entered the house of Cornelius. At 
 Peter’s desire, Cornelius told the cause of his sending for him. 
 “Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive 
 that God is no respecter of persons, but in every nation he that 
 feareth Him and worketh righteousness is accepted with Him ” 
 (ver. 34—37). Observe this remarkable language. He does 
 not say shall be accepted, because he feareth God and worketh 
 righteousness ; but he is accepted—6exrds ἐστι. He is already 
 accepted, or he could not.work righteousness. His devout 
 mind and righteous ¢onduct were the happy results of his 
 acceptance and communion with God; the blessed character for 
 the formation of which in man, acceptance and communion with 
 (tod, are graciously vouchsafed in the gospel, and are indis- 
 pensable. 
 
 But how was Cornelius accepted? Through the knowledge 
 of the gospel. But did he know the gospel before Peter went 
 to him? Yes. The apostle distinctly says so (ver. 36, 87). 
 This, I repeat, is of the utmost importance. Had this been 
 attended to as it deserves, it would have prevented many specu- 
 lations concerning natural religion and congruity for grace, of 
 
 ‘ 
 
114 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 which the case of Genelia is quoted as scriptural authority, 
 and a scriptural specimen. 
 
 If to this view of his case it be objected,—To what end, then, 
 was Peter sent unto him? He was a spiritual Christian 
 already. He knew the gospel, believed it, was accepted of God, 
 was sanctified, and living a godly life; what more was or could 
 have been required?—we answer, two things were to be 
 accomplished by this mission. The first and chief was, that by 
 the miraculous descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Gentiles, in 
 the presence of the apostle and other Jews, Jewish prejudice 
 was to be broken down. This object was attained, as will be 
 perceived by considering the fact as stated at verse 44, and the 
 use which Peter afterwards made of this fact. 
 
 The whole transaction was soon known in Judea among the 
 apostles and brethren; and their prejudice upon the subject was 
 so strong, that when Peter returned to Jerusalem, it formed a 
 ground of accusation against him (chap. xi. 1—3). Peter, in 
 ie defence, rehearsed the matter from the beginning, declaring 
 in order all the circumstances connected with the vision. From 
 ver. 15—17, it is obvious that he grounds his defence mainly on 
 the fact of the Holy Ghost having descended upon the Gentiles. 
 And from verse 18, it is obvious that because of this fact, his 
 defence was received as complete, and the great object gained of 
 a public acknowledgment by the apostles and assembled brethren, 
 that God had extended His salvation among the Gentiles. 
 
 Another object was gained by this mission of the apostle. 
 When Cornelius was desired to send for Peter, he was informed 
 that Peter would tell him what he ought to do (chap. x. 6): 
 Spiritual Christian though he was, there was still a command- 
 ment of the Lord with which he had not complied. Peter went 
 to him, and preached to him. But in Peter’s preaching we find 
 no commandment of anything that Cornelius was to do, The 
 apostle preached historically concerning Jesus of Nazareth (ver. 
 38—43). But when he saw that the Holy Ghost had come upon 
 Cornelius and his household, then he gave commandment what 
 they should do. ‘He commanded them to be baptized in the 
 name of the Lord”’ (ver. 48). 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 115 
 
 The case of Cornelius, fairly considered, does not affect, does 
 not indeed apply directly to, the question now under exami- 
 nation. 
 
 I conclude, then, concerning the power by which holiness is 
 produced in the Church of God, that every member of that 
 Church is created anew, by the sovereign energy of the Holy 
 Spirit, in the image of Him that created him (Col. iii. 10; Eph. 
 iy. 23, 24). The Holy Spirit is in him, and dwells in him, and 
 leads him. The Holy Spirit prays in bim with strivings of in- 
 ward earnestness, with breathings and groanings, which bafile 
 human language to give them utterance (St. John xiv. 17; 
 Rom. viii. 14, 26, 27). The Holy Spirit repents in him, and 
 watches in him, and quickens him, and maintains his conflict 
 against the world, the flesh, and the devil: and encourages 
 him, and comforts him, and never leaves him nor forsakes him 
 (2 Cor. i. 21, 22, and v..5; 1 Johnii. 27). _ This is the living 
 power by which holiness is produced in every member of the 
 Church of God in Christ. 
 
 ΠῚ. The next and truly interesting inquiry is, By what means 
 is this power ordinarily exercised? Ordinarily, because there 
 may be, as there have been, exceptions; God is not limited o 
 confined even to His own appointed ordinances among men. 
 But generally the sword of the Spirit, the grand instrument 
 used, is the word of God. 
 
 For the new birth of the members of the Church the word is 
 the seed. They are “born again, not of corruptible seed, but 
 of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth 
 for ever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man,” in 
 his pride and pomp, his eloquence and philosophy, “as the 
 flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof 
 falleth away; but the word of the Lord endureth for ever; and 
 this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you” 
 (1 Peter i. 23—25). “Of His own will begat He us with the 
 word of truth” (St. James i. 22). 
 
 For their growth towards the measure of the stature of Christ, 
 
 the word of God is the milk: “ Wherefore, laying aside all 
 
116 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and ‘all evil 
 speakings, as new-born babes, desire the sincere milk of the 
 word, that ye may grow thereby’ (1 Peter ii. 1, 2). 
 
 For their guidance through the bewildering ways of a sinful . 
 world, they may each say w neh the Psalmist, “Thy word is a 
 lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path. The entrance of 
 thy words giveth Keht: it giveth understanding unto the simple. 
 Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I Dees not sin against 
 thee ” (Psalm exix.) 
 
 For their general sanctification, the word of God is the in- 
 strument, according to. the prayer of the Great Intercessor. 
 “Sanctify them through thy truth; thy word is truth” (St. 
 John xvii. 17). 
 
 When St. Paul describes the great purpose of the Redeemer 
 concerning His Church which He loved, and for which He gave 
 Himeelf, it is “ that He might sanctify and cleanse it,” as it were, 
 “by the washing of water,” that is, “by the word; that He 
 might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot 
 or wrinkle; but that it should be holy and without blemish” ὁ 
 (Eph. v. 25—27). 
 
 And when our great Example met and repelled the tempta- 
 tions of the devil, He appealed at every step to the word of God, 
 saying, “It is written.” When Satan attempted to meet Him 
 on this ground, and made his appeal also to the word of God, 
 Jesus was not to be turned from the use of the sacred word by: 
 the devil’s abuse of it; neither did He deem it needful to point 
 out the mutilation of the text of the Psalm in which that abuse 
 consisted, but simply answered, “It is written again” (St. 
 Matt. iv. 1—11). 
 
 At the fourth verse of this wonderful narrative, our Lord 
 cited from Moses a general principle of most important applica- 
 tion. “It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by 
 
 every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” very 
 word! By this expression our attention is called to the compre- 
 hensiveness of the Scriptures for the attainment of their great 
 
 a Psalm xci. 11; comp. St. Matt. iv. 6. Satan omitted the clause, “In all 
 thy ways.” 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 117 
 
 design, and to the duty of making our appeal to them without 
 partiality, as well as without hypocrisy (St. James iii. 17). The 
 ward of God contains every topic necessary for producing 
 sanctifying effects upon the members of the Church of God, or 
 as St. Peter expresses it, “ All things that pertain to life and 
 _ godliness” (2 Peteri.3). The natural characters and besetting 
 tendencies of real Christians differ exceedingly one from an- 
 other ; and the states of mind of the same individual Christians 
 are very different at different times. For all this variety the 
 word of God provides. Itis indeed to meet this variety that 
 _ the provisions of the word are so diverse and so comprehensive; 
 and it is by confining his attention to one, or at the most to 
 only a few of these varieties, that the expositor betrays his 
 narrowness of mind, looking at his own experience as a sample 
 of all, instead of a unit among many; and so placing himself in 
 an antipodes position against another expositor equally sincere, 
 but equally narrow and partial, at some other favourite point. 
 The catholicity of the word of God puts all such ex parte exposi- 
 tions to shame. 
 
 Addressed to the highest aspirations of grateful love, in the 
 members of the Church, towards Him who first loved them, the 
 word of blessing, rich, free, everlasting blessing in Christ Jesus, 
 is reiterated as supplying the most urgent motives to holiness. 
 But is this. all? Do we represent this as inclusive of every 
 word? Do we, who delight in this, confine ourselves to this? 
 By no means. 
 
 Addressed to the desire for instruction in the details of duty 
 in the Church of God, the word of practical guidance unfolds its 
 store of descriptions and commands concerning tempers, and 
 words, and conduct, personal and relative. 
 
 Addressed to the lower feelings of selfishness and terror, 
 which are still found in some members of the Church frequently, 
 and in others occasionally, the word of warning raises its 
 appalling sounds against apostasy witb all its dreadful conse- 
 quences. 
 
 Addressed to the panting anticipations of hope, which form so 
 strong a feature in the Christian character, and are kept in 
 
118 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 vigorous action by the great truth of the approaching advent of 
 our Lord and Saviour, the word of judgment according to works — 
 and the word of reward jor works exercise their animating 
 influence. 
 
 And thus the round of the Church’s experience, taken in ‘its 
 fulness, supplies an interesting comment on the saying of the 
 Lord. Jesus, that man. lives, in the highest sense of that ex- 
 pression, by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
 God. 
 
 (1.) Zhe word of blessing proclaims the characteristic glad 
 tidings of the everlasting gospel, preaching pardon and peace by 
 Jesus Christ ;:and the immediate influence ascribed te this, 
 wherever the statements are cordially received, is holiness. 
 The love of God is planted in the heart, and fruits of righteous- 
 ness are the appropriate produce. This is the prescription of 
 the Great Physician for the disease of our nature. In various 
 ways a man may be made conscious of his disease, but only in ~ 
 one way can it be cured. Nothing but pardoning love from 
 God can reach the real seat of it. The disease is sin, not only 
 in its guilt against the divine law, but also in its effects upon 
 the human conscience. In its guilt, it exposes a man to the 
 righteous anger of God; in its effects upon the human 
 conscience, it produces in a man alienation from God, as well 
 as self-reproach. How then is this to be dealt with in the way 
 of moral instrumentality? The holiness of the law, the 
 majesty of the lawgiver, the dreadful consequences of continued 
 disobedience—all these serve but to aggravate the disease. 
 This is their proper use—-to exhibit it in its true light, till it 
 shall become intolerable; “by the law is the knowledge of sin” 
 (Rom. ii. 20). But» they supply no cure, no balm to heal. | 
 And yet, till the disease is healed, there can be no true obedi- 
 ence. There may indeed be compliance with many of the 
 outward duties of the second table of the law, but the first and 
 greatest commandment of all is absolutely impracticable, “ Thou 
 shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,” etc. Alas! the 
 heart recoils in alienation and enmity as from a task-master ; 
 and all his majesty, and power, and rightful authority, serve 
 
 
 

 
 pardoning love, which makes provision for the depth of its 
 necessity, and this is precisely the announcement of the gospel, 
 in its word of blessing. It proclaims love, that it may produce 
 love ; love from heaven to beget love on earth, pardoning love 
 to raise the holy echo of grateful love. ‘“ Thy sins be forgiven 
 thee.” One owed fifty pence, another five hundred, and when 
 they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. “Be it 
 known to you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this 
 man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins’’ (Acts xiil. 38). 
 
 This proclamation is so made as to show it in strictest 
 harmony with the holy character of God, and the hateful 
 character of sin. God is just, and the justifier of the ungodly. 
 The great object of the Church’s faith is, at the same time, the 
 great manifestation of God’s inexorable justice, and of God’s 
 pardoning love. It is Jesus Christ, Jesus crucified, “The just 
 for the unjust, to bring us to God;” .6., to love, to law, to 
 holiness, to happiness. 
 
 This meets the necessity of the case, pours balm into the 
 very seat of the disease, and thus changes the nature of the 
 tree, in order that in consequence of such change, the nature of 
 the fruit may be changed also. 
 
 The divine Husbandman Himself has adopted this figure, 
 which, if it be appropriate at all (and who will deny this 3), 
 must be fundamentally instructive, and ought in- fairness to 
 be decisive of this branch of the controversy. ‘Make the tree 
 good, and his fruit good.” “ Do men gather grapes of thorns, 
 or figs of thistles?’’ (St. Matt. vii. 16—18). He compares a 
 man to a tree, and his works to the fruit. By nature both are 
 corrupt. In the process of renewal, which of these must have 
 the precedence? Not the fruit, but the tree ; not the works, 
 but the man. And can the process stop at the first step? . 
 When the tree is made good, can the fruit remain evil? Not 
 so. ‘A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.” How fully 
 armed is this beautiful figure against the corrupt system on 
 either side ; either the “ congruity ” which ‘represents a man’s 
 Christianity as consequent upon his good works, or the Anti- 
 
120 7) a Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 nomianism which represents a man’s Christianity as unproduc- 
 tive of good works ! 
 
 The word of blessing is specially and copiously applied for 
 the production of such good works. Having in his epistle to 
 the Romans displayed in glowing colours the unsearchable 
 riches of the everlasting gospel of the grace of God, St. Paul 
 draws, as a concentrated consequence from them all, an ani- 
 mating exhortation to universal devotedness. “I beseech you, 
 therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your 
 bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is 
 your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world, 
 but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may 
 prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” 
 (Rom. xii. 1, 2). 
 
 Having in his second epistle to the Corinthians cited some of 
 God’s gracious promises to the members of His Church, to 
 dwell in them, and walk in them, and be a Father unto them, 
 he adds, ‘‘ Having, therefore, these promises, dearly beloved, let 
 us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, 
 perfecting holiness in the fear of God” (2 Cor. vii. 1). 
 
 And when he urges the members of the Church in Ephesus 
 to the practice of brotherly love, especially in the matter of 
 mutual forgiveness, he derives the constraining motive for this 
 conduct from the blessings of forgiveness which God had already 
 mercifully.and freely bestowed on them, and from the high and 
 precious dignity of being imitators of God. ‘And be ye kind 
 one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as 
 God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. Be ye therefore 
 followers of God, as dear children” (Hph. iv. 2, and v. 1). 
 
 It was by a pressure on the same principle, derived from 
 blessings mercifully and freely conferred upon them, that the 
 members of the Church of God, under the Jewish dispensation, 
 were urged to holy abedience. The 105th and 106th Psalms 
 supply an interesting instance of this. In all the wonders gra- 
 ciously wrought for Israel in Egypt, in their deliverance out 
 of Egypt, and in the wilderness, the object in view was, “ that 
 they might observe His statutes and keep His laws.” 
 
| The Church of God in Christ. 121 
 That blessings bestowed should thus instrumentally produee 
 such characteristic results, it is indispensable that the receivers 
 of them should know that they have received them. Tlius the 
 apostle speaks : ‘‘Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither 
 haye entered into the heart of man the things which God hath 
 prepared for them that love Him. But God hath revealed them 
 unto us by His Spirit.” The things here spoken of are not the 
 things of a future world, as yet unrevealed ; they are the things 
 of present Christian experience, revealed by the Spirit. Man, 
 then, in this passage, is man untaught by the Spirit of God. 
 He, indeed, cannot imagine these things. However furnished 
 with information on other subjects, and qualified for high attain- 
 ments, he can make no progress here. These things are not 
 matters of natural intellect, but of spiritual discernment, and 
 the apostle asserts, with unambiguous plainness, that “the ΄ 
 natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for 
 they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, 
 because they are spiritually discerned.’ ‘ But God hath re- 
 vealed them unto us by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth. all 
 things, yea, the deep things of God. Now we have received, 
 not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God ; that 
 we might know the things that are freely given to us of God” 
 (1 Cor. ii. 9—14).  “ τς we have known a believed the love 
 that God hath to us.” “Hereby know we that we dwell in 
 Him, and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit” 
 (1 John iv. 16, 13). “ And we know that the Son of God is 
 come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know 
 Him that is true ; and we are in Him that is true, even in His 
 Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life ” 
 (1 John y. 20). “Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter 
 into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, 
 which He hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to 
 say, His flesh; and having an high priest over the house of 
 God ; let us draw near with a true heart, in full assurance of 
 faith”? (Heb. x. 19-—22). 
 Mr. Ward, indeed, denounces the doctrine of assurance as a 
 heresy, and decides dogmatically that its effects, wherever it is 
 
122 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 received, must be unholy. But perhaps this only proves that 
 he has never himself enjoyed the blessing experimentally, and 
 that his theory of Christianity, as well as his ideal of a church, 
 has been derived from “ Catholic authors,” and not from the 
 word of God. 
 
 But the word of blessing does not stand alone for the forma- 
 tion of the Christian character. Many members of the Church 
 of God, perhaps all of them at some time, require a different 
 treatment ; and it is at hand. 
 
 (2.) The word of practical guidance unfolds its stores of 
 descriptions and commands concerning tempers and words and 
 works. The Chaistian is not left in this perplexing world 
 without a guide to direct his steps. Richly supplied and clothed 
 for his heavenward journey, he is not left in doubt as to the 
 way in which he should walk. No, truly. This would be to 
 expose him to unconscious wanderings in a strange country, 
 and among crossing roads, where, with the best intentions to 
 reach his holy home, he might be drawn aside unwittingly by 
 the delusions of a wily and powerful adversary. 
 
 To his desire for instruction in the details of duty, the word 
 of God responds with grest plainness of speech. And here I will 
 take the liberty to quote from a sermon of my own, printed in 
 
 1825, on the application of the moral law as a rule for the 
 
 Christian’s life :— . 
 
 “Tf any man dispute this, and deny any such application of 
 the law to the Christian, because that Christ hath fulfilled the 
 law for him, and he is completely delivered from the law, asa 
 covenant of works, let such a man remember that Christ in His 
 
 life hath set us an example, that we should follow His steps ; 
 
 and let him ask himself, Whither do the steps of Christ lead, 
 but among the precepts of the law? What was the life of Christ, 
 but one undeviating conformity to the whole law? If, then, the 
 example of Christ be the rule of a Christian’s life, so must the 
 moral law be also ; for we challenge any man to point out the 
 smallest discrepancy between the life of Christ and the law of 
 God. ‘In Him was no sin ;’ but sin is the transgression of the 
 law, therefore He never trangressed the law; and they who 
 
 ee ee ee ὦ. ἡ "ὦ 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 123 
 
 
 
 would follow His steps must be guided by the precepts of the 
 law. These precepts. the apostles press upon their converts; 
 they wear, indeed, a more attractive dress in the apostolical 
 epistles than in the books of Moses ; under the genial influence 
 of the gospel sun, they bloom as the fruits of the Spirit, but in 
 substance they are still the precepts of the law. Let the mind, 
 therefore, and manners, and conversation, be in you, my beloved 
 brethren, which were also in Christ Jesus; and if any man 
 among you object to this application of the law to the believer’s 
 life, only let that man be diligent and successful in cultivating 
 the fruits of the Spirit as enumerated in the gospel, and we shall 
 presently find him obeying, without intending it, the holy pre- 
 cepts of the moral law. We are not contending for any merit 
 in this observance of the law, either to recommend the sinner to 
 Christ, or, in conjunction with the righteousness of Christ, to 
 recommend the sinner to God. Such views we cordially disclaim, 
 and we sincerely grieve over that inveterate and pernicious pride 
 which mars by such views the free beauty of the gospel. But we 
 earnestly contend forthe inestimable blessing of holiness in heart 
 and life which is conferred upon every true Christian, and which 
 manifests itself in a growing conformity to the holy law of God, 
 or (what is the same thing) to the holy example of Jesus Christ. 
 
 “ Thankfulness and diligence and humbleness of mind are the 
 _ genuine characteristics of the true Christian, and in the exercise 
 of all these there is a direct reference to the law. 
 
 ‘1. The law proves an occasion of thankfulness to the Christian, 
 because it shows him—nothing else can show him—the extent 
 of the ruin in which he was involved, and the exceeding difficulty 
 of the task which Christ undertook to perform in his stead. No 
 created arm could have wrought that mighty work which caused 
 even the everlasting Son of the most high God to shrink and 
 tremble, and cry out in agony under the inconceivable weight 
 that pressed upon Him, when it pleased the Father to vindicate 
 the sanctions of His most holy law, by bruising His well-beloved 
 Son. And as the law thus shows the difficulty of the perform- 
 ance, so also it points out the perfection of its accomplishment. 
 Had Christ left one single precept of the law for the sinner to 
 
124 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 fulfil as a condition, all the rest would have been kept in vain ; 
 that one violated precept (according to the tenor of the covenant 
 of works) would have been sufficient to sink the soul into ever- 
 lasting ruin. But He kept it all: He finished His righteous 
 work ; He redeemed His people—from what? From the curse. 
 What curse? The curse of the law.. And in proportion as by 
 looking into that law they obtain clearer views of the fearfulness 
 of that curse, they shall have a more adequate sense of the mag- 
 nitude of the blessing bestowed upon them, which is the main- 
 spring of all their grateful thanksgiving. ‘ What shall I render 
 unto the Lord for all the benefits He hath done unto me?’ 
 ‘ Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’ 
 
 “2. Thus diligence springs up in the believer, as the legitimate 
 fruit of this thankfulness of spirit. Am I indeed rescued from 
 so dreadful a condemnation? Am I indeed saved at so great a 
 price? ‘Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’ And in answer 
 to this gracious inquiry, the law (and nothing else) points out 
 the nature and supplies the measure of the obedience which 
 God enjoins. The Old Testament and the New speak here with 
 one voice : Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart. 
 Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou 
 serve. Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Love not 
 the world, neither the things of the world. If any man love the 
 world, the love of the Father is. not in him ; and thou shalt love 
 thy Father who is in heaven with all thy heart and mind, and 
 soul and strength. 
 
 “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain ; 
 neither shalt thou swear at all by any oath, but be content with 
 a simple assertion or denial ; let your yea be yea, and your nay 
 nay, for whatsoever is more than this cometh of evil. Remem- 
 ber the Sabbath of the Lord thy God to keep it holy, calling it 
 a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable, not doing thine own 
 ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own 
 ‘words, but giving thyself wp to the service of the Lord thy God. 
 Honour thy father and thy mother, which is the first command-_ 
 ment with promise. Thou shalt not kill, no, nor be angry with 
 any man. Thou shalt not commit adultery, nor look upon a 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 125 
 
 
 
 woman to lust after her. Thou shalt not steal, nor covet any- 
 thing belonging to any man ; neither shalt shod go beyond nor 
 défrand thy brother in any transaction. Thou shalt not bear 
 false witness against thy neighbour, nor circulate, nor rejoice in, 
 nor exaggerate evil reports ; neither shalt thou attempt to justify ᾿ 
 thyself in any of these, by pleading provocation, for thou shalt 
 not retaliate, nor return evil for evil in anywise, but rather over- 
 come evil with good. Owe no man anything, but to love one 
 another ; for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. For 
 these commandments above enumerated, and if there be any 
 other commandment of the second table, all are briefly compre- 
 hended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as 
 thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour ; therefore love 
 is the fulfilling of the law. Give all ὙΤΑΤΕ: add to-your 
 faith virtue ; and to virtue, knowledge; and to knowledge, tem- 
 perance; and to temperance, patience; and to patience, godli- 
 ness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to beeen 
 
 kindness, love. This is the lawful use of the law, as the guide 
 and measure of the Christian's diligence. 
 
 “3. And the standard thus set ὯΝ when faithfully contem- 
 plated, proves an occasion for abundant humbleness of mind. 
 
 “ Seeing we are still so far, so very farfrom that holy height; 
 seeing that with all our striving to obey, we are still living in 
 too frequent disobedience ; that with all our earnest anxiety to 
 avoid sin, there is still sin in everything we do; not only in our 
 worldly transactions, but peculiarly in our prayers, and our 
 reading, and our attendance upon divine worship; such impa- 
 tience of temper, such wandering of thought and affections, such 
 forgetfulness and ingratitude, that we may well adopt the lan- 
 guage of the apostle labouring under the pressure of the same 
 ainfal conflict: ὁ We Doane that the law is spiritual; but I 
 am carnal, sold under sin. Oh wretched man that I am! who 
 shall deliver me from the body of this death?’ This is what 
 causes the Christian’s instinctive breathing, pardoned though he 
 be, and though he knows it, to echo and re-echo the prayer of 
 the publican, ‘ God, be merciful to me, a sinner.’”? 
 
 1 Sermon on the Lawful Use of the Law. 
 
126 The Church and the Phibihn 
 
 
 
 Call this an inconsistency if you will; it may be so in eS 
 
 or in cold metaphysics; but it is the warm flow of the very life- — 
 
 blood of experimental Christianity, ‘which passeth all under- 
 standing.” 
 
 And more particularly, see how, in such a passage as Eph. iv. 
 25—32, the word of God by the apostle inculcates on the members 
 of the Church truth, zeal, with self-command, honesty, diligence, 
 delicacy of language, watchfulness not to grieve in anything the 
 Holy Spirit of God, and all Christian tempers : “ Wherefore, 
 putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour : 
 for we are members one of another. Be ye angry, and sin not: 
 let not the sun go down upon your wrath: neither give place to 
 the devil. Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him 
 labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he 
 may have to give to him that needeth. Let no’ corrupt com- 
 munication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good 
 to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. 
 And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed 
 unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and 
 anger, and clamour, and evil-speaking, be put away from you, 
 with all malice. And be ye kind one to another, tender-hearted, 
 forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath for- 
 given you.” 
 
 Similar is that specifying exhortation to the Colossians (iii. 12, 
 13), “ Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, 
 bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long- 
 suffering ; forbearing one another, and forgiving one. another, if 
 any man have a quarrel against any : evenas Christ forgave you, 
 so also do ye.’ Subdued under a deep conviction of his own 
 manifold faults and provocations, and sustained by a conviction 
 equally deep of God’s free forgiveness of all his sins, the tried 
 member of the Church of God is qualified to bear long and 
 patiently with the faults and provocations of others. The word 
 of God is voluminous on this point in a variety of aspects. Solo- 
 mon says, “ He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding : 
 but he that is hasty of spirit exalteth folly” (Prov. xiv. 29). 
 And, “ A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment: for if thou 
 
 5 eae ie ΄. 
 
\ 
 
 The Church of God in Christ. 127 
 
 deliver him, yet thou must do it again” (Proy. xix. 19), And - 
 our Lord, in His sermon on the mount, supposes three extreme 
 cases of provocation, and inculcates in each the very extreme of 
 forbearance: 1. A personal assault. “ Whosoever shall smite 
 thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” 2. An 
 ageression upon property. ‘And if any man sue thee at the 
 law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.” 
 ὃ. An intrusion on time and convenience. “ Whosoever shall 
 compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain” (Matt. v. 39—41). 
 
 But neither does this gentle dealing stand alone in the word 
 
 -of God for the formation of the holy character of the Church. 
 ‘ Some members of the Church, though truly sincere, are com- 
 
 posed of less generous materials; and others, though susceptible 
 at some times of the tenderest emotions of grateful love, are at 
 other times not so. Selfish fear must be addressed for their 
 merciful preservation ; and 
 
 (3). The word of warning sounds its terrible alarm. It: 
 comes, indeed, with an IF; an IF which unconverted nature 
 disregards, and sins on, reckless of eternity, but which carries 
 a startling and restoring emotion to the Christian’s heart in the 
 
 _ hour of need. “For it is impossible for those who were once 
 
 enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were 
 made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good 
 word of God, and the powers of the world to come, ir they 
 shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance, seeing 
 they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him 
 
 -toan open shame. For the earth, which drinketh in the rain 
 
 that- cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them 
 by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God: but that 
 which beareth thorns and briars is rejected, and is nigh unto 
 cursing, whose end is to be burned” (Heb. vi. 4—8). True, it is 
 hypothetical ; true, the apostle softens it in what follows so as 
 to call attention to its hypothetical form and meaning (ver. 9), 
 “But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and 
 things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak.” True, 
 it may be applied, and perhaps properly (though I think, if such 
 an application be rested on as the only one of this passage, it 
 
128 The Church and the» Churches. 
 
 would amount to a practical evasion, as obsolete, of a word 
 
 which, like every word of God, liveth and abideth for ever), to’ 
 
 those who in the apostolic times had the miraculous teaching 
 and the miraculous powers of the Holy Ghost, but who were 
 really not converted to God. True, assurances that the members 
 of the Church of God shall not fall away are given frequently 
 and absolutely, without any hypothesis ; still the implication of 
 even the possibility that such an one may fall away, has its 
 place, its legitimate, its indispensable place, in the provision 
 which He who knows what is in all men has made in His, word 
 for the holiness of the Church. And many (who shall estimate 
 how many?) members of the Church shall give thanks to God 
 throughout eternity for the salutary fear and penitent trembling 
 whereby they have been seized at some critical moment or 
 moments of their lives, by hearing, or reading, or remembering 
 such a passage as this— 
 
 “For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the 
 knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for 
 sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery 
 indignation, which shall devour the adversaries’? (Heb. x. 26, 
 27). | 
 
 Again the language is hypothetical, and therefore not in verbal 
 contradiction to the strongest and’ most positive assurances of 
 the Church’s security. 
 
 Doubtless, also, this passage referred primarily to those 
 Hebrews who, after joining the primitive Church, were deterred 
 by the persecutions to which that Church was exposed, and 
 tempted to go back to Judaism under the notion that the 
 Jewish ἈΝΑ δὰ would still be available for their forgiveness, as 
 they had been for their forefathers; and that thus they might re- 
 tain the benefit of shedding of blood for the remission of sin, which 
 they knew to be a truth; and at the same time escape the ex- 
 posure to present danger by retiring from their Christian pro- 
 fession. To such the apostle says, that if they so wilfully sin, 
 there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin,—Judaism is now a 
 dead letter, instead of a living type. Still this does not exhaust 
 the meaning or application of these words; it- liveth and 
 
 Pe 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 129 
 
 Ἢ abideth for ever; and oh, how solemn it is, how awfully solemn, 
 how well calculated to silence the superficial chatterings of un- 
 concerned professors, and to harrow up the lower, more personal, 
 and selfish feelings of the Christian, who, for the time being, has 
 declined from the holy self-forgetting attraction of the ieee of 
 Jesus ! 
 
 Again the word of warning speaks: “For 1 after they 
 have escaped the, pollutions of the world, through the know- 
 ledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again 
 entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with 
 them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not 
 to have known the ways of righteousness, than, after they have 
 known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto 
 them. But it is happened unto them according to the true 
 proverb, “The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the 
 sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire”’ (2 Peter ii. 
 20—22). 
 
 Some readers of these pages may at this point be brought 
 into secret experimental conflict with some besetting sin pleading 
 deceitfully for indulgence; and while these words swim before 
 his eyes, he may be inwardly engaged in an agitating struggle 
 between a rising Christian resolve against, and a lingering 
 extenuation in favour of, his darling oe 
 _ The writer can only pray, and entreat his readers who through 
 grace have overcome in such conflicts, to jom him in prayer, 
 that a tempted brother may have power and strength to have 
 victory and to triumph over all those evils and instigations to 
 evil which the craft and subtlety of the devil or man worketh 
 against him. 
 
 (4.) But, further, there is a word of judgment addressed ' to the 
 sense of retribution which is in man, and a word of reward 
 addressed to the anticipations of hope. 
 
 These great truths do not rest upon an isolated text or two. 
 It is the habit of Scripture to speak of a judgment according 
 to works on both sides, and a varying reward for works ameng 
 the heirs of the kingdom. “Ah Lord God! behold Thou hast 
 _ made the heaven and earth by Thy great power and stretched 
 3 wea 
 
130 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 out arm, and there is nothing too hard for:'Thee; Thou showest 
 Jovinekindness unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquity 
 of the fathers into the bosom of their children after them: The 
 Great, the Mighty God, the Lord of Hosts, is His name; great 
 in counsel, and mighty in work: for thine eyes are open upon 
 the ways of the sons of men: to give every one according to his 
 ways, and according to the fruit of his doings” (Jer. xxxii. 17—19). 
 “For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ; 
 that every one may receive the things done in his body, accord- 
 ing to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor. 
 v.10). “ And I will kill her children with death; and all the 
 churches shall know that I am He which searcheth the reins and 
 hearts: and J will give unto every one of you according to your 
 works” (Rev. ii. 23). “ And I saw the dead, small and great, 
 stand before God: and the books were opened; and another 
 book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were 
 judged out of those things which were written in the books, 
 according to their works” (chap. xx. 12). “And, behold, I 
 come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man 
 according as his work shall be”’ (chap. xxii. 12). 
 
 This may suffice for the nature of the judgment, that it will 
 take its course, according to the nature of men’s works. We 
 have already seen how good works are produced in men. 
 
 But more particularly, as to the varying rewards among those 
 who have been made good. St. Paul declares it expressly in 
 speaking of himself and Apollos. Both were on the Lord’s 
 side; both were engaged in the ministry of the gospel; the one 
 planted, the other watered ; .and the apo adds, “ Now he that 
 planteth and he that watereth are one.” “ And every man shall 
 receive his own reward, according to his own labour” (1 Cor. iii, 8). 
 All who are in deed and in truth labouring for God shall be re- 
 warded, but not equally, it appears, unless their labours be equal. 
 
 The beloved disciple, in his second epistle to the elect lady and 
 her children, uses language which would be inexplicable but for 
 this truth: “Look to yourselves, that we lose not those things 
 which we have wrought, but that we receive a full reward” 
 
 (2 John 8). 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 131 
 
 
 
 Our Lord, also, in His instructions to His disciples, obviously 
 inculcates the same. His words are attended with some diff- 
 culty, and will repay a somewhat more detailed attention. He 
 sent forth the twelve ona high and glorious mission ; He invested 
 them with wonderful powers and privileges; He apprised them 
 of imminent dangers; and He encouraged them, and all who 
 would favour them, with gracious promises. “ Think not that I 
 am come to send peace on earth: I come not to send peace, but 
 a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his 
 father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter- 
 in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man’s foes shall be 
 they of his own household” (Matt. x. 3436). 
 
 The case of the disciples seemed to be indeed evil when thus 
 exposed. Who would receive them, who would admit them 
 into their houses, when such contentions were to be the conse- 
 quences? In order to secure them a reception, the Lord adds, 
 ver. 40, “He that receiveth you receiveth me; and he that 
 receiveth me receiveth Him that sent me.” And then, in appli- 
 cation to their followers in the ministry, he adds, ver. 41, “He 
 that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall receive 
 a prophet’s reward.’ And to all His people He adds, verses 
 41, 42, “ And he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of 
 a righteous man, shall receive a righteous man’s reward. And 
 whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup 
 of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto 
 you, he shall in nowise lose his reward.” 
 
 Acts of Christian kindness vary in their degrees of excellence, 
 in proportion as they approach the person of Christ, who is their 
 genuine object, and as they more largely partake of the love of 
 Christ, which is the genuine principle of all Christian kindness. 
 In the words now under our consideration, we have four classes 
 of such acts, enumerated and distinguished from each other by 
 the several and distinct promises made to them. ‘The first is 
 that of receiving the apostles, which, under all the circumstances 
 of the case, required a bold and decided confession of Christ 
 before men. So decided was this, that receiving them is de- 
 clared to be the same as receiving Him, as receiving Him is the 
 
132 The Church and the Churches. 
 same as receiving God, who sent Him. The second is receiving 
 a prophet. The third is receiving a righteous man. The fourth 
 is giving any relief, even a cup of water, to one of the least of 
 Christ’s disciples. The persons mentioned are of four sorts : 
 apostles, prophets, righteous men, and little ones. 
 
 The apostles, upon the death of Jesus, succeeded to the 
 government and direction of the Church. Under them were 
 placed teachers and pastors of different orders, who are compre- 
 hended under the general name of prophets. The two next 
 
 characters belong to the flock of Christ, and are distinguished ἢ 
 
 from one another only by their Christian progress. We read of 
 babes in Christ, and of young men, and of fathers (1 John ii.) 
 By the righteous man, I understand the advanced Christian, 
 whose more matured character and decisive testimony for Christ 
 would render an open reception of him more difficult to flesh 
 and blood, and therefore more honourable to his Divine Master. 
 By the little ones, I understand the babes in Christ, who, being 
 as yet undecided and timid, and not having drawn the attention 
 of men to them as Christians, might be received without in- 
 curring much reproach; but if required for Christ’s sake, such 
 an act of kindness to them should by no means lose its reward. 
 
 To receive a prophet in the name of a prophet is to receive 
 him because he is a prophet ; not because he is our relation and 
 friend, not because he is agreeable or clever, but because of his 
 character and office, and the relation he thus bears to Christ. 
 In like manner, to receive a righteous man, in the name of a 
 righteous man, is to receive him because he is a Christian; not 
 because of his natural qualities of relationship, but because of 
 his spiritual relationship in Christ. So also, to give a cup of 
 cold water to one of the little ones in the name of: a disciple, is 
 to do it because of that little one’s discipleship, not because of 
 their natural want, or their natural attachment to us, or any- 
 thing natural, but because they are members of Christ. 
 
 To these several acts of Christian kindness are graciously 
 
 promised several degrees of Christian reward. And there isa 
 beautiful appropriateness in the distribution. 
 He that receiveth, lodgeth, supplieth a prophet because he is 
 
 —> - 
 εν δὲ... ἃ Ἰ rte 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 133 
 
 a prophet, shall receive a prophet’s reward; and most appro- 
 priately, for he in fact performs a prophet’s duty. By enabling 
 the prophet to do the work of his high calling, he becomes the 
 doer of it. By feeding the mouth that preaches, he himself 
 preaches. 
 
 The same line of reasoning will apply to all the other instances 
 following. It.is' as if Jesus had said to the twelve, I am come 
 to send a sword upon the earth; you shall carry that sword far 
 and wide; you shall be hated for my name’s sake: but hold on, 
 and hold fast; bear your cross, and follow me; I have a people 
 in the world, and they will receive you. To receive you will be 
 to declare war with the world, it will be to risk a man’s life, it 
 will be to receive me as you have done, and they who do it 
 shall receive me; 1.6., they who receive an apostle shall receive 
 an apostle’s reward. ‘To receive any of your faithful successors 
 in the ministry, will be a trial of the attachment of men to me; 
 whosoever does it will show the same love to me that the prophet 
 himself shows; therefore, whosoever does it shall receive a 
 prophet’s reward. To receive a righteous man, a believer in 
 your doctrine, will be to profess attachment to me similar to 
 ‘that of the righteous man himself; therefore whosoever does it 
 shall receive a righteous man’s reward. ΤῸ receive any disciple 
 of mine, the most timid will evince some attachment to me, and 
 therefore whosoever does it shall have his reward, whatever it 
 miy be, according to what he hath done. 
 
 I am aware that many truly devoted members of the Church 
 - of God feel a strong repugnance to the anticipation of any 
 reward, conscious as they are that their best doings are not 
 good; but that, on the contrary, as Bishop. Beveridge has ex- 
 pressed it, “their repentance needs to be repented of, and their 
 tears to be washed in the blood of the Lamb;”’ yet surely, if 
 the Lord Himself, who is the judge, and who knows best, has 
 condescended to call the services of His faithful people good, — 
 if He has represented Himself as receiving such a one with the 
 cheering welcome, “ Well done, good and faithful servant ;” if 
 He has been pleased to promise rewards for such services, and 
 varying rewards to every faithful servant according as his work 
 
134 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 shall be; if this be so indeed (and how can it be gainsayed ?), 
 then, is it not an affectation of humility, under whatever subtle 
 disguise it may present itself, in any man who has the testimony 
 of his conscience that in simplicity and godly sincerity he is 
 serving God, not to anticipate a reward, and not to allow the 
 anticipation to form one ingredient in the mysterious system of 
 motives by which he is actuated? 
 
 To say that love to Christ is a constraining motive to holy 
 obedience, is to say truly. To say thatit is the most constraining 
 of all motives, is, I think, equally true, and by most members of 
 the Church of God it is felt to be so; but to say that it is the only 
 
 motive, is surely to charge (however unintentionally) upon Him. 
 
 who has addressed other motives in us, a work of needless 
 supererogation in inditing His holy Scriptures. For why does 
 He promise a reward if we are not to expect it? Is all He has 
 said upon the subject a mere flourish, devoid of meaning? Or 
 has He said it to us, without intending that we should attach 
 any meaning to it? And if we do attach a meaning to it, and 
 really expect Him to be as good as His word (not because we 
 deserve it, but because He has been pleased to say it), how is it 
 possible that such expectation should fail to mingle in our 
 motives for action? Surely there is an essential difference 
 between the foundation on which all blessings from God to 
 fallen man rest, and the measure in which those blessings shall 
 
 be distributed. Surely there is an essential difference between . 
 
 the union of a member in the body of Christ, and the station in 
 the body to be occupied by that member. All the members 
 are in the body, but are all shoulders? or are all hands? 
 The Church is the body of Christ, and the individuals composing 
 it are members in particular (1 Cor. xii. 27), each to occupy his 
 own place, and perform his own functions for ever and ever. 
 And what if the Lord the Head has plainly declared that the 
 station which each shall occupy in his body glorified, shall bear 
 a recognised proportion to the service of each in his body mili- 
 tant? Of the service He alone is the judge, and He is perfectly 
 cognizant of all the opportunities and lack of opportunities, of 
 all the helps and all the hindrances, which each: member has 
 
The Church of God in Christ. . 135 
 
 experienced during the entire of .his spiritual warfare. He 
 knows also how to enter experimentally into their struggles, 
 because He looks on, not as a stranger, in a cold theory of sym 
 pathy, but as a fellow-struggler, who has toiled on the same 
 road, who has suffered being tempted, and who is touched with 
 a feeling of every infirmity of every member; and for this 
 gracious reason among others, is all judgment committed to 
 Him, because He is. the Son of man (Heb. ii. 18, and iv. 15; 
 St. John ν. 27). 
 
 Thus, taking into consideration all holy Scripture as it is 
 given by inspiration of God, and all the varieties of constitu- 
 tional character ard feeling and experience presented by the 
 Church of God, it is on His sacred word, blessing, guiding, 
 warning, promising, all of it rendered effectual by the promised 
 teaching and influences of the Holy Spirit, that we rely for the 
 production of holiness, in principle and practice, in the members 
 of His Church. We believe that the manifestations of such 
 holiness will vary, as individuals vary in outward appearance as 
 well as in inward disposition. We do not dare, we would not 
 wish, to attain uniformity of manifestation, an automaton holi- 
 ness by an artificial discipline, a sort of Procrustes’ bed, to the 
 dimensions of which the short must be stretched, and the long 
 crippled or amputated. ‘ Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there 
 
 -is liberty’ (2 Cor. iii. 17), and therefore we repudiate all such 
 ecclesiastical drills as are now gravely commended to our appro- 
 bation. Independent of what we are deeply convinced to be 
 the falsehood and idolatry involved in some of them,! we reject 
 
 1 “To give this inquiry all the force of a practical comparison, I will append 
 an account sent me for publication by the superior of a priest’s seminary in 
 France, who is describing a system of which he has had for years the personal 
 cognisance and direction. It must be acknowledged, I think, that priests so 
 trained are likely to enter on their ministrations with no very inadequate con- 
 ception of the primary necessity of spiritual discipline, and no very inadequate 
 power of understanding and sympathising with the spiritual difficulties and 
 distresses of the humblest of the flock. 
 
 “Tn order to form our candidates for the priesthood to the holiness necessary 
 to the state of life for which they are destined, the rule prescribes the following 
 methods :— 
 
 “i, Vocal prayer at half-past five in the morning. Itis short, and proceeds 
 
136 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the drill as such; because, however valuable, or even indispens- 
 able, such treatment may be to prepare soldiers for this world 
 (unthinking machines, to move in masses at the word of the 
 commanding officer), it can never prepare them for that “rea- 
 sonable service” to which the soldiers of Jesus Christ are 
 called. It is consummate policy in those who wish to make 
 the Church appear co-extensive with the community ; that is, . 
 to appear what it is not, and what it can never be, until by 
 some competent authority, a large portion of the New Testament 
 shall be pronounced obsolete. But for those who are more con- 
 
 as follows:—1. The student puts himself in the presence of God, by a special 
 act of faith in the truth of His universal presence, and adores Him. 2. He 
 thanks God for the gift of the day thus beginning, and consecrates to Him all 
 his actions, promising to do them all in imitation of Him. 3. He recites in the 
 ecclesiastical language the Pater Noster, Ave Maria, and Credo. 4. He com- 
 mends himself to the Blessed Virgin, to his patron saint, to his guardian angel, 
 that they may watch over and protect him during the day, and by their 
 prayers obtain for him the grace of which he has need. The whole concludes 
 with acts ee faith, hope, and charity, of contrition and renewal of baptismal 
 promises.”— Ward's Ideal, etc., pp. 317, 318. 
 
 Then follow similar directions, under the heads i ii. Mental paves or Medita- 
 tion; ili. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass; iv. Holy Scripture ; v. Spiritual 
 Reading; vi. Examination of Conscience; vii. Visit to the Holy Sacrament ; 
 viii. Spiritual Conference; ix. The Chapel; x. Evening Prayer; xi. Studies, 
 Lectures (classes), and Meals are begun and concluded with Prayer, Also in 
 the morning, at midday, and in the evening, the prayer called the Angelus is 
 recited, and this is done to pay honour to the mysteries of the Annunciation 
 and ‘Incarnation; xii. Confession; xiii. Holy Communion; xiv. The Monitor; 
 xy. The Spiritual Director ; xvi. The Relations with the Superior; xvii. The 
 Retreat ; xviii. The Vacation ;—all tending to fix attention on the routine itself, 
 rather than on any object in view by it; or more properly speaking, to make the 
 recurring regularity of the routine its own object, and thus to emulate the 
 scrupulous punctiliousness of those ancient devotees concerning whom the Lord 
 said, ‘“ This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me 
 with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship 
 me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men” (St. Matt. xy. 8, 9). 
 
 ᾿ On this point proofs may be multiplied from the experience, the number, 
 and the character of the true members of the true Church of God, as largely 
 described in the New Testament. 
 
 “Concerning the experience of true Christians under this dispensation, we 
 read that ‘all who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution’ 
 (2 Tim. iii. 12). ‘Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute 
 you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake *(St. Matt. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 137 
 
 
 
 / 
 
 cerned about realities than SPE err: this mode of treatment 
 possesses no charms. 
 
 God loveth a cheerful worshipper, as well as a cheerful giver; 
 and the children of God are bound by the strongest ties to 
 stand fast in the holy liberty wherewith Christ had made them 
 free, and not to be entangled again in the yoke of bondage 
 (Gal. ν. 1). It is their privilege to sing unto the Lord, and 
 heartily to rejoice in the strength of their salvation: to rejoice 
 in the Lord always; again, saith the apostle, to rejoice: to 
 sing to the harp with a psalm of thanksgiving. Praise is 
 
 y. 11). ‘If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because 
 ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the 
 »world hateth you’ (St. John xv. 19). ‘Suppose ye that I am come to send 
 peace on earth? I tell you, Nay, but rather division: for from henceforth there 
 shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three’ 
 (St. Luke xii. 51—453), etc., etc. ‘Anda man’s foes shall be they of his own 
 household ’ (St. Matt. x. 36). 
 
 “ Concerning the nwmber of true believers, we read, Matt. xxii. 14, ‘ Many are 
 called, but few are chosen.’ Matt. vii. 13, 14, 24, 22, 23,‘ Enter ye in at the 
 strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruc- 
 tion, and many thére be which go in thereat; because strait is the gate and 
 narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. Not 
 every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of 
 heaven; but he that doeth’ the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many 
 will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name ? 
 and in Thy name cast out devils? and in Thy name done many wonderful works? 
 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that 
 work iniquity.’ 
 
 “Concerning the character of true believers, we read, 1 John ii. 15, ‘Love 
 not the world, neither the things of the world. If any man love the world, the 
 love of the Father isnot in him ;’ James vi. 4,‘ The friendship of the world is 
 enmity with God; whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world, he is the 
 enemy of God ;’ 2 Cor. vi. 17, ‘ Wherefore, come out from among them, and be 
 ye separate, saith the Lord.’ ‘And I beseech you, by the mercies of God,’ 
 saith the apostle, ‘that ye be not conformed to this world’ (Rom. xii. 1, 2). 
 
 “These passages of Scripture avowedly belong to this dispensation. They 
 have applied in every age, and do still apply, to the true disciples of the Lord 
 Jesus. On the supposition that we have rightly interpreted the language of St. 
 James at the council of Jerusalem, and that the design of this dispensation is 
 to take a people out of the Gentiles, these scriptures will continue to apply to the 
 end of this dispensation ;. but on the supposition that the dispensation is to 
 enlarge itself by degrees into the universal blessedness predicted by the 
 prophets, then these scriptures will not continue toapply. And who is to deter- 
 
138 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 comely. It is a good thing to give thanks, to make our boast 
 in the Lord, and say, If God be for us, who can be against us ? 
 
 He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us 
 
 aul, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things ? 
 Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God 
 that justifieth, who is he that condemneth? I will work, and 
 who shall let it? saith Jehovah of hosts. It is Christ the 
 crucified, the risen, that ever liveth to make intercession for us ; 
 who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Thus saith the 
 Lord, the eternal Word, the first-born of every creature, the 
 head of His body the Church, “I have loved thee with an ever- 
 lasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn 
 thee;” “TI will not turn away from thee to do thee good; and 
 IT will pas my spirit in your hearts, that you shall not depart 
 from me.” 
 
 And thus, in sweetest harmony, nahh the Church, “ I am 
 
 mine at what point of the progress they cease to be applicable? If the world 
 become Christian, the world will no longer persecute Christians. If all the 
 families of the earth be blessed with eternal life, the way of life will be no 
 longer narrow. If the world become Christian, then Christians cannot separate 
 from the world. It is obvious that in the transition from our present state to a 
 state of universal holiness, these characteristic sayings of the New Testament 
 
 must cease to have any application, and become obsolete, not to say false. And- 
 
 again, I ask, who is to determine at what point of the progress they cease to 
 apply? If it be answered, when the more favourable circumstances of the 
 Church cease to require them, the question recurs, who is to judge of those 
 circumstances? Some persons in this country think that already trwe religion 
 is not thus exposed to hatred and enmity, but only extravagance and enthu- 
 siasm, provoking a cross for themselves; while others consider such an opinion 
 as a proof that those who hold it are themselves ignorant of what true religion 
 is. We maintain, therefore, that as the statutes of the book of Leviticus con- 
 tinued binding until another plain and direct communication from the God who 
 gave them showed that they were superseded, and a better order of things 
 introduced, so these scriptures, describing the experience, the number, and the 
 character of the Lord’s people under this dispensation, must continue applicable 
 till another plain and direct communication from Him who gave them shall 
 show that they are superseded, and a still better order of things introduced. 
 This communication we expect at the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ ; 
 and, consequently, we conclude that we haye no reason to expect, until the 
 coming of the Lord, any such change in the aspect of the Church as would 
 falsify or neutralise these statements of the New Testament.”—The Author's 
 Lectures on the Prophecies. 
 
 —— eo a 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 139 
 
 _ persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor princi- 
 palities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 
 nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to 
 separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ our 
 Lord.” 
 
 IV. I proceed now to consider the nature and amount of the 
 holiness which we have scriptural reason to expect in the 
 members of the Church of God, while here on earth. 
 
 As a general answer ‘to this inquiry, and for the purpose of 
 giving order to a more particular examination into it, I state — 
 these three characteristics of Christian holiness. It is, 
 
 (1) Habitually sincere ; 
 
 (2) Upon the whole progressive ; 
 
 (3) At the best imperfect. 
 
 (1) Habitually sincere. The descriptions given by the 
 apostle Paul and by the Psalmist, of their own habitual state of 
 mind with reference to the great standard of holiness, the law 
 of God, are to be considered, not as of private or personal ex- 
 clusiveness, but as of general and transferable application. 
 They express the deliberate convictions and conscientious pre- 
 ferences of all the true members of that body, or Church, to 
 which they themselves belonged. “I delight in the law of God 
 after the inward man;” ‘ With the mind I myself serve the 
 law of God” (Rom. vii. 21, 25). “Oh, how I love Thy law!” 
 “T love Thy commandments above gold, yea, above fine gold.” 
 “T esteem all Thy precepts, concerning all things to be right, 
 and I hate every false way ” (Psalm exix.). 
 
 It is not alleged that all the true members of the Church of 
 Christ are always in this state of mind, without variation and 
 without interruption. “ The heart is deceitful above all things, 
 and desperately wicked; who can know it?” “ Who can tell 
 how oft he offendeth?” But Ido think the passages here cited 
 are accurately descriptive of the habitual state of mind, as to 
 the conscious preference, of every real Christian. It is with 
 reference to this habit of mind, and not with reference to some 
 
140 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 occasional act or temper, that the beloved disciple writes, when 
 he says, “ Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for 
 his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he 
 is born of God” (1 John iii. 9). These remarkable words, 
 if taken absolutely, would contradict expressly, not only other 
 passages of Scripture, but also the facts of the case, as recorded 
 in the histories of even the apostles themselves. Tried by such 
 
 a standard, neither James nor John, neither Paul nor Peter, 
 
 could be pronounced to be “born of God.” But the words, 
 however taken, cannot in fairness be understood to mean less 
 than habitual sincerity of purpose, effectually excluding any 
 harboured, deliberate, and continued course of evil. 
 
 Whatever subtlety some besetting temptation may for a time 
 possess, ensnaring the real Christian into even an intention to 
 sin, it can be but for a time, as a passing cloud. A continued 
 habitual intention to sin is absolutely incompatible with true 
 religion. No member of Christ’s body can live in it. 
 
 This has been illustrated simply and well, by the possibility 
 of a man falling into the’ water, and the impossibility of his 
 living under the water. To be thrown into.the water suddenly, 
 unintentionally, reluctantly; nay, in a moment of excitement 
 wilfully to leap into the water; nay, in an hour of delusion 
 deliberately to plan and execute a fall into the water,—all these 
 are compatible with human life: the man may arise again out 
 of the water, and alive. But, in whatever way’ he may have 
 got in, to remain under the water is incompatible with human 
 life: the element is too thick; the man who continues in it dies. 
 And what water is in this respect to human life, sin is to 
 true religion. The sincere Christian may be thrown into it, 
 suddenly, unintentionally, reluctantly, and spring out again the 
 next moment; or he may, as I have said, be so far beguiled as, 
 actually for a time to intend it; but owing to the new creation 
 within him, the .seed of God that has taken root in him, the 
 Holy Ghost who dwelleth in him, it has become impossible for 
 him to remain in it. The life given him in Christ Jesus is 
 eternal life. Habitual continuance in allowed sin would destroy 
 it ; but it cannot be destroyed; the sure word of God con- 
 
 ed 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 141 
 
 cerning Him is, “He shall not come into condemnation ” (St. 
 John y. 24); “ Sin shall not have dominion over him” (Rom. 
 vi. 14). Therefore he cannot continue in known sin. His 
 holiness, however occasionally interrupted, will be habitually 
 sincere, corresponding with that characteristic of the blessed 
 man in the Old Testament, “in whose spirit there is no 
 guile.” 
 
 (2) Upon the whole ‘progressive. . Whatever interruptions 
 may occur in the holiness of the Christian, such as those now 
 alluded to, they do not and cannot prevent its growth upon 
 the whole. The members of Christ, with reference to the new 
 life of God in their souls, are compared to “ babes,” and the 
 word of God is the “sincere milk” by which the babes “grow” 
 to be, young men, and advance to the maturity, of wisdom and 
 discernment, characteristic of fathers in Christ (1 Peter ii. 2 ; 
 1 John ii. 12—14). It isnot on any positive degree of attainment 
 in his own character, such as might safely. content him, without 
 any addition to it, that the real Christian relies. His reliance 
 is on Christ, and his desire is to be like Christ. Christ is all 
 and in all to him; his rock from the first, his example to the 
 last. What he is looking for is progress. At all stages, from 
 the beginning, and unto the end, what he looks for, and aims 
 at, is progress. What he is predestinated to arrive at, is 
 conformity to God’s dear Son.t To this end Christ has ap- 
 prehended, or laid hold of, him; and his master object is to 
 apprehend, or lay hold of, that for which he is apprehended 
 of-Christ.” 
 
 Here, again, we appeal to the example of the apostle Paul, _ 
 who in a figure transferred to himself for our sakes (1 Cor. iv. 6), 
 and exhibited in the glass of his own experience, this genuine 
 characteristic*of the members of the Church of God. He an- 
 nounces a great change which had taken place in his character 
 and opinions. His national and hereditary privileges, his zeal 
 for the Jews’ religion, and his righteousness according to the 
 law, on which he had before depended for salvation, or, as he 
 expresses it, which “ were gain” to him, had ceased to be so. 
 
 * Rom, viii. 29, ? Phil, iii, 12. 
 
142 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 He had given them all up, “ counting them for loss,” for Christ. 
 Then, not content with this description of a past change, he 
 proceeds to express, in the strongest terms, his present feelings, 
 his abiding and animating desires for the time to come. “ Yea, 
 doubtless; and I count,’’—not only I did so once, but I do still, 
 it is my deliberate and cherished judgment and feeling,—* I 
 count all things but loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of 
 Christ Jesus, my Lord.’ Then, looking forward, he adds, 
 “that I may win Him,” not as though I had won Him, either 
 were already found in Him, but “that I may win Him, and be 
 found in Him, not having mine own righteousness, which is 
 of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the 
 righteousness which is of God by faith.” And, further, I have 
 another object in view, for which I count all my former pursuits 
 and privileges as dross: it is, “that I may know Christ ;” that 
 I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the 
 fellowship of His sufferings, “being made conformable unto 
 His death.” Not as though I did already know Him (though 
 I do know Him already well enough to prefer Him above all 
 things), but that I may know Him, “being made conformable 
 unto His death; if by any means I might attain unto the resur- 
 rection of the dead. Not as though I had already attained, 
 either were already perfect; but I follow after, if that I may 
 apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Jesus Christ. 
 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended; but this 
 one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, 
 and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press 
 toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in 
 Christ Jesus.’? What a spirit-stirring description of progress 
 is here! yes, the Christian’s tendency is forward. God said to 
 Moses, ‘ Say to the people that they go forward. * Joshua, the 
 servant of the Lord, exhorted the heen saying, “ There re- 
 maineth yet much land to be possessed.” 
 
 Hosea the prophet says, ‘‘ Then shall we know, if we follow on 
 to know, the Lord” (vi. 3). . “ Beholding with open face, as in 
 a glass the glory of the Lord,” the true members of the Church 
 
 4 Phil, iti, 7—14, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 143 
 
 of God are progressively “changed into the same image, from 
 glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor. iii. 18). 
 Objections to this statement may occur to the reader’s mind. 
 It may be, as it has been, urged, that the scriptural histories of 
 the most eminent saints are practical contradictions of such a 
 statement. It may be asked, Is not the unbelieving falsehood 
 of Abraham a contradiction to it? the adultery of David, the 
 vain glory of Hezekiah, the apostasy and blasphemy of Peter ? 
 I answer, No, in nowise. There may be progress—real, sound, 
 advancing progress—-and still no perfection. To grow in holiness 
 is one thing; to become incapable of any deviation into sin is 
 quite another thing. Compare a robust man of forty with a 
 delicate child of four years old; who can deny that the man has 
 made progress in the power of walking beyond what the child 
 has made? Yet he stumbled and fell yesterday, and the child 
 walked and ran about all day without falling. Abraham 
 stumbled and fell, yet he had made real progress in “ walking 
 with God.” Again, contemplate’ a sick man, whose disease has 
 relaxed every muscle and enervated every joint of his body; he 
 cannot move his limbs, he cannot turn in his bed, he cannot 
 feed himself. Compare him with a healthy child: his limbs and 
 joints and muscles have made great progress towards strength 
 beyond those of the child, and yet at this moment the child is 
 stronger than he. David had a severe attack of spiritual sickness: 
 the powers of his life of faith were paralysed; his watchfulness 
 in holy devotion was gone; his resistance against sin was pros- 
 ‘trated before the prevailing power of the temptation; yet he 
 had, upon the whole, made great progress in spiritual life, as 
 the depth and bitterness of his repentance afterwards most satis- 
 factorily prove. Once more, look up into the heavens. The sun 
 does not shine so bright now, at eleven o’clock, as it did this 
 _ morning at seven, soon after its rise. Yet it has been making 
 progress towards its meridian. It may be behind a cloud for a 
 season—a deep, darkening cloud—but upon the whole it makes 
 progress. “ The path of the just,” of the true Christian, “is as 
 the shining light, which shineth more and more unto the perfect 
 day.” He may indeed be obscured for a season, and to a 
 
144 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 superficial observer he may seem to retrograde; but upon the 
 - whole he makes progress. 
 
 After his greatest progress, however, he continues dependent 
 —as entirely dependent on the upholding grace of God as he 
 
 was in his spiritual infancy; so that, if it were possible that 
 
 after many years of spiritual living he could be entirely forsaken 
 of the Holy Spirit, he would instantly be as carnal as if he had 
 
 never been spiritual, as dead to God as if he had never been | 
 
 alive. | Neither is there any contradiction or inconsistency in 
 this. “The life of the flesh is in the blood.” The life of the 
 spirit is in the Holy Ghost. Let the blood (the circulation of 
 natural life) be taken from the flesh of a man of fifty years old, 
 and from the flesh.of an infant, and both are instantly and equally 
 dead. Yet between infancy and fifty years of age a real bond 
 fide increase had taken place in the amount and power of animal 
 life. Still, after all, the holiness of the Christian in this life is 
 
 (3) At the best imperfect. 
 
 This is implied in what has been already said; for if perfec- 
 tion were once attained, there could remain no more room for 
 progress. But we have seen it to be the duty, the habit, the 
 instinct of the real Christian, to aim at progress as long as he 
 lives. ‘If we say we have no sin, we do indeed deceive our- 
 selves, and the truth is not in us” (1 Johni. 8). It is true that 
 the member of Christ is “ created anew after the image of Him 
 that created him” (Col. iii.. 10). But this lovely image is 
 obscured by fleshy mists which rise and float around it. These 
 are not the same in all. They vary with the prevailing sins by 
 which each is most easily beset. And here the treachery of 
 the heart betrays itself afresh, secretly pleading to have some 
 favourite indulgence spared, on the ground that perfection is 
 impossible of attainment. It is so, and will be found after every 
 the most strenuous and persevering, effort; but to make this an 
 excuse for wilfully relaxing the effort, is an abuse of the truth, 
 and a deception of ourselves. 
 
 Perfection is unattainable in this life, because to whatever 
 extent the spirit may be sanctified and assimilated to God, the 
 flesh is still under the original curse. We are in a body of 
 
 SS ae. a a 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 145 
 
 humiliation (ταπεινώσεως, Phil. iii. 21), a body of sin and 
 death. At the resurrection we shall have perfection in holiness, 
 when this mortal shall have put on immortality, and this cor- 
 ruptible shall have put on incorruption ; but for the present 
 “the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together ; 
 and not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits 
 of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting 
 for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.” * 
 
 For what is a member of the Church of God? What is a 
 Christian indeed? The question isa simple one, but a scrip- 
 tural answer to it is fraught with most excellent wisdom. A 
 real Christian is an immortal compound being, consisting of two 
 essential parts ; first, of all that which other men consist of, body 
 and soul, with the powers, passions, and infirmities thereunto 
 belonging ; and, secondly, of that which no other man except a 
 real Christian possesses—viz., that which is born in him, and 
 sustained in him by the Holy Spirit of God. And what is that? 
 I answer in the words of the Lord: “ That which is born of the 
 Spirit is spirit.”? Hence the apostle calls the Christian a 
 spiritual man (avevparixos), as distinguished from all others, who 
 are called natural or soulish men (puyexor).” 
 
 By a true member of the true Church of God, then, I would 
 be understood to mean, a man or woman who possesses, not 
 only a human body with all its wants, infirmities, and lusts, and 
 a human soul with all its capacities, but also a heaven-born 
 spirit with all its holiness; a man or woman in whom this spirit 
 does not acquire such an ascendancy as to resist effectually and 
 at all times the desires and motions of the natural body and 
 soul,—this would be perfection: and in whom the natural body 
 and soul do not retain such an ascendancy as to overbear 
 effectually and at all times the motions and desires of the spirit, 
 —this would be unconverted nature: but a man or woman, in 
 whom nature born of Adam, and spirit born of God, both live, 
 and live contrary the one to the other, so that the Christian 
 cannot do the things that he would do. To will is present with 
 him—the spirit is willing; but how to perform that which is good 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 22, 23. 2 St. John iii. 6. 2 1 Cor. ii. 
 10 
 
146 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 he finds not—the flesh is weak. With the mind he serves the 
 law of God, witn the flesh the law of sin.’ The spirit would be 
 holy; nature cannot. Nature would be unholy; the spirit 
 cannot. The spirit would be like God; nature cannot. Nature 
 would be like. Satan; the spirit cannot. A bird of paradise is 
 ‘detained in a cage of fallen humanity. The cage cannot kill the 
 bird, the bird cannot free itself from the cage, neither can it 
 transform the cage into its own likeness. It flutters and falls 
 back. It sighs for liberty, and flutters again. It quiets itself 
 in patience, and sings in hope of deliverance; and thus it must 
 flutter and sigh, and sing and wait, till the cage is removed. | 
 “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” 
 “To depart and be with Christ is far better; ’’ but concerning 
 that state of existence, little is revealed. Much has indeed been 
 fancied. Sentiment and poetry and heresy have been busy 
 here. Tender hearts, vivid imaginations, and guilty consciences, 
 have all been eloquent. But the word of God, from which 
 alone satisfactory information on such a subject could be derived, 
 is silent; with the exception of a few general, very general in- 
 timations, quite silent. Lazarus, who was permitted to live 
 among men after having been four days absent from the body, 
 did not, as far as we can learn from the sacred narrative, utter 
 one syllable upon the subject. 
 ~ ΤῈ is at the resurrection of the body, and not before, that the 
 Church of God, perfected in the holiness of each member, and 
 perfected in the then complete assembly of all the members, 
 shall be “ presented to the Lord, her Head, a glorious church, 
 not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but holy and 
 without blemish”? (Eph. v, 27). As we have borne the image 
 of the earthy (the first Adam), wé shall also bear the image of 
 the heavenly (the second Adam). But every man in his own 
 order; Christ the first-fruits; afterwards they that are Christ’s 
 (οἱ χριστοῦ) at His coming; when He shall change our vile 
 bodies, that they may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, 
 according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all 
 things unto Himself (1 Cor. xv.; Phil. iii.). “Then shall I be 
 1 Gal. νυ, 16—18; Rom. vii. 18, 25, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 147 
 
 satisfied,” exclaims the Psalmist, “ when I awake with Thy like- 
 ness” (Psalm xvii. 15). ὃ 
 
 This is “the blessed hope” to which the Church of God in all 
 ages has looked forward as her “ perfect consummation and 
 bcs, both in body and soul.” The language of one of her 
 _ most distinguished members in ancient times was, “‘ J know that 
 _my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day 
 upon the earth:” so far the language might be applied to the 
 - first coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, when He stood in our 
 nature on the earth; but what follows cannot be so applied, 
 neither can it be fulfilled unto the resurrection of the body, for 
 the patriarch added, “ And though after my skin worms destroy 
 this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God” (Job xix. 25, 26). 
 
 Saint Paul, before Felix, said, “I have hope toward God, 
 which they themselves (the J ewe also allow, that there shall be 
 a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust.” And 
 when answering for ἜΤ before King Agrippa, he said, “ I 
 stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God 
 unto our fathers: unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly 
 serving God day and night, hope to come. For which hope’s 
 sake, King Agrippa, I am accused of the Jews. Why should it 
 be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise 
 the dead ?” (Acts xxiv. 15; xxvi.6—8). The resurrection then, 
 including the perfected holiness of the Church, was the promise 
 made of God unto the Jewish fathers. All who believed, having 
 obiained a good report through faith, received not the promise 
 (the thing promised). They had it in word, saw it afar off, were 
 persuaded of it, embraced it, confessed that they were strangers 
 and pilgrims here waiting for it, but they received it not in fact 
 (Heb. xi.). It was not God’s plan to bestow this consummation 
 upon the members of Christ’s body seriatim (day by day, as He 
 bestows spiritual renewal), but simultaneously, in the twinkling 
 
 1«“ The Old Testament is not contrary to the New; for both in the Old and 
 New Testament everlasting life is offered to mankind by Christ, who is the only 
 Mediator between God and man, being both God and man. Wherefore they are 
 not to be heard, which feign that the old fathers did look only for transitory 
 promises.”—Art. vii. 
 
148 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 ef an eye at the last trump. He has prepared that better thing 
 for us who believe in these last days, as well as for them; that 
 they should not be made perfect without us (Heb. xi. 40), but 
 that they with us, and we with them, should be made perfect — 
 together. 
 
 And now we ask, if what has been here written be a scrip- 
 tural account of the holiness of the Church of God, where are ' 
 the members of that Church to be found? What community 
 among men can advance any scriptural claim to the name of 
 “the Church of God” ? Can the Greek, or the Roman, or the 
 English, or the Scotuh—which all call themselves churches—can 
 any one of them, or can they all taken together, be called, with 
 scriptural propriety, the Church of God? Will all their mem- 
 bers, or a majority of their members, or even in the most favour- 
 able instance, will any considerable proportion of their members 
 bear comparison for a moment with what the Word of God ἡ 
 describes as indispensable in every member of the Church of 
 God? It is not denied that these and other sections of those 
 “ who profess and call themselves Christians” may in a different 
 sense be called churches ; but this admission does not invalidate 
 or weaken in the slightest degree the conclusion we are com- 
 pelled to arrive at—viz., that it is an usurpation, wholly unten- 
 able on scriptural grounds, for any or all of them to assume the 
 title of the Church of God, the Catholic Church. They all contain, 
 and recognise, and sanction, and caress, multitudes whom the 
 Church of God utterly repudiates. For the Church of God is holy, 
 not as a corporation, in virtue of its office, and in defiance of the 
 unholiness of its living members, but as a body consisting of 
 members each of which discharges its own holy office; not as 
 an aggregate invested with ideal holiness, though composed— 
 in the far greater part—of unholy items, but as a company of 
 men, and women, and children, in each of whom the Holy Spirit 
 of God really dwells, maintaining against all opposition, and 
 gently strengthening under every pressure, faith, and hope, and 
 love—these three; and the greatest of these is love. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS APOSTOLICITY. 
 
 Apostolicity, what ?—Romish Definition of it—Scriptural Definition of it—The 
 Apostles’ “" Doctrine and Fellowship ”—Without the Doctrine no apostolical 
 Church—Proofs—Dr. Barrow—Mr. Palmer—Opposition to this on the 
 Hypothesis of Development Answered—Tertullian—Apostles’ Fellowship, 
 what ?—Connexion with the Doctrine—Succession cannot Secure either 
 the Doctrine or the Fellowship—Proofs—Claims to Infallibility from Ana- 
 logy with the Jewish Church Answered—Where is an Apostolical Church 
 to be Found ?—Only among Spiritual Men—Proofs. 
 
 APOSTOLICITY is not a word which I would have invented, or of 
 choice adopted; but as it is commonly enumerated among the 
 distinguishing and indispensable notes of the true visible Church, 
 I am anxious to show the vitally important sense in which I 
 think it may be applied as descriptive of the Church of God in 
 Christ. 
 
 I must premise, however, that I do not adopt the term in the 
 meaning usually assigned to it by controversialists, and there- 
 fore Iam bound to state explicitly in what meaning I do adopt 
 it. For clearness’ sake I shall do this by contrast. 
 
 Apostolicity, as commonly understood in this controversy, 
 signifies the manifest succession of the pastors and bishops of 
 the Church in ordination after ordination, and, consecration 
 after consecration, in an unbroken chain, from the apostles 
 down to our own times; which succession, it is alleged, is a 
 proof that the Church possessing it is the Catholic Church of 
 Christ. 
 
 Messrs. Kirk and Berington, in their “ Compendium of Roman 
 Doctrine,” open their chapter on apostolicity thus— 
 
150 ~The Church and the Churches. 
 
 “ SUCCESSION FROM THE APOSTLES. 
 “ SCRIPTURE. 
 
 “Matt. xxviii. 19, 20. ‘Go ye, therefore, and teach all 
 nations : baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all 
 things whatsoever I have commanded you.’ 
 
 “ Acts ii. 41,42. ‘There were added to them about three 
 thousand souls; and they were persevering in the doctrine of 
 the apostles.’ 
 
 “ Hph. iv. 11—14.. ‘And He gave some apostles, and some 
 prophets, and others some evangelists, and others some pastors 
 and doctors: for the perfecting of saints for the work of the 
 ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all meet 
 into the unity of faith. That henceforth we be no more. children, 
 tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doc- 
 trine.’ 
 
 “Heb. xiii. 7, 17. ‘Remember your prelates who have spoken 
 to you the word of God; whose faith follow, considering the 
 end of their conversation—obey your prelates, and be subject 
 to them. For they watch ὁ as being to render an account of your 
 - souls.’ ”?? 
 
 This is the only attempt made by these gentlemen to show 
 that their doctrine of Apostolicity is confirmed by Scripture, 
 and it must be confessed that the foundation they build upon is 
 not very clear to their purpose. They have not condescended 
 to point out how, these passages of Scripture support their 
 opinions; but after what is here transcribed, they proceed with- 
 out further comment to cite from the Fathers. 
 
 It is to one of the passages of holy Scripture quoted above 
 _ that I now refer, as giving the true idea of genuine apostolicity, 
 
 ‘ The Faith of Catholics, etc. London: Booker. 1830. Second edition, pp. 
 62, 63. This compilation is used as a text-book by the Roman priests in this 
 country, notwithstanding Mr, Pope’s unanswered exposure of its disgraceful mis- 
 quotations from the Fathers. 
 
 ~? 
 
 Se Τ᾿ ὦ, ιν». ἰ 
 
The Church of Got om Christ. 151 
 
 
 
 It is St. Luke’s description of the first important accession to the 
 infant Christian Church. 
 
 “The same day there were added unto them about three 
 thousand souls. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ 
 doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread and in prayers ” 
 (Acts ii. 41, 42). 
 
 By Riyastolicity: tions I would be understood to mean 
 “ steadfast continuance in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship.” 
 
 I shall now endeavour to show— 
 
 I. That’ without such continuance, there can be no apostolical 
 Church: 
 
 II. That regular unbroken succession, even if it could be 
 proved, would not secure this indispensable conformity to the 
 apostles, either in doctrine or fellowship; and therefore, 
 
 III. That in looking for a true apostolic Church we must look 
 along the line, not of ecclesiastical succession alone since the 
 days of the apostles, but rather of continuance in a doctrine and 
 
 fellowship which will bear accurate comparison with the doctrine 
 and fellowship of the apostles, as described in the holy Scriptures. 
 
 I. First, then, the apostolicity of the Church of God in 
 Christ consists in a steadfast continuance in the apostles’ doctrine. 
 
 This is so clear, so true, so infallible a mark of the Church of 
 .God, that when any company of men professing and calling 
 themselves a Church refuse to be tried by it, there arises irre- 
 sistibly a prima facie suspicion that they are conscious to them- 
 selves of holding doctrine which will not bear comparison with 
 the apostles’ doctrine. If not, why object to the test? Differ- 
 ences might naturally and honestly arise in the application of 
 the test, but the rejection of an appeal to the doctrine as a test 
 altogether can scarcely be reconciled with an honest desire to 
 maintain nothing but truth. | 
 
 On our side we constantly court an appeal to the doctrine, and 
 a comparison of the apostles’ doctrine with our doctrine. I shall 
 not, of course, attempt to describe in detail what the apostles’ 
 doctrine is. This would be a new and a wide subject. I must 
 take for granted, for the present, that my readers are substanti- 
 
152 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 ally instructed in that doctrine, and able therefore to appreciate 
 a general reference to it, whether of comparison or contrast. 
 My immediate object is to show that consent in faith and 
 opinion concerning all principal matters of doctrine, or, as St. 
 Luke expresses it, “ continuance in the apostles’ doctrine,” is an 
 indispensable characteristic of an apostolical Church; that where 
 any of the fundamental doctrines of the faith once delivered to 
 the saints are denied, it is an abuse of language, a contradiction 
 of holy Scripture, and of the best ancient writers, to admit the 
 existence of Christianity at all. 
 
 This is not in harmony with the latitudinarianism of these 
 times, which is, in truth, but another name for that easy indiffer- 
 ence about vital religion which prefers the present peace and 
 urbanity of society to the everlasting salvation of immortal 
 souls. Truth, however, is truth; and the things which the 
 apostles, speaking as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, 
 bound and loosed on earth, will be found bound and loosed in. 
 the judgment of God; to the dismay of many who softly sen- 
 timentalise on divine love, and seem to think that God has no 
 more real regard to His own veracity than they have. 
 
 St. Paul makes the introduction of false doctrine a ground of 
 an excommunicating anathema. Writing to the Christians at 
 Galatia, he says, “1 marvel that ye are so soon removed from 
 Him that called you into the grace of Christ, unto another © 
 gospel, which is not another; but there be some that trouble 
 you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, 
 or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than 
 that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.”? A 
 departure, therefore, from apostolical doctrine, so far from being 
 compatible with the continuance of an apostolical Church, incurs, 
 distinctly and decidedly, the apostle’s anathema. 
 
 It will be observed that the members of the Church are here 
 addressed as persons competent to determine whether what 
 they heard from another teacher did, or did not, coincide with 
 what they had heard from St. Paul. If not, this language of 
 his would be utterly meaningless and vain. Had they been 
 
 } Gal. i, 6—8. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 153 
 
 
 
 bound to receive with deference whatever a teacher ordained in 
 the regular succession told them, then the true ground of aposto- 
 lical warning would have been against unaccredited teachers; 
 but, instead of this, we find the apostle making the supposition 
 of an angel from heayen teaching, or of himself teaching, a 
 different doctrine from what he had originally taught them; 
 
 and, even then, fixing the attention and judgment of the people 
 
 on the doctrine taught so supremely, that if it did not harmonise 
 
 with the gospel which they had already received, even the angel, 
 
 or the apostle himself, was to be rejected with horror. ‘ Though 
 
 we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you 
 
 than that which we have preached unto you, let him be ac- 
 
 cursed.” It is impossible to suppose a case, or to make use of 
 language more entirely to our purpose than this. 
 
 St. John, in like manner, fixes the attention of the members 
 of the Church on the doctrine taught, and pronounces every 
 spirit which ‘teaches false doctrine to be a spirit of Antichrist. 
 Instead of referring generally to “the gospel,” as St. Paul did 
 when writing to the Galatians, St. John makes use of his 
 favourite compendium of tke gospel as a summary of divine 
 truth, from which, in its full meaning, no deviation was com- 
 patible with genuine Christianity. This summary is, “ Jesus 
 Christ. come in the flesh;” and the apostle’s language is, 
 ‘Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether 
 they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out 
 into the world.” In proceeding, then, to give a test whereby 
 these false prophets might be distinguished from the true, δέ. 
 John says nothing about succession. Strange omission, if real. 
 apostolicity consist in regular succession! unaccountable neglect 
 in an inspired apostle, if a true mission of a Christian teacher 
 consist in his ordination! St. John’s test is of a totally different 
 character. It is an appeal to the acknowledgment or non- 
 acknowledgment of the true doctrine of the gospel, as expressed 
 in his summary. He says, “ Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. 
 Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the 
 flesh, is of God; and every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus 
 Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God: and this is that spirit 
 
154 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 ef Antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come, and 
 even now already is it in the world.’’} 
 
 - Here, as by St. Paul, the people are addressed as being com- 
 petent to judge whether what they heard, from any teacher, did 
 or did not agree with the truth of the gospel as it had been 
 preached and explained by the apostle. Their attention is called 
 to this very point, and they are solemnly enjoined to judge what 
 they hear, on peril of receiving and embracing Antichristian 
 instead of Christian teaching. very teacher who did not coin- 
 cide with the true doctrine is pronounced to be of Antichrist. 
 No exception is made for those who were regularly ordained in 
 “the suecession;’’ neither can it be pretended that the apostle’s 
 supposition of Antichristian teachers implies in such persons (as 
 a matter of course) the want of true ordination. On the con- 
 trary, in the second chapter of his epistle, where he first warns, 
 the brethren against the “many Antichrists”’ who were gone 
 forth, he says: “ They went out from us; but they were not of 
 us: for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have con- 
 tinued with us; but they went out, that they might be made 
 manifest that they were not all of us.” These teachers had been 
 of the apostolical company outwardly, or they could not have 
 manifestly forsaken it. But they could not have belonged to it 
 outwardly without being in the succession. And _ therefore, 
 clearly, the inspired test of true apostolicity is not succession or 
 not succession, but truth or not truth of Christian doctrine. 
 And, as clearly, the judges of what was taught, whether true or 
 false, to whom the apostle appeals, were not councils of the 
 teachers, but congregations of the hearers, who were thus en- 
 couraged not to continue babes, neither unskilful in the word of 
 
 righteousness; but to cultivate discernment and discrimination, 
 eee their spiritual senses exercised, by reason of use, to 
 dinoerm both good and evil, both truth nde falsehood. 
 
 It is “the Church of the living God,” and not only the 
 
 ministry of that Church, however regularly ordained, that is 
 
 “the pillar and ground of the truth” —true doctrine, as is 
 
 evident from the summary that follows, “ God manifest in the 
 tI Joba iv. 128.) ΤΡ 2 1 John ii, 18, 19. 
 
: 
 
 The Church of God in Christ. 155 
 
 
 
 flesh,” etc., and its contrast with the false doctrines, which are 
 described as the predicted characteristics of the apostasy from 
 
 the Church. (Compare 1 Tim. iii. 14—16 with iv. 1—13). 
 
 ' Dr. Barrow says: It is evident that the Church is one by 
 consent in faith and opinion concerning all principal matters of 
 doctrine, especially in those which have considerable influence 
 on the practice of piety toward God, righteousness toward men, 
 and sobriety of Late panna ‘to teach us which the grace of 
 God did appear.’ 
 
 “ As he that should in any principal doctrine differ from Plato 
 (denying the immortality of the soul, the providence of God, 
 the natural difference of good and evil), would not be a Plato- 
 nist, so he that dissenteth from any doctrine of importance, 
 manifestly taught by Christ, doth renounce Christianity. 
 
 “ All Christians are ‘delivered into one form of doctrine,’ to 
 which they must stiffly and steadfastly adhere, keeping the de- 
 positum committed to them; they must ‘strive together for the 
 faith of the gospel, and ‘earnestly contend for the faith which 
 was once delivered to the saints; they must ‘hold fast the form 
 of sound words, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus;’ that 
 great salvation which at first began to be spoken by the Lord, 
 and was confirmed unto them by His hearers; God also bear- 
 ing them witness with ‘signs and wonders, and with divers 
 miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, Hon ie to His own 
 - will.’ 
 
 “They are bound ‘to er or think, ‘one and the same 
 thing; ‘to stand fast in one spirit with one mind;’ ‘to walk» 
 by the same rule ;’ ‘to be joined together in the same mind, and 
 in the same judgment ; ‘with one onic and mouth to eae 
 
 God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.’ 
 
 “They are obliged to disclaim consortship with the gainsayers 
 of this doctrine; to stand off from those who-do ἐτεροδοξεῖν, or 
 who do not consent to the wholesome words of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness; ‘to 
 mark those who make divisions and scandals, besides the doc- 
 trine which Christians had learned, and to decline from them; 
 to ‘reject heretics; to ‘beware of false prophets, of seducers, 
 
156 The Church and the Churches, 
 
 of those who speak perverse things to draw disciples after 
 them ;’ to ‘pronounce anathema on whoever shall preach any 
 ote doctrine.’ ”’ 
 
 “Thus are Christians ‘one in Christ Jesus;’ thant are they 
 (as Tertullian speaketh) ‘ confederated in the society of a sacra- 
 ment,’* or of one profession. 
 
 “This preaching and this faith the Church having received, 
 though dispersed over the world, doth carefully hold as inhabit- 
 ing one house; and alike believeth these things, as if it had 
 one soul and the same heart, and consonantly doth preach, and 
 deliver these things, as if it had but one mouth.? 
 
 “As for kings, though their kingdoms be divided, yet he 
 equally expects from every one of them one dispensation, and 
 one and the same sacrifice of a true confession and praise. So 
 that, though there may seem to be a diversity of temporal ordi- 
 nances, yet an unity and agreement in the right faith may be 
 pee and maintained among ἽΝ 
 
 “Tn regard to this union in faith peculiarly, the body of 
 Chri? adhering to it was called the Catholic Church, from 
 which all those were esteemed ipso facto to be cut off and 
 separated who in any point deserted that faith; such a one 
 (saith St. Paul), ἐξέστρωπται, is turned aside, or hath left the 
 Christian way of lite. He, in reality, is no Christian, nor is to 
 be avowed or treated as such, but is to be disclaimed, rejected, 
 and shunned. 
 
 “<“He,’ saith St. Cyprian, ‘cannot seem a Christian who doth 
 not persist in the unity of Christ’s gospel and fwith.’® 
 
 “<¢Tf? saith Tertullian, ‘a man be a heretic, he cannot be a 
 Christian.’ * ) 
 
 “Whence Hegesippus saith of the old heretics, that they did 
 ‘ divide the unity of the Church by pernicious speeches against 
 God and His Christ.’ ° 
 
 “<The virtue’ (saith the pastor Hermes, cited by Clemens 
 Alex.) ‘ which doth keep the Church together, is faith.’® 
 
 > Tertull. in Mare. iv, 5. 1 Tertull, de Preeser. cap. 37. 
 
 2 Tren. i. 3 (Apud Epiph. Heer, 31), ° Eus, Hist. iv. 22. 
 3 Cypr. de Unit. Eccl, ὁ Herm. Apud Clem, Strom. ii, p. 281. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 157 
 
 
 
 “So the fathers of the sixth council tell the emperor that 
 they were members one of another, and did constitute the one 
 body of Christ by consent of opinion with him, and one another, 
 and by faith.* 
 
 “¢ We ought in all things to hold the unity of the Catholic 
 Church, and not to yield anything to the enemies of faith and 
 truth.”? 
 
 “<Tn each part of the world this faith is one, because this is 
 the Christian faith.” 
 
 “*He denies Christ who confesses not all things that are 
 Christ’s.”* 
 
 “< Hence, in common practice, whoever did appear to differ 
 from the common faith was rejected as an apostate from Chris- 
 tianity, and unworthy the communion of other Christians.’ ” ® 
 
 The testimony here borne to the indispensable necessity of 
 oneness in all fundamental doctrine is decisive; while the learned 
 and eloquent writer.does not fail to add, that on other points of 
 ‘less moment, and more obscurely delivered, Christians might 
 dissent from one another without breach of unity, and dispute 
 with one another without breach of charity. 
 
 Mr. Palmer says: “It is undeniable that the end of Christ’s 
 mission on earth was the sanctification of His people. He called 
 us with a holy calling (2 Tim.i. 9). His will is our sanctifica- 
 tion (1 Thess. iv. 3). Therefore, if it could be clearly shown 
 that any society professing to be Christian denied the obligation 
 of good works, and taught its members that they might freely 
 indulge in wickedness, such a society would be evidently 
 anathema from Jesus Christ. Nothing further could be re- 
 quired to prove it.” ὃ 
 
 And this is most true, and the argument may, with un- 
 diminished truth, be transferred to any fundamental doctrine of 
 the gospel. For example, it is undeniable that the end of 
 Christ's mission on earth was the justification of His people. 
 We are “justified freely by His grace.” ‘‘ By the obedience of 
 
 ? Conc. vi. Act. xviii. p. 271, * Ambr. in Luc, lib. vi. cap. 9, p. 205. 
 
 2 Cypr. Ep. 71. ° Barrow on the Unity of the Church. 
 3 Aug. cont, Jul. 1, 2, p. 203, § Vol, i., p. 133. 
 
158 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 One shall many be made righteous” (Rom. iii. 24, v. 19). His 
 will is our justification by faith (Acts xiii. 38, 39). Therefore, 
 if it could be clearly shown that any society professing to be 
 Christian denied justification by faith, and taught its members 
 that they might be justified by works, such a society would 
 be evidently anathema from Jesus Christ. Nothing further 
 could be required to prove it. . 
 
 (1) A company of men professing and calling themselves a 
 Christian Church, or the Church of Christ, whatever their out- 
 ward circumstances may be, in name, numbers, authority, 
 wealth, succession, and if there be any other outward advan- 
 tage, cannot be, indeed, an apostolical Church, if they teach 
 as indispensable to, salvation a doctrine or doctrines which thé 
 apostles never taught. For example, if such a company teach 
 authoritatively and as indispensable to salvation, that in the 
 Lord’s supper “there is a propitiary sacrifice for the sins of the: 
 living and the dead,” they cannot be an apostolic Church, 
 because the apostle never so taught. . 
 
 This is a favourite instance on which to try one important 
 branch of this question, because many of our adversaries agree 
 in the statement that the apostles themselves never taught this; 
 yet they maintain the apostolicity of the Church which teaches _ 
 it as absolutely essential. This they do, on the ground of what 
 is called development, i.e., either, first, that although the doctrine 
 itself was not explicitly taught by the apostles, yet the germ of 
 it was contained in what they taught, and afterwards cultivated 
 into mature growth by the piety and intelligence of their suc- 
 cessors ; or, secondly, that inspiration such as the apostles had, 
 is a permanent endowment of the Christian Church, considered 
 collectively as the body of Christ; and consequently that every 
 decision of the Church collective, duly come to in a com- 
 petent assembly, presided over by the chief bishop, is as cer- 
 ~ tainly and infallibly true, and ought to be as finally decisive, as 
 anything which the apostles themselves taught.) 
 
 2 On this subject Mr. Ward writes thus:—‘ When we speak to the apostles 
 having taught some principle of the early Church, we mean what we say ; not 
 that they gave to their successors an embodiment of that principle carried to its 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 159 
 
 
 
 It will be ΠῚ τ that this claim of development entirely 
 destroys the claims at other times grounded on antiquity. The 
 primitive fathers are appealed to as containing the best and 
 safest expositions of Christian truth, because they lived nearest 
 to the source, the apostolical period itself. But what advantage 
 did this give them, if the truth did not come perfect from the 
 source? If any part of it came from the apostles only as an 
 
 farthest limits. Every principle, which (as Mr. Carlyle would say) is a reality, 
 not a sham, has indefinite results contained within it, of which those who first 
 receive it have not even the faintest suspicion. They may hold it for some 
 length of time in company with other modes of thought which are virtually 
 inconsistent with it; they may so hold it through a life, through many lives, 
 until gradually and unconsciously it is matured within, and springs forth into 
 full development. Now the reverse of this is commonly assumed by controver- 
 sialists; they find the fathers of some later century far more explicit and 
 unanimous than in earlier times, on some great truth, and immediately conclude 
 that it is the matured fruit of some false principle which has crept into the Church. 
 Most illogically indeed! unless it be false principles only which are carried for- 
 ward but slowly and by degrees to their full bearing. Whether in this. or that 
 case it be false is matter of evidence in the particular instance; but to say that 
 ὰ priori it probably is so is really to rule that the apostles tanght no principle 
 whatever. Real or living principles differ for mere formule as the works of 
 nature from the works of art; a table or a chair is made once for all, and 
 ᾿ remains stationary in size and proportions as’it came from the maker’s hands; 
 but a small seed, small and imperceptible, grows and expands without human 
 cognisance, and ends, not begins, by banishing all rival claimants from,the space 
 it is destined to occupy. It may well be, then, as Mr. Goode has pointed out 
 (vol. ii., p. 202—214), that the fifth century was far more decided and interested 
 than the second in the defence of St. Mary’s perpetual virginity, and yet may 
 have been altogether right in such increased love of the doctrine. Such love 
 may well have been the natural and legitimate development of principles 
 taught by the apostles (¢.g., the blessedness of celibacy,the sacramental efficacy 
 of proximity to our Lord, the unspeakable dignity to which human nature is 
 raised by the incarnation, etc., etc.), and St. Augustine may have been most pious 
 and wisely zealous in denouncing those as heretics (vol. ii., pp. 211, 213) who did 
 not receive a statement which the orthodow, by that time, had discovered to have 
 been ever morally inyolved in the principles they held from the first. 
 
 * Again—the apostles may not only have taught principles beeen their 
 development, but doctrines without their analysis. 
 
 “ Again—still though the foundations of the faith were fully ἘΝΈΝΕ from the 
 first, other principles there were, no doubt, and very far from unimportant ones, 
 which were deposited, as it were, in germ, within the bosom of the Church ; that 
 her internal action might gradually nurture them, or external circumstances 
 hasten their appearance on the surface.” — Ward’s Ideal, etc., pp. 547—550. 
 
160 The Church and the Charen 
 
 
 
 unripe germ, which was to develop its rich stores afterwards, 
 then the primitive fathers may have died during the period of 
 the germ, and previous to the development. The same may be 
 said of the Nicene fathers; of the medieval fathers; perhaps 
 the true development was the reformation; or possibly there 
 may remain a development still. At all events, if development 
 be appealed to, antiquity must be relinquished, and the cele- 
 brated saying of Tertullian, id extraneum et falsum, quod sit 
 posterius immissum, must be reversed. 
 
 If it be retorted that development being relinquished, anti- 
 quity may and ought to ke appealed to, we answer, certainly, 
 We entirely agree with the saying of Pope Stephen, “ Nihil 
 novandum—nil nisi quod traditum est;”’ and with Vincentius 
 of Lerins, “ Retenta est antiquitas, explosa novitas.” Provided 
 always that the appeal to antiquity be fairly made and fully 
 carried out; and that what is really oldest be received as best. 
 Which is older, God or Satan? Truth or falsehood? ‘The ' 
 
 1 No man holding this doctrine of development, can at any time have any — 
 certainty that he is in possession of the revealed will of God. This leayes him 
 practically without revelation altogether; because he may not form any decided 
 opinion, or engage in any zealous practice, on the authority of Scripture or anti- 
 quity, or both, lest what remains to be developed should prove him to be in fatal 
 error; neither may he reject anything which seems now to be false, from its 
 opposition to Scripture and antiquity, lest what remains to be developed should 
 prove that in so doing he has been rejecting a catholic truth. We have a notable 
 instance of this in the present position (December 1845) of Dr. Pusey, who 
 hesitates to condemn Roman doctrine lest it should eventually prove to be 
 true, and who hesitates to leave the Church of England lest this should eventu- 
 ally prove to be wrong. In the secession, after so long a struggle, of his more 
 talented and less scrupulous coadjutors, we hail a very gratifying practical proof 
 that the Church of England cannot be Romanised. 
 
 To do Mr. Newman justice, he made the experiment with consummate nes 
 and of course with success oversome minds. Those who felt themselves agreeing 
 with him, up to the point of his secession, and who now refuse or hesitate to follow 
 his example, cannot have very comforting assurances of their own sincerity. 
 
 If there remain among us any of his disciples bent on accomplishing still 
 what he has failed to accomplish, they will require a double measure of caution, 
 because now they are justly suspected, and their movements watched. 
 
 The younger and less adroit pupils in their school, who occupy the lower 
 forms through the country, and are not likely to be heard of beyond the precincts 
 of their own villages, will, it is to be hoped, confine themselves to what they 
 consider the true rubrical and canonical practice of the Church of England, 
 
Vid Gieirch of God in. Christ 161 
 
 wheat which the Master sowed, or the tares which the enemy 
 sowed among it? Which is the older, the Scripture or the 
 fathers? The Nicene Creed, the distinguishing symbol of the 
 reformed as it was of the early churches, or the creed of Pope 
 
 Pius ΕΝ ον} 
 
 Revealed religion is not like a science of human discovery, at 
 first imperfect, and gradually improved under successive develop- 
 ments, throwing more.and more light upon the original facts 
 and fundamental principles; neither is it left dependent for its 
 complement, or necessary corollaries, on assemblies of fallible 
 men. Just the reverse. It came perfect and entire from the 
 
 ? A-brief reference to these two creeds is decisive of the matter of antiquity 
 in this controversy. The creed of the ancient Christian Churches was defined 
 by their assembled prelates at Nice in A.D. 325. This Nicene Creed was recited 
 as the received creed of the Churches, by the Council of Constantinople, A.D. 
 381. And again it was so recited by the Council of Ephesus, A.D. 431. This 
 Council (of Ephesus) added a solemn sentence of excommunication against any 
 one who should “dare to compose, or to profess, or to offer any other form of 
 faith.”, The Nicene Creed was again recited as the catholic creed of the 
 Churches, at the Council of Chalcedon, a.D. 451. 
 
 EXTRACT FROM THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON. 
 
 “ The catholic faith delivered by the holy three hundred and eighteen fathers 
 (viz., at Nice), and by the holy one hundred and fifty fathers (viz., at Constan- 
 tinople), also by the other most holy and glorious fathers (viz., at Ephesus), 
 we guard, and according to that we believe. The most reverend bishops 
 exclaimed, ‘ No person makes any other exposition of faith. We neither attempt 
 nor dare todo so. For the fathers have taught, and in writings are preserved, 
 those things which haye been set forth by them; and other than these we 
 cannot speak.’ 
 
 “Those principles which have been set forth are sufficient: it is not lawful to 
 make any other exposition.” 
 
 The same Nicene Creed was recited as still the creed of the Churches by the 
 Council of Trent, in her third session, Feb. 4th, A.D. 1546. 
 
 Up to that period no-other creed had been heard of in the Churches. Various 
 heretical opinions and schismatical practices, some borrowed from paganism, 
 some from Judaism, some from perverted interpretations of detached passages 
 of Scripture, especially from the application to the Christian dispensation, of 
 prophecies which describe the millennium, had been introduced by individuals, 
 and greatly corrupted and divided the Churches; but the Nicene Creed was still 
 the generally, the almost universally, recognised symbol of the catholic Chris- 
 tian faith. 
 
 It was reserved for the Bishop of Rome, A.D. 1564, to introduce a new creed. 
 All our controversy with Rome has reference to the articles of this new creed. 
 
 11 
 
162 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 hand of its divine Author, and will admit of no mutilations or 
 additions by the hand of man. When, under pretencé of sim- 
 plifying it, we attempt to hide any of its deep and mysterious 
 announcements from the people; ‘or when, under pretence of 
 magnifying it, we attempt to add imposing ceremonies or gor- 
 geous magnificence to its chaste and severe simplicity,—in either 
 case, we mar the fair symmetry of the daughter of heaven, and 
 present to view a monster of our own imagination.! Had the 
 
 ? Mr. Newman, in his recently published treatise,’ labours to establish his 
 theory of developed Christianity by analogies. The species of development for 
 which he contends will be understood by the following specimen. After citing 
 a passage from Bishop Butler, in which the great philosopher argues our obliga- 
 tions to worship the Son and the Holy Ghost, from the revealed relations 
 towards those divine persons in the Godhead in which we stand, Mr. Newman 
 observes, ‘‘ Here is a development of doctrine into worship; in like manner the 
 doctrine of the beatification of the saints has been developed into their Cultus ; 
 of the θεοτόκος, or mother of God, into hyperdulia ; and of the real presence 
 into adorations of the host,” p. 50. 
 
 In defence of the reasonableness and propriety of such developments, Mr. 
 Newman refers to the progressive improvements in human sciences, natural and 
 political. He says, “ When some new philosophy, or its portions, are introduced 
 into the measures of the Legislature, or into the concessions made to a political 
 party, or into commercial or agricultural policy, it is often said, ‘we have not 
 seen the end of this:’ ‘it is an instalment of future concessions ;’ ‘ our children 
 will see.’ We feel that it has unknown bearings and issues,” p. 48. “ And so in 
 philosophy the systems of physics or morals, which go by celebrated names, pro- 
 ceed upon the assumption of certain conditions which are necessary for every 
 state of development. . . . . And so in military matters the discovery of gun- 
 powder developed the science of attack and defence in a new instrumentality: 
 . . . » So states have their respective policies, on which they move forward, 
 and which are the conditions of their well-being.” —Pp. 67, 68. 
 
 But it may be asked, What have these things to do with revealed religion? 
 or where is the justice of the presumed analogy? In all these things fallen man 
 is left to the exercise of his natural powers; and the advances or eyen the 
 mistakes and failures of one man lead to improvements by another, each profit- 
 ing by the experience of his predecessor in the field of inquiry. But in revealed 
 religion man is not left to the exercise of his natural powers for the progressive 
 attainment of, and improvement in, truth. On the contrary, he is supernaturally 
 put in possession of truth, pure and perfect from its divine source. Is it so? 
 This is the question between us who say so concerning the Scriptures, and 
 those who disparage the perfectness, in this respect, of the sacred volume. All 
 Mr. Newman’s analogies are therefore, in the assumption of being fairly appli- 
 eable, guilty of a petitio principii. 
 
 * An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. London : Toovey. 1845, 
 
 ie ΥΣ 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 163 
 
 
 
 New Testament contained germs designed to ripen into such 
 fruit-bearing as Romanist controversialists defend, it would not, 
 in common consistency, have contained such language as this ; 
 well calculated to make its sincere disciples shudder at develop- 
 
 One instance adduced by Mr. Newman supplies remarkable elements for its 
 own refutation. He says: “The admission of Jews to municipal offices has 
 lately been defended! on the ground that it is the introduction of no new principle, 
 but a development of one. already received ; that its great premises have been 
 decided long since, and that the present agé has but to draw the conclusion; 
 that it is not open to us to inquire what ought to be done in the abstract, since 
 there is no ideal model for the infallible guidance of nations; that change is 
 only a question of time, and that there is a time for all things; that the applica- 
 tion of principles ought not to go beyond the actual case, neither preceding nor 
 ᾿ coming after an imperative demand,” etc., pp. 48, 49. 
 
 How utterly the implied analogy between this and revealed religion breaks 
 down at the first touch! Doubtless, in, the complicated details of political 
 measures, concerning which no higher wisdom than man’s can be consulted, 
 and in the management of which it may be man’s best wisdom to vary with 
 varying circumstances, it is not open to us to inquire what ought to be done in 
 the abstract, since there is no ideal model for the infallible guidance of nations. 
 But with reference to Christian truth, the case is totally different. Here we 
 have “‘ the wisdom of God,” which is perfect, and here, therefore, it is open to’ 
 us to inquire what ought to be believed in the abstract, since there is an ideal 
 model for the infallible guidance of Christians: “that the man of God may be 
 perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” Doubtless, in human 
 policy, change is only a question of time, but in Christianity there is no change. 
 The gospel, “ the everlasting gospel,” like its divine Author, is “the same yes- 
 terday, and to-day, and for ever.” Doubtless, principles of human wisdom, 
 short-sighted as they are, and liable to reversal by unforeseen occurrences, 
 ought not to be applied dogmatically beyond the actual case; but the principles 
 of revealed religion are applicable to all cases; they have emanated from Him 
 who “ declareth the end from the beginning, and from ancient times, the things 
 that are not yet done;” no occurrence, or combination of occurrences, unfore- 
 seen and unprovided for in principle,.can by possibility arise—“the word of 
 God liveth and abideth for ever.” Ina subsequent chapter of his book, Mr. 
 Newman insists upon the fact, which no one, I believe, ever disputed, that 
 Christianity cannot be earned all at once. He says, “It is the peculiarity of 
 the human mind that it cannot take an object in which is submitted to it 
 simply and integrally. It conceives by means of definition or description ; 
 whole subjects do not create in the intellect whole ideas, but are, to use a 
 mathematical phrase, thrown into series, into a number of statements, strength- 
 ening, interpreting, connecting each other, and with more or less exactness 
 approximating, as they accumulate, to a perfect image. There is no other way 
 of learning or of teaching..... The more claim an idea has to be considered 
 
 1 Times newspaper. March 1846, 
 
164 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 ments : “ For I testify unto every man that heareth the words 
 of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall 
 add unto him the plagues that are written in this book” (Rey. 
 xxi. 18). 
 
 living, the more various will be its aspects; and the more social and _ political 
 is its nature, the more complicated and subtle will be its developments, and the 
 longer and more eventful will be its course. Such is Christianity, and what- 
 ever has been said in the last chapter about the development of ideas generally, 
 becomes of course an antecedent argument for its progressive development,”— 
 Pp. 94, 95: I venture to affirm that the right answer to this consists in the 
 detection and exposure of a sophism. The development which in the illustra- 
 tion is ascribed to the mind of the learner, is in the application ascribed to the 
 things learned. A gradual understanding of revelation is a development of the 
 mind of the student, not a development of Christian doctrine. We do not con- 
 tend that men learn Christian doctrine perfectly at once, but we do contend that 
 all that is to be learned of it is revealed perfectly in the sacred writings, and 
 that consequently those writings prescribe the bounds beyond which all sup- 
 posed developments of Christian doctrine are nothing better than human con- 
 jectures. f 
 
 Upon Mr. Newman’s own principle of development, it may be fairly inquired 
 of him how he has arrived at any certainty, if indeed he pretend to any, that 
 having reached all Roman doctrine, as at present exhibited, he has therein 
 attained to the ne plus ultra of development? Did the bud of Christian doc- 
 trine, progressively unfolding its rich stores for fifteen centuries, become the full- 
 blown and last rose of summer at ‘the Council of Trent? If he affirm this, he 
 cuts off all subsequent development, and ascribes to that council the finality 
 which we ascribe to the holy Scriptures. Upon what principle this should be 
 done or defended does not appear. If he reject finality altogether, and his 
 arguments seem fairly to shut him up to this, he cannot consistently remain 
 stunted from all further growth by the iron band of a Church whose boasted 
 motto is semper eadem. Christian doctrine, in his progressive mind, must burst 
 the Tridentine bands, and develop into still richer luxuriance, cudtus rising into 
 hyperdulia, hyperdulia into latria, and latria into some quintessence of worship 
 for which logical development has not yet invented a suitable title. This is a 
 scrious prospect. 
 
 The most imposing passages in Mr. Newman’s book are those in which he 
 claims Bishop Butler for an ally; but the intelligent and cautious. reader will 
 perceive that what Butler says of the dispensation of Christianity as a system 
 Mr. Newman applies—if his citations from “The Analogy” have any applica- 
 tion—to the development of Christian doctrine. And here lurks another 
 sopbism. Butler admits that the truths revealed in Scripture suggest to the 
 mind other things which are not revealed, and that obscurities and difficulties 
 are an inevitable consequence ; but he denies that such obscurities and difficul- 
 ties are any just objection to the Christian system, since the system of nature 
 might with equal justice be objected to because of similar obscurities and diffi- 
 
 eet ; κα. " 
 ΝΣ ΝΣ, ν᾿ ὦ 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 165 
 
 And here we find the true scriptural answer to the second 
 aspect of development above mentioned. For if an inspiration 
 such as the apostles had be a permanent endowment of the 
 Church collective; and if, consequently, every decision of that 
 Church duly come to be as certainly and infallibly true as 
 anything taught by the apostles themselves, then the canon of 
 inspired teaching has never yet been perfected, has never yet 
 closed. With this, the passage of holy Scripture just now 
 quoted is utterly irreconcilable; and before any Church can 
 prove her right to add to what is written (and acknowledged 
 by all parties engaged in this controversy to be the inspired 
 word of God), she must prove her right to subtract from, or 
 avowedly and openly to disobey, what is written. It is manifest 
 that a power lodged in the Church to add, as of divine authority, 
 any teaching contrary to the Scriptures, would be a power to 
 render the Scriptures practically useless. It is vain to attempt 
 half measures in this matter. If we begin by admitting in the 
 Church any such depositum of inspiration as that claimed by the 
 objection now under review, we shall be shut up, and most 
 deservedly, to a practical disregard of the holy Scriptures. We 
 shall lose sight of the written standard of apostolical truth, as of 
 a thing superseded by a living apostolical authority, just as we 
 would naturally turn away from a man’s letter if we could enjoy 
 the privilege of converse with the man himself. 
 
 Where, then, shall we find any rectifying standard of appeal 
 in any doubtful case?, We have admitted an authority said to 
 be equal with the Scriptures, but, because alive and present, 
 _ practically superior: and we cannot consistently appeal from it 
 
 culties. In conducting this argument, Butler calls Christianity “a scheme 
 revealed but in part,’ but he nowhere intimates that it is the office of the 
 Church, or in anywise in man’s power to add the remaining parts, so as to 
 render the scheme more perfect, and thereby more perfectly intelligible. 
 
 Mr. Newman’s object is to establish this perfection-attaining development, 
 and he cannot, in strict fairness, cite Butler as an authority on his side. He 
 has, however, availed himself of what Butler says of the imperfection of Chris- 
 tianity as a revealed system or dispensation from God, to claim this high 
 authority in support of his alleged imperfection of Christianity, as an inchoate 
 germ of doctrine to be developed by the Church, 
 
166 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 back again to the-Scriptures. “No man can serve two masters; 
 for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will 
 hold to the one and despise the other.” Men cannot serve holy 
 Scripture, which asserts its own inspired sufficiency, and a 
 ‘ Church which claims a depositum of plenary inspiration. It is 
 right and proper that the alternative should be fairly viewed, 
 and that men should not deceive themselves by an unexamined 
 fancy that they can hold to such a Church without despising 
 such a Bible. 
 
 History and experience here bear their decisive testimony. 
 Wherever such authority has been admitted in the living Church, 
 there the Bible, under plea of erroneous rsnclibons or some 
 other plausible but dishonest pretence, has been practically 
 superseded, and some of its plainest commandments openly and 
 vauntingly disobeyed." The advocates of Church authority, in 
 the sense here opposed, have indeed exposed themselves to the 
 rebuke which has been, I do not know by whom, thus quaintly 
 expressed : 
 
 “Tf Chaldee, Hebrew, Syriac, will not bend, 
 And stubborn Greek refuse to be their friend ; 
 
 If languages and copies all ery, No! 
 THE CHURCH has said it, and it must be so!” 
 
 But this claim on the part of the Church is a modern inven- 
 tion, The ancients knew nothing of it. Hear Tertullian, a 
 witness frequently appealed to by our opponents in this contro- 
 
 versy. He is as pointed as can be desired on the necessity of 
 _ apostolical doctrine to the apostolicity of a Church, and on the 
 sufficiency of such doctrine as a test, even where direct succes- 
 sion cannot be claimed. . 
 I cite the following passages from the pages of Messrs. Kirk 
 ‘and Berington, adopting their translation.” 
 
 * There can be no more striking proof of this than the “ Catholic ” practice of 
 bowing donn to images, though “ God spake these words, and said, Thou shalt 
 not bow down to them.” Whether these words form a second commandment, 
 as in our division of them, or an enlargement of the first, as in thedivision made 
 by the Romish Church, the fact remains the same, plainly recorded in every 
 
 varsion of the holy Scriptures. ‘God said, Thou shalt not bow down to them.’ 
 2 Faith of Catholics, pp. 66, 67. 
 
 * 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 167 
 
 
 
 TerTuLuaN. “We are not allowed to indulge our own 
 humour, nor to choose what another has invented. We have 
 the apostles of our Lord for founders, who were not themselves 
 the inventors nor authors of what they have left us; but they 
 have faithfully taught the world the doctrine which they re- 
 ceived from Christ. Therefore, if an angel from heaven should 
 preach another gospel, we would say anathema to him. Heresies 
 have arisen from philosophy and from human wisdom, which is 
 different from the spirit of Christianity. What is there common 
 between Athens and Jerusalem? Between the academic groves 
 and the Church? Our lessons come from the porch of Solomon, 
 which teach us to seek the Lord in simplicity of heart. Having 
 learned Christ and His gospel, we must indulge no curiosity, no 
 further inquiry. We believe: that suffices. Our first maxim 
 is, that nothing more is necessary.”’—De Prescriptione, ὁ. Vi., 
 Vii., Vill. 
 
 “Tt is a maxim not to be controverted, that what was first 
 delivered is evangelical and true, and what was afterwards im- 
 ported is extraneous and false. By this rule all future heresies 
 may be tried.'’ But should they dare to arrogate to themselves 
 
 1 Which was first delivered, then? And which was afterwards imported ? 
 The Scripture or the Fathers? By this rule of Tertullian, taken absolutely in 
 the letter of it, all patristic teaching, seeing it was all afterwards imported, is 
 extraneous and false. Of course he ought to be understood as saying, that 
 what was afterwards imported, if not in accordance with what was first delivered, 
 is extraneous and false. This is precisely what we say. “ Having learned 
 Christ and His gospel,” which was first delivered, we bring everything we after- 
 wards hear or read to be tested by this standard. If Tertullian’s rule be good 
 for anything as a practical detector of heresies, the members of the Church 
 must in every age be competent to compare what was afterwards imported with 
 what was first delivered—* to refuse the evil and choose the good.” 
 
 The Greek Church appears to be in perfect harmony with the Church of 
 England on the subject of tradition, and the authority to be justly ascribed to 
 the writings of the Fathers. A remarkable book, written by a professor of 
 theology in one of the orthodox Russian universities, was printed at St. Peters- 
 
 burg in 1827. It is dedicated to the Synod of Russia, and has the following 
 title :— 
 
 “ Christiane, orthodox, dogmatico-polemicee Theologiz, olim a clarissimo 
 viro Theophane Procowicz ejusque continuatoribus adornatz, ac in tribus volu- 
 minibus primum anno MDCCLXXXII edite, Compendium, in usum Rossicze 
 studios juventutis concinnatum, atque adjectione sex ultimorum librorum 
 
168 The Church and the Churches 
 
 
 
 the name of apostolic, because at that time they may have been 
 in existence, let them produce the origins of their Churches, the 
 regular succession of their bishops; so that the first in that 
 order should have been an apostle, or one constantly united to 
 the apostles. For in this manner the Apostolic Churches deduce 
 the order of their successions. ‘Smyrna has her Polycarp, ap- 
 pointed by St. John; Rome her Clement, ordained by Bt. 
 Peter; and so the other Churches. Let the heretics show this. 
 And should they invent something like it, they will have gained 
 nothing, since their doctrine, compared with that of the apostles, 
 by its diversity and contrariety, will show that it came not from 
 any apostle, nor apostolic man. For, as the apostles would not 
 
 juxta delineationem ejusdem cl. Theophanis, ab Archimandrita Kioviensis 
 Fratrum monasterii, publicoque 5. Theologiz in Academia Kioviensi professore, 
 Trenaeo Falkowcki, completum. Petropoli, 1827.” 
 A few extracts will be interesting to some of my readers :— 
 “ De Traditionibus. 
 
 “ Traditiones, quee de dogmatibus fidei aut morum in Scriptura nec formaliter, 
 nec virtualiter comprehensis adferuntur, nihil valeant, suntque rejiciendz. 
 (1) Quia sola Scriptura est principium Theologiz. (2) Quia eadem ita est 
 necessaria, ut fideles non aliunde, nisi ex ipsa, omnia ad salutem consequendam 
 pertinentia haurire possint. (3) Quia Scriptura ita est perfecta, ut omnia 
 dogmata, sine quibus salvari non possumus, contineat,” 
 
 “ De Auctoritate Patrum. 
 
 “ Testimonia Patrum non sunt eloquiis Dei equiparanda sed generant tantum 
 humanum fidem, (1) Quia sola Scriptura est principium Theologiz, estque suf- 
 ficiens et necessaria ad salutem. (2) Quia Patrum scripta non sunt libri canonici. 
 (3) Quia Patres confirmaturi suas sententia ad Scripturam recurrunt. (4) Quia 
 quidam Patres errarunt. (5) Quia ipsi Patres testantur, se aliter posse sapere, 
 ac veritas postulat, nec Scripta sua pro canonicis haberi volunt. (6) Quia multi 
 Patres unum Scripture locum varie interpretati sunt; adeoque non omnes 
 Scripture sensum perfecte assequi poterant.” 
 
 “ De auctoritate igitur Patrum sequentes regule sunt observande: (1) Etiamsi 
 Patres alicubi titubent, pius tamen erga eos affectus non est exuendus. (2) Non 
 temere etiam erroris arguendi sunt; sed videndum prius, an non possint dicta 
 eorum commode explicari. (3) Si vero interpretationes commode locum habere 
 non possunt ; tum ejusmodi Patrum dicta, sine dissimulatione rejicienda sunt.” 
 
 “ Denique, qui dicunt, se malle cum Patribus errare, quam cum aliis recte 
 sentire ; hee Cypriani verba Libr. 2, Epist. 3, audiant: ‘Si solus Christus 
 audienUdus est, non debemus attendere, quid aliquis ante nos faciendum puta- 
 verit ; sed quid prior Christus, qui ante omnes est, fecerit. Neque enim hominis 
 consuetudinem sequi oportet, sed Dei.veritatem,’ "ἢ 
 
 "» 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 169 
 
 have taught discordant doctrines, so neither would their imme- 
 diate icillowers have taught differently from them. To this rule 
 those Churches appeal, ΨΕΙΟΝ being of ἃ much later foundation, 
 as daily rising, claim not for heise first bishop either an apostle 
 or an immediate disciple, but, maintaining the same faith, they 
 may be deemed apostolic.” —Ibid., ¢. xxxi., xxxii. 
 
 Here it is admitted that hosed @hiarches may invent some- 
 thing like succession; but it is plainly declared that, even so, 
 they will gain nothing, because their false doctrine will betray 
 them. A semblance of succession may be set up, deceiving, so 
 far, even those who have learned Christ and His gospel; but a 
 false doctrine cannot escape their detection, and by this all 
 heretics are refuted. While such is the paramount importance 
 of the true doctrine, that all Churches maintaining the same— 
 i.e., the apostolic faith— may be deemed apostolic.” 
 
 ‘I feel justified now in coming to a conclusion in which I am 
 sanguine enough to anticipate the agreement of candid Christian 
 readers, that without steadfast continuance in the apostles’ 
 doctrine, there can be no apostolic Church. 
 
 I proceed to notice another feature equally essential, 
 namely— 
 
 (2.) The apostles’ fellowship. 
 
 Of this we have an interesting description in the First Epistle 
 of St. John, where the close connexion is stated between holding 
 the true doctrine of the apostles, and enjoying their holy fellow- 
 ship. “That which was from the beginning, which we have 
 heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked 
 upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of Life; for the 
 life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and 
 show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and 
 was manifested unto us.” Here is an epitome of apostolical 
 doctrine ; Jesus Christ the eternal Word, God manifest in the 
 flesh, is the alpha and. omega of it. The apostle proceeds, 
 “That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that 
 ye also may have fellowship with us ; and truly our fellowship is 
 with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ” (1 John i, 1—3). 
 
 Apostolical fellowship then, according to this true description, 
 
170 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 is fellowship with God, in and by Jesus Christ, the one only 
 Mediator between God and men. In apostolical fellowship 
 there is no mention of, because there was no place and no ocea- 
 sion for, any sub-mediators. Christians had “ access to God;” 
 they were “made nigh by the blood of Christ;” they were 
 “ quickened ‘together with Christ, and raised up together, and 
 made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ;”’ their “ life 
 was hid with Christ in God;”’ they hada great High Priest, 
 passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God; an High Priest 
 touched with a feeling of all their infirmities, and ever living to 
 make intercession for them; and therefore they had (solemn 
 doubtless, but real and well-warranted) boldness to enter into 
 the holiest by the blood of Jesus (ph. ii.; Col. ii.; Heb. ἵν.» 
 Vila, Xs) 
 
 Every member of the Church of God in Christ is introduced 
 into this fellowship. He has “obtained like precious fait 
 with the apostles (2 Peter 1. 1), and enters into like precious 
 fellowship. So St..John writes to them, “that ye may have 
 fellowship with us, and truly our fellowship is with the F ather, 
 and with His Son Jesus Christ.” It is a holy fellowship, a test 
 indeed for the separation of the precious from the vile; not in 
 outward manifestation before men, but in the hidden testimony 
 of the heart. 
 
 As the members of the Church of God have access into this holy 
 fellowship by the blood of Christ (Rom. ν. 2 ; Eph. ii. 13), so also 
 they have continuance in it by the same abiding propitiation. It 
 is concerning persons who are walking in this fellowship that St. 
 John says, “the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.” 
 He is not speaking of the first application of the atonement to a 
 heathen or unconverted man; but of its continual application ‘to 
 a Christian man. “If we walk in the light, as he is in the 
 light, we have fellowship one with ave and the blood of 
 see Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.”! If, in the 
 enjoyment of such holy fellowship with God, and such loving 
 fellowship with one another, we fancy that we do not require 
 constant cleansing from sin; “If we say we have no sin, we 
 
 1 1 John i, 7—9. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 17: 
 
 
 
 deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us; but if we confess 
 our sins,” if our habitual state of mind be a readiness to 
 acknowledge our faults before God; if, when no special act of 
 transgression presents itself, we nevertheless cultivate an 
 instinctive penitence of spirit, ready ‘to cry in unaffected 
 humility, Lord, who can tell how oft he offendeth? cleanse Thou 
 me from secret faults; “ He is faithful and just to forgive us 
 our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Thus we 
 have not only “ the blessing of the man whose iniquity (past) 
 is forgiven, and whose sin (past) is covered;” but also “ the 
 blessing of the man to whom God will not impute sin”? 
 (present). 
 
 Concerning such persons the apostle makes the further 
 supposition, “If any man sin:”’ any man among those whom 
 he calls his “little children,’ ameng those with whom he 
 associates himself in what follows, “we have ;” any baptized 
 man obviously. Here then is a case supposed of post-baptismal 
 sin, and here follows the beloved apostle’s treatment of such a 
 case. What does he prescribe? Is it penance? Is it “a 
 second plank ”’ on which there is a bare possibility. of escaping 
 shipwreck at last; but an infinite doubtfulness whether any 
 who are there shall escape or not? Is it a course of austerity 
 _and self-discipline, and meritorious almsgiving in satisfaction for 
 sin, to procure if possible final forgiveness in the day of judg- 
 ment? Does he inform his unhappy disciples that there is no 
 forgiveness except in baptism and at the day of judgment ? 
 Does he thus lavish the gospel on baptism, and then bring all 
 who sin after baptism under the law? Having begun in the 
 spirit, does he aim at perfection by the flesh? Does he 
 introduce “the spirit of bondage again to fear,” again to 
 produce alienation from God, and so put an end to that filial 
 fellowship in the enjoyment of which alone true holiness can be 
 cultivated ? 
 
 Oh, no, no! He says, “If any man sin, we have an 
 ᾿ advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is 
 the propitiation for our sins.” He zs, not was at our baptism, 
 
 1 Rom. iv. 7, 8. 
 
172 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 but is day by day, the standing, all and always sufficient propi- 
 tiation for our sins: keeping out of the way everything i 
 could keep us from fellowship with our God. 
 
 Here it is that a great gulf is fixed between the gospel 
 and Romanism; and here the Romanising writers amongst 
 ourselves, and in a peculiar manner Dr. Pusey in his celebrated 
 Tract on Baptism, are in strict accordance with Romanism, and 
 direct hostility to the gospel and the Church of England. 
 
 Fellowship with the apostles did not consist in outward con- 
 sorting with the apostles’ company. Many who did not so 
 consort with them, who had never seen them in the flesh, had 
 nevertheless true fellowship with them ; while some who did 
 consort with them for a time, and seem to belong to them, were 
 destitute of real fellowship with them, and therefore eventually 
 forsook them. Of the former, the Christians at Laodicea and 
 Colosse afford a striking instance. They had never seen the 
 apostle’s face ; but though he was thus utterly a stranger to 
 them as regarded personal acquaintance, he cordially recognises 
 their fellowship in the spirit, joying and beholding their order, 
 and the steadfastness of their faith in Christ... Of the latter © 
 unhappy class, Demas and Diotrephes were striking examples. 
 “Demas hath forsaken me,” writes one apostle, “having loved 
 this present world.”? “I wrote unto the Church,” says 
 another apostle; “but Diotrephes, who loveth to haye the 
 pre-eminence among them, receiveth us not. Wherefore, if I 
 come I will remember his deeds which he doeth, prating 
 against us with malicious words; and not content therewith, 
 neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and forbiddeth 
 them that would, and casteth them out of the Church.” ὃ 
 
 But though the “ apostles’ fellowship” did not consist in, nor 
 of necessity include, outward and visible companionship, but 
 rather an experimental oneness in the enjoyment of God and 
 love of one another, yet it surely did include compliance with 
 the authoritative instructions of the apostles, not only in points 
 of doctrine, but also in matters of discipline and worship, e.g., 
 To the Church at’ Corinth the apostle Paul wrote plainly and 
 
 * Col, ii, 1—5, ? 2 Tim. iv. 10, 3. 3 John 9, 10, 
 
aes 
 
 The Church of God. in Christ. 173 
 
 
 
 pointedly concerning the Lord’s Supper, leaving no doubt in 
 the mind of any intelligent reader of his epistle that every 
 member of the Church should reverently “ eat of that bread and 
 drink of that cup.” He wrote also concerning the language 
 to be used in the public wership of God, that it should be a 
 language “understanded of the people,’ so that the unlearned 
 hearer might be able to say amen to the giving of thanks ; 
 for that otherwise the speakers and hearers would be as bar- 
 barians to one another.? If, in defiance of this, the Corinthian 
 Church had adopted a rule, rendered imperative by their local 
 ecclesiastical authorities, by which the use of the cup in the 
 Lord’s Supper was always confined to the officiating ministers 
 of the Church, and never extended to the congregation ; and 
 another rule, by which the most solemn services of the Church 
 in public worship were always conducted in a foreign and 
 dead language; it would have been palpable contempt of the 
 apostles to have recognised that Church as any longer an. 
 apostolical Church. 
 
 II. I proceed in the second place to show that regular 
 ‘unbroken succession from the apostles, even if it could be 
 proved, whatever collateral advantages it might boast, and 
 whatever disturbing irregularities it might exclude, could not 
 secure the steadfast continuance, thus shown to be indispensable, 
 in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship. 
 
 This seems to be susceptible of easy proof. St. Peter says, 
 “There were false prophets also among the people, even as 
 there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring 
 in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, 
 and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall 
 follow their pernicious ways, by reason of whom the way of 
 truth shalt be evil spoken of. And through covetousness shall 
 they with feigned words make merchandise of you, whose — 
 judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation 
 slumbereth not” (2 Peter ii. 1—3). Here false teachers, bring- 
 ing in damnable heresies, and leading many into pernicious ways, 
 
 1 1 Cor. xi. 20—26. εἰ 7 1 Cor. xiv. 11—19. 
 
174 |The Church and the Churches. 
 
 τ 
 are predicted; not strangers proved to be false by their want of 
 succession, but persons in the succession ; among you, the apostle 
 says, addressing the apostolical Church. And St. Paul gives 
 a similar prophetic warning to the overseers of the Ephesian, 
 Church: “ Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking 
 perverse things, to draw away disciples after them” (Acts xx: 
 30). This is corroborated by our Lord’s address to that 
 Church a few years after. “I know thy works, and thy labour, 
 and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are 
 evil; and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and 
 are not, and hast found them liars ” (Rey. ii. 2). If the persons 
 here referred to had not been in the succession, they could not 
 have even pretended to be apostolic ministers, and no trial of 
 them would have been required—they would have stood ipso 
 facto convicted as pretenders; but being in the succession, their 
 outward pretensions were good; and the faithful pastor who 
 detected their inward falsehood is highly commended. And 
 thus it appears, that however important for various reasons of 
 historical evidence, and to guard against various irregularities, 
 succession from the apostles by an outward and visible ordina- 
 tion may be, there is yet nothing in it which can with safety be 
 depended upon, for the continuance in a Church of apostolical 
 truth in doctrine, or purity in practice. 
 
 There is nothing in it which can be depended upon for pre- 
 servation from even personal apostasy. This was made too 
 awfully plain at the fountain-head of Christian ordination. If 
 ever men were truly ordained to the Christian ministry, those 
 were so whom Christ Himself ordained. In St. Mark (chap. 
 iii. 14), it is written, “ He ordained twelve;” and. so little 
 necessary connexion is there between ordination and the apos- 
 tolical character of the persons ordained, that one of the twelve 
 was a devil. Beware of false prophets, said the Lord,—by 
 their fruits ye shall know’ them (St. Matt. vii.) Suppose a 
 presbyter able to trace clearly his ordination or mission from 
 the apostles wno derived theirs from Christ ; what then ? Judas 
 was ordained by Christ Himself. Suppose a bishop (say the 
 Bishop of Rome) to make out his case of apostolical succession ; 
 
 an oa 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 175 
 
 
 
 grant, for argument’s sake, that no link was broken, no step 
 made void, by false pope, or antipope, or female pope,! but that 
 he can show his ordination without a flaw from Christ Himself: 
 what then? Why, then it may still be said to him, “The son 
 of perdition”’ (St. John xvii. 12) was ordained by Christ Him- 
 
 The story of Pope Joan is not a popular fiction, as many seem to imagine; 
 induced to that opinion, probably, not by any historical evidence, but by the 
 grossness of the tale itself ; but it is a well-authenticated fact. 
 
 This extraordinary woman, concealing her sex, of course, contrived so to 
 ‘win all hearts and voices during the pontificate of Leo IV., that upon the 
 death of that pontiff, she was, without a dissentient voice, raised to the chair 
 of St. Peter. 
 
 Platina, in his Lives of the Popes, gives the ag ea account of this trans- 
 action :— 
 
 (Baptista Platina, or railolenk Sanchi, was born at Piadena, near Mantua, 
 1421, and died at Rome, being then librarian to Pope Sixtus IV., 1481, zt. 60.) 
 
 “ Johannes Anglicus, ex Maguntiaco oriundus, malis artibus (ut aiunt) pontifi- 
 catum adeptus est. Mentitus enim sexum, cum fcemina esset, adolescens 
 admodum Athenas cum amatore viro docto proficiscitur: ibique praceptores 
 bonarum artium audiendo tantum profecit, ut Roman veniens, paucos admodum 
 etiam in sacris literis pares haberet, nedum superiores. Legendo autem et dis- 
 putando docte et acute, tantum benevolentiz et auctoritates sibi comparavit, ut 
 mortuo Leone in ejus locum (ut Martinus ait) omnium consensu pontifex 
 crearetur. Verum postea a seryo compressa, cum aliquandiu occulte ventrem 
 tulisset, tandem dum ad lateranensem basilicam profisceretur, inter theatrum 
 (quod Coliseum vocant, a Neronis colosso) et sanctum Clementem, doloribus 
 circumyenta peperit: eoq. loci mortua, pontificatus sui anno secundo, mense 
 uno, diebus quatuor, sine ullo honore sepelitur. Sunt qui ob hee scribant pon- 
 tificem ipsum’ quando ad lateranensem basilicam proficiscitur, detestandi 
 facinoris causa, et viam illam consulto declinare, et ejusdem yitandi erroris 
 causa, dum primo in sede Petri collocatur, ad eam rem perforato, genitalia ab 
 ultimo diacono attrectari. De primo non abnuerim, de secundo ita sentio, 
 sedem illam ad id paratum esse, ut quiin tanto magistratu constituitur, sciat se 
 non deum, sed hominem esse: et necessitatibus nature, utpote egerendi sub- 
 jectum esse, unde merito stercoraria sedes vocatur. Hac qui dixi vulgo feruntur, 
 incertis tamen et obscuris autoribus: que ideo ponere breviter et nude institui, 
 ne obstinate nimium et pertinaciter omisisse videar, quod fere omnes affirmant : 
 erremus etiam nos hac in re cum vulgo, quanquam appareat, ea que dixi,ex his 
 esse, que fieri posse’ creduntur. Sunt qui dicant hujus temporibus beati Vin- 
 centii corpus e Valentia citerioris Hispaniz civitate, a quodam monacho in 
 pagum albiensem ulterioris Galliz deportatum. Dicunt preterea Lotharium 
 jam grandem natu, sumpto monachorum habitu, filium Ludovicum impera- 
 torem reliquisse, qui statim in Germaniam provinciam rediens, omnes ad arma 
 spectantes sua presentia in officio continuit,” 
 
176 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 self, and therefore we may grant your ordination according to 
 your own showing, and yet still call you and believe you to be 
 “a son of perdition,” if we find his marks upon you; if we find 
 you like Demas loving this present world (2 Tim. iv. 10), or 
 like Diotrephes desiring to have the pre-eminence (3 John 9), 
 or like Judas betraying your Master with a kiss. 
 
 St. Paul describes true ministers of the Christian Church as 
 “workers together with God” (2 Cor. vi. 1). This supplies 
 one of the simplest tests for discrimination. For what bath God 
 done? He has given all Scripture by divine inspiration, and 
 declared it to be profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correc- 
 tion, for instruction in righteousness (2 Tim. iii. 16). He has 
 commanded, saying, “Search the Scriptures,” or commended, 
 saying, Ye search (St. John v.39). And “ Thou shalt teach my 
 words diligently unto thy children; and thou shalt write them 
 upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates ” (Deut. vi. 1—9). 
 
 Now, if we see an ordained minister commending the Scrip- 
 tures, explaining the Scriptures, endeavouring, by judicious, 
 patient, and persevering efforts, that men, women, and children 
 may have opportunity “to hear, read, mark, learn, and inwardly 
 digest’ the contents of the sacred volume,—here we see a 
 “ worker together with God,” and, in this particular at least, an 
 apostolical minister according to St. Paul’s description of such. 
 
 On the other hand, if we see an ordained minister, whether 
 bishop or presbyter, opposing the reading of the Scriptures by 
 the people generally, on the plea that through the ignorance of 
 the people, and the obscurity of the Scripture, more injury than 
 benefit will arise from it; if we see him objecting to the children 
 of his people being taught the Scriptures in the schools; if we 
 know of his interference to prevent the attendance of his people 
 at scriptural readings; if, as in one remarkable instance, we 
 find him commending the zeal of the peasant who put a Bible 
 in the fire, and enlarging in terms of high approbation on the 
 orthodox horror of a contaminating touch, which induced that 
 peasant to take the vile thing in the tongs rather than his 
 fingers,—do we here recognise a “ worker together with God,” 
 or a worker against God: do we here recognise a successor of 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 177 
 
 
 
 Peter, who earnestly recommended the Scriptures as a light to 
 which the people did well to take heed ; and exhorted all the 
 faithful, “scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, 
 Asia, Bithynia,” to “desire the sincere milk of the word, that 
 they might grow thereby ” (2 Peter i. 19 ; 1 Peter ii. 2); or do 
 we ποῦ rather recognise here a successor of Judas, who betrayed 
 his master and His cause through worldly, ambition? Peter 
 and Judas had the same ordination. It is not by their mission 
 in visible succession that ye shall know the true “ambassadors 
 for Christ’ from the false, but by their fruits. 
 
 If this be so, what becomes of the vaunted infallibility of the 
 Church? In whom, and in the virtue of what, does it reside ? 
 
 On this point, Romish controversialists are fond of referring 
 to the analogy between the Jewish and Christian Churches. 
 
 (1.) The Jewish Church had a charter of divine authority, 
 invested in a regularly constituted council or ecclesiastical court, 
 consisting of priests, with the high priest at their head. All 
 matters of controversy were to be referred to that tribunal, 
 The decisions of that tribunal were final; and if any of the 
 people were at any time so refractory as not to submit to those 
 decisions, such rebels were to be put to death. This charter is 
 thus expressed in the word of the Lord: “ If there arise a matter 
 too hard for thee in judgment, between blood and blood, between 
 plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of 
 ‘controversy within thy gates, then shalt thou arise, and get 
 thee up into the place which the Lord thy God shall choose. 
 And thou shalt come unto the priests, the Levites, and unto the 
 judge that shall be in those days, and inquire; and they shall 
 show thee the sentence of judgment. And thou shalt do ac- 
 cording to the sentence, which they of that place which the 
 Lord shall choose shall show thee, and thou shalt observe to do 
 according to all that they inform thee. According to the sen- 
 tence of the law which they shall teach thee, and according to 
 the judgment which they shall tell thee, thou shalt do: thou 
 shalt not decline from the sentence which they shall show thee, 
 to the right hand nor to the left. And the man that will do 
 
 12 
 
178 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 presumptuously, and will not hearken unto the priest that 
 standeth to minister there before the Lord thy God, or unto the 
 judge, even that man shall die: and thou shalt put away the 
 evil from Israel; and all the people shall hear, and fear, and 
 do no more presumptuously.”! This was decisive. 
 
 (2.) The Jewish Church had an assurance of the divine 
 presence’ always dwelling with her. The Lord said, “I will 
 sanctify the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar: I 
 will sanctify also both Aaron and his sons, to minister to me 
 in the priest’s office. And J will dwell among the children of 
 Israel, and will be their God. And they shall know that I am 
 the Lord their God that brought them out of the land of Egypt, 
 that Imay dwell among them.” * This was referred to long after 
 as being continuously fulfilled and never to be lost sight of. 
 Thus the prophet Haggai, addressing Zerubbabel the governor, 
 and Joshua the high priest, after their return from the captivity 
 in Babylon, says, “I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts: 
 according to the word that I covenanted with you when ye 
 came out of Egypt, so my Spirit remaineth among you: fear 
 ye not.” ? 
 
 (3.) The Jewish Church had plain and: reiterated promises of 
 divine protection, such as this: “No weapon that is formed 
 against thee shall prosper, and every tongue that shall rise 
 against’ thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. ‘This is the 
 heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is 
 of me, saith the Lord.’ ὁ 
 
 These all have. been made the basis of an argument from 
 analogy, to prove the divine authority and infallible decisions 
 of the Christian Church. Shall the Church guides under the 
 old law, it is asked, have such authority and such infallibility, 
 and shall not those under the new law have as much? Shall 
 the Jewish Church have such assurances of the abiding presence 
 of her God, and shall not the Christian Church have at least 
 the same? Shall the Church under types and shadows which 
 were ready to vanish away, have such satisfying promises of 
 
 1 Deut. xvii. 8—13. 8, Haggai ii. 4, δ. 
 2 Exod, xxix, 44—46, * Isa. liv. 17. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 170 
 
 the divine protection, and shall not the Church under the 
 everlasting and unchanging light of the gospel have even 
 more ? 
 
 Such is the line of argument adopted in this question, 
 not by irresponsible individuals only, but under the sanction 
 of the highest authorities in the Roman Church. On the 
 passage in Deuteronomy above cited, the following annotation 
 oecurs in the Douay Bible. I quote from an edition “au- 
 thorised by the Right Rev. N‘ Gibson, Vicar Apostolic of the 
 Northern District: revised and corrected by the Revs. T. 
 Robinson and Vincent Glover” :— ἡ 
 
 “ Here we see what authority God was pleased to give to the 
 Church-guides of the Old Testament, in deciding, without 
 appeal, all controversies relating to the law, promising that 
 they should not err therein,—punishing with death all who proudly 
 refuse to obey their decisions; and surely He has not done less 
 with the Church guides of the New Testament.” ἢ 
 
 Proceeding, then, to particulars, the parallel is thus filled up. 
 
 (1.) The charter of divine authority given to the Christian 
 Church is found in the words of the Lord Jesus to His disciples, 
 when He said, “ He that heareth you, heareth me ; and he that 
 despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that despiseth me, despiseth 
 Him that sent me.” And again, “ He that receiveth whomsoever 
 I send receiveth me; and he that receiveth me, receiveth Him 
 that sent me.” ? Ἢ 
 _ (2.) The assurance of the divine presence with the Christian 
 Church is found in the Lord’s parting words immediately 
 previous to His ascension. ‘“ Lo! I am with you always, even 
 to the end of the world.” And again, “I will not leave you 
 
 ' Tn other editions this note has been modified. I now transcribe from one 
 printed in Belfast in 1839, and published “ with the approbation of Right Rev. 
 Dr. Denvir.”’ In this the note appears thus, the clause “ punishing with death 
 all who proudly refuse to obey their decisions ” being suppressed :— 
 
 “Here we see what authority God was pleased to give to the Church-guides 
 of the Old Testament, in deciding without appeal all controversies relating 
 to the law, promising that they should not err therein; and surely He has not 
 done less for the Church-guides of the New Testament.” 
 
 2 St. Luke x. 16; St. John xiii. 20. 
 
180 Tne Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 comfortless, I will come to you.—If a man love me, he will 
 keep my words, and my Father will love him, and we will come 
 unto him, and make our abode with him.” } 
 
 (3.) The promise of divine protection to the Christian Church 
 is found in the words of Jesus to Simon Peter, “ Upon this rock 
 I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
 against it.” ? 
 
 The parallel is complete, and Roman Catholic writers are 
 fond of urging and enlarging upon it, as the ground of the 
 alleged scriptural authority and covenanted infallibility of the 
 Christian Church, to decide all controversies, and to punish 
 even with death—when this can be done with safety to the 
 faithful—all refractory and obstinate heretics. It isa fruitful 
 theme. All who impugn the decisions or resist the authority 
 of the Church, ard all who excite others so to do, are described 
 
 as partaking in the rebellion, and therefore well deserving of 
 the fate of Dathan and Abiram; while all schismatics who ἡ 
 
 violate the Church’s unity are represented as most justly in- 
 curring the punishment which fell on king Jeroboam.. 
 
 This is, in no ordinary degree, imposing ; but now let us try 
 the agplication of it. And here the Jewish part of the subject 
 becomes highly instructive, because of certain facts, of a very 
 unequivocal character, which have occurred in the history of 
 the Jewish Church. 
 
 The divine commandment was, as we have seen, that in 
 matters of controversy appeal should be made to the great 
 ecclesiastical council, under the presidency of the high priest 
 for the time being; and that the sentence there delivered should 
 be considered final. Under this charter, the council so con- 
 stituted claimed for their decisions all the infallibility of a 
 divine sentence; and in the outset, in the days of Moses and 
 Joshua, they were actually guided by express communications 
 from heaven. These were given sometimes in audible words 
 from the Lord, sometimes by the Urim and Thummim in the 
 consecrated breastplate of the high priest. Afterwards, when 
 such communications ceased, how often, and under what cir- 
 
 1 St. Matt. xxviii. 20; St. John xiv. 18, 23. 2 St. Matt. xvi. 18. 
 
 + 7 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 181 
 
 
 
 cumstances, the Jewish ‘ecclesiastical council exercised their 
 authority, we have no means of knowing, because no special 
 cases of reference to them are cited in the sacred narrative. 
 
 Still, they had the abiding assurance of the divine presence : 
 “JT am with you, saith the Lord of hosts; according to the 
 word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, 
 so my Spirit remaineth among you;” and at last we do meet 
 with a case, a remarkable case, of a controversy which arose 
 at Jerusalem, and was referred to the great Church council, 
 with the high priest at its head. It was the controversy Sink 
 arose upon the claim of Jesus of Nazareth to be the Messiah, the - 
 Son of the living God. This claim was warmly espoused by some, 
 and as vehemently denied and resisted by others; the whole 
 city was moved; and after several discussions in the streets, in 
 the temple, and elsewhere, the matter was brought before the 
 proper tribunal. “They led Jesus away to the high priest, 
 and with Him were assembled all the chief priests and the elders, ° 
 and the scribes.” + Here was the great ecclesiastical council of 
 the Jewish Church, in the regular Aaronic and Levitical suc- 
 cession from the days of Moses; and doubtless there were 
 many among the Jewish people who regarded the authoritative 
 decisions of that council as the expression, without risk of error, 
 of the mind of God. Doubtless there were many ready to plead 
 the language of Moses and the prophets, as well as the traditions 
 of their fathers, in support of the infallibility of their Church. 
 
 Facts speak. To the high priest’s first address Jesus answered 
 nothing. His accusers were heard; and then the high priest 
 said, “ Answerest thou nothing ? What is it which these witness 
 against thee ?’’ But Jesus held His peace, and answered nothing. 
 pee the high priest asked Him, and said unto Him, Art thou 
 the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? And Jesus said, I AM; and 
 ye shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right tighid of power, 
 and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest rent 
 his clothes, and said, What need we any further witnesses ?—ye 
 have heard the blasphemy; what think ye? And they-all con- 
 demned Him to be guilty of death.’ ? 
 
 1 St. Mark xiv. 53. * St. Mark xiv. 60—64, 
 
182 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 They all condemned Him to be guilty of death! Such was the 
 unanimous decision of this council, the catholic consent of this 
 infallible Church: that instead of being the Son of God indeed, 
 as He said He was, Jesus was an impostor, and advanced His 
 _ pretensions with such arrogancy as amounted to blasphemy. 
 By their law, death was the punishment of the convicted blas- 
 phemer, and thus they arrived at the conclusion, and gave forth 
 the sentence, that the prisoner at their bar was guilty of death. 
 
 This brings the matter to a crisis. If they were right, forming 
 their judgment under divine influence, and coming to a decision 
 in accordance with the mind of God, then Jesus was not the 
 Messiah, the Son of the Blessed, but an arrogant blasphemer. 
 On the other hand, if Jesus was indeed the Christ, then their 
 decision was fatally wrong. If their decision was right, what is 
 to be said of Christianity? If their decision in such a matter 
 was wrong, what is to be said of ecclesiastical infallibility ? 
 
 Now we know that their decision was wrong; and their de- 
 scendants, even the whole nation, have been enduring the bitter 
 consequences of it from that day until now. According to 
 their dreadful imprecation, His blood has been upon them and 
 upon their children, in the way of still unexpiated vengeance.! 
 
 What, then, becomes of the infallibility of their Church ? 
 Such an interpretation of their charter as would represent 
 infallibility as*inherent in their great ecclesiastical council, 
 whatever might be the character of its members, must be 
 relinquished. The fact now before us compels us so to interpret 
 their charter as to render it compatible with their fatal mistake. 
 
 Were they partially right in their decision, and can any limita-_ 
 
 tion or explanation be found on that side? No. They were 
 utterly wrong, and the explanation must be wholly on the other 
 side. To what end, then, it may be asked, were the statutes and 
 
 judgments to be observed by the Jewish people given in such 
 
 copious detail as we find them in the Books of Moses? To what 
 
 end were the miraculous communications by Urim and Thummim 
 
 cireumstantially recorded ? Chapter after chapter is oceupied 
 
 with statutes and ordinances, moral, ceremonial, and judicial, 
 1 St. Matt, xxvii, 25, 
 
 ἔξ τὴς 
 
The Church of Gol in! Choitet. 183 
 
 
 
 involving general principles, and entering into the most minute 
 particulars. It is an obvious inquiry, Where was the object of 
 all this, and of commanding the people to attend to it all, and 
 teach their children to attend to it all, if there was a living 
 tribunal among them, invested with absolute authority to decide ? 
 
 Moses, ΑΝΑΝ ΟΝ before his death, and referring the 
 people of Israel to all that had been said ἀρὰ done during his 
 wondrous ministry among them, said, “ These are the pera, 
 ments, the statutes, ΠΝ the judgments which the Lord your 
 God commanded to teach you, that ye might do them in the 
 land whither ye go in to possess it ; that thou mightest fear the 
 Lord thy God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments 
 which I command thee; thou, and thy son, and thy son’s son, 
 all the days of thy life; and that thy days may bé prolonged. 
 Hear, therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it, that it may be 
 well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord 
 God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth 
 with milk and honey. Hear, O Israel! the Lord our God is one 
 Lord; and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine 
 heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these 
 words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart ; 
 and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt 
 talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou 
 walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou 
 risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine 
 hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And 
 thou alk write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy 
 
 gates.” + 
 
 This would have been vain and useless if the authority given 
 to the ecclesiastical council, and guaranteed to their legitimate 
 successors, had been esha Here, therefore, we find the true 
 limitation, a right understanding of which will harmonise the 
 charter of the Church with the facts of the history. 
 
 The authority vested in the Church council was not absolute, 
 but relative. It was not given alone, but in company with, and 
 of course in reference to, the written law. He who gave autho- 
 
 ? Deut. vi. 1—9, 
 
184 D he Church and the Churches. 
 
 rity to the council, gave also laws to the people. The authority 
 was not legislative, to originate laws of its own; neither was it 
 arbitrary, to decide without laws; but it was executive of the 
 Jaws which God had given. Thus the Jewish Church had all 
 the advantages for energy and discipline to be derived from an 
 executive government invested with substantial power ; while, at 
 the same time, they had all the security against tyranny and 
 caprice which is derived from a written and published charter. 
 It was possible for the executive government to lose sight of 
 part or parts of the charter, and to do wrong. It is a fact that 
 they did do wrong, to the extent of denying and crucifying the 
 Lord of Glory. They did wrong, not only with reference to the 
 person of Jesus whom they knew not, but also with reference to 
 one of their own plainly-written laws. It was written in their 
 law that no man should be condemned unless upon the agreeing 
 testimony of at least two witnesses.' The witnesses against 
 
 Jesus did not agree. “They sought witnesses to put Him ἕο. 
 
 death, but found none; yea, though many false witnesses came, 
 yet found they none,” ? ze. none to put Him to death,—none 
 
 whose testimony agreed one with the other. In defiance of this, ᾿ 
 
 they proceeded to condemn Him to death. : 
 
 It was not the duty of any man in Jerusalem to puta to 
 such a decision. The authority of their Church council was 
 under limitation to a written law, and when that law was 
 violated the ecclesiastical executive forfeited their own charter. 
 
 It is no answer to this to say that the prisoner pleaded guilty, 
 and that consequently no further witness was required. The 
 assertion that He was the Christ, the Son of the Blessed, was 
 not primd facie, and of necessity, false. They themselves were 
 expecting the Messiah to appear. The person then before them 
 might be He. When He said I am, they presumed and pre- 
 judged Him guilty; but before they could lawfully find Him 
 guilty, they should have lawfully proved that His assertion was 
 false. To pronounce upon the assertion itself, by whomsoever 
 made, that it was, in itself, blasphemy, was in fact to pronounce 
 that Messiah could never come. They are, therefore, fully open 
 
 1 Deut. xvii. 6. 2 St. Matt, xxvi. 59, 60, : 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 185 
 
 ——__..___. 
 
 
 
 
 
 to the charge of having proceeded without proof and without 
 witnesses to condemn a man contrary to the law. 
 The parallel in this point with the Christian Church is indeed 
 
 ‘complete, and highly instructive—an executive government 
 5 4 > b > 
 
 under limitation of a written charter! 
 
 The Jewish Church for a time decided with infallible truth, 
 guided by the miraculous communications vouchsafed from 
 “Him who dwelled between the cherubims ;” but when her 
 written code of instructions and precedents was complete, and 
 those miraculous communications were withheld, she went wrong, 
 fatally wrong,—that is, as to her outward and visible part, com-_ 
 prising the national bulk of the circumcised community. There 
 was indeed an election in that community, and they were kept 
 right; but, as St. Paul expresses it, the rest were blinded. 
 
 The Christian Church for a time decided with infallible trath, 
 
 . guided by the plenary inspiration given to her apostolical council. 
 
 They bound on earth what is bound in heaven, and loosed on 
 earth what is loosed in heaven, without the possibility of mis- 
 take; but when her written code was completed, and plenary 
 inspiration withheld, it became possible for her to go wrong. | It 
 was only by constant and dutiful attention to her written law 
 that her living executive could be kept right. 
 
 The parallel does not prove that the Christian Church actually 
 has gone wrong: but it proves that, notwithstanding her high 
 charter of divine authority, her assurance of her Lord’s abiding 
 presence, and His promises of final and indefeasible security, 
 the Christian Church, as to her outward and visible part, com- 
 prising the bulk of the baptized communities, may go wrong, 
 fatally wrong, even to the extent of crucifying the Lord afresh, 
 and putting Him to an open shame. This throws open the 
 inquiry as to whether the visible Christian Church has gone 
 wrong or not. Her charter of divine authority cannot, with 
 justice, be pleaded in arrest of all inquiry; and they who still 
 maintain her infallibility must relinquish analogy with the Jewish 
 Church as the ground of their argument, and defend their posi- 
 tion on some other grounds. . 
 
 To what end has the Old Testament been preserved, the New 
 
186 7) he Church and the Churches. 
 
 Testament composed, and both circulated? To what end are 
 the members of the Christian Church commanded to read the 
 Scriptures, and commended for searching the Scriptures? To 
 what end did one apostle say, “I speak as unto wise men, judge 
 ye what I say; and another,” “Try the spirits whether they 
 be of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the 
 
 world;” and another, ‘‘ We have a more sure word of prophecy, 
 3 by) Ἢ 3 
 
 whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto.a light that 
 shineth in a dark place”? Why all this, if there be a living 
 infallible tribunal to put an end to all controversies and all doubts, 
 to speak light, giving the mind of God, and that absolutely ? 
 But all this is beautifully harmonious, if Church authority be 
 an executive authority—executive of a written law, not legisla- 
 tive, not arbitrary; restrained from lording it over God’s heri- 
 _tage, and at the same time most usefully efficient for all the 
 ready purposes of living energy, and scriptural discipline, pre- 
 serving order and decorum, and subordination. 
 
 If it be objected that this, after all, leaves the practical ques- 
 tion in every instance open, bringing in the exercise of private 
 opinion, and making the members of the Church judges as to 
 whether the executive government have or have not transgressed 
 the written law, Ianswer, Why not? Why were reason and 
 conscience and immortality given to the members of the Church? 
 Of what is the Church, as a body, composed, but of individual 
 members? And how can responsibility attach to the aggregate, 
 but by attaching to each of the constituent parts? Christianity, 
 in its written code, treats men as individuals : He that believeth, 
 in its language, and he that believeth not, let him that heareth 
 understand, to him that overcometh will I give ; one shall be 
 taken and another left ; and God shall render to every man accord- 
 ing to his works. It is as individuals we must. stand in the 
 judgment of God, according to the opportunities, talents, and 
 circumstances of each: and therefore upon us, as. individuals, 
 devolves now the solemn, the awfully responsible duty of a con- 
 scientious use of all our opportunities and talents; and herein, 
 pre-eminently, of all our hearing and reading on the subject of 
 religion. It becomes those in authority to beware how they 
 
- 
 
 The Church of God in Christ. 187 
 
 command; and it becomes those under authority to beware how 
 they disobey. But to lodge absolute irresponsible authority in 
 some men would be inconsistent with human frailty; and to 
 require the prostration of unexamining obedience from other 
 men, would be inconsistent with human liberty. He who knows 
 what is in man, and judgeth righteously, has done neither of 
 these inconsistent things. 
 
 III. Thus, thirdly, in tracing the true apostolicity of the 
 Church, the line of succession will not suffice as a trustworthy 
 conductor ; because on that line we may possibly find wolves in 
 sheep’s clothing, devouring the flock, men of corrupt minds and 
 reprobate concerning the truth, to whom gain is godliness, false 
 teachers bringing in damnable heresies: on that line we may 
 find also, men who love to have the pre-eminence, and who there- 
 upon reject the supremacy of apostolical instructions, and elevate 
 their own inventions, or the traditions of their fathers, into the 
 highest place. 
 
 If, therefore, we would trace apostolicity, not in name and in 
 word, but in deed and in truth, we must look for steadfast con- 
 tinuance in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship. In other words, 
 we must look among spiritual men; because the doctrine and 
 fellowship of the apostles include what St. Paul calls “the things 
 of the Spirit of God,” and he tells us, with unequivocal plainness, 
 that ‘the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of 
 God: for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know 
 them, because they are spiritually discerned.” ἢ 
 
 This fundamental truth demands the most careful attention. 
 It is of no private interpretation. It is neither local nor tem- 
 porary: neither confined to the apostolic age in which it was 
 written, nor to the Corinthian Church to hans it was originally 
 addressed. It is a truth universal and eternal, the natural man, . 
 —that is, to use the language of our Church iauie les δε man natu- 
 rally engendered of the offspring of Adam,” and not yet born 
 again of the Spirit of God: whatever his station in life may be, 
 whatever may be his natural talents, or the extent of his acquired 
 
 1 1 Cor. ii, 14, 
 
188 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 knowledge, whatever may be the aspect of his natural character, 
 whatever things his mind may be able to receive and appreciate 
 
 and discuss—things of business, of art, of literature, of science, 
 
 —he cannot wisely discuss, he cannot duly appreciate; nay, he 
 cannot at all receive the things of the Spirit of God. \He can- 
 not embrace the doctrine or enjoy the fellowship of the apostles, 
 and therefore he cannot be a living member of, though he may 
 apparently belong to, an apostolic body. 
 
 It may seem at first sight that, admitting this to be a truth, no 
 practical good can be reasonably Pcie te result from making 
 it prominent and insisting upon it. It wears a discouraging 
 aspect, and we may be asked, If you wish to stir men to valuable 
 exertion, why throw ‘such a dead weight as this upon them ? 
 
 Our answer is, first, that instead of waiting for a reason to 
 obey what God has commanded, we hail, in the fact that He has 
 commanded, it, the best possible reason why we should obey ; as 
 instead of waiting for a reason to believe what God has revealed, 
 we hail, in the fact that he has revealed it, the best possible 
 reason why we should believe. 
 
 And our answer is, secondly, that being truly anxious to stir 
 up man to valuable exertion in the service of God, and knowing 
 
 that he is naturally inclined, when he exerts himself at all, to 
 exert himself in a wrong direction, in a way wherein he can 
 do nothing valuable, but where everything that seems valuable 
 is really deceitful in itself and eventually destructive in its con- 
 sequences, we do most reasonably begin by setting up a barrier 
 at the entrance of that fatal road. The truth now before us is 
 such a barrier; it separates at once and for ever true religion 
 from natural exertion, whether of mind or body or both ; and it 
 throws every one who is assured of it into a posture of depend- 
 ence upon supernatural aid. This is a grand point. When this 
 is done indeed, though the victory cannot be said to be actually 
 won, it may truly be said to be eventually certain. Prostration 
 in the dust is fallen man’s first, best, and safest step towards 
 heaven. It is upon his knees, looking unto Jesus, that he re- 
 ceives and learns the use of wings to fly into the bosom of God ! 
 Let πο reader marvel, then, if we insist upon this truth when 
 
 = = 
 ee a νιν 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 189 
 tracing the true apostolicity of the δἰ Christian Church, It is not 
 eadilp acknowledged, especially by the wise and prudent of this 
 world ; and a high branch of the high calling of Christ’s minis- 
 ters is, to present it with true heavenly winders and prudence 
 to various minds in various scriptural aspects, and to commend it 
 by sound arguments and explanatory distinctions, if God perad- 
 venture will give repentance and humility, to the cordial acknow- 
 ledgment of it. Such arguments and distinctions will be found 
 to throw much light upon the Holy Scriptures in sundry places. 
 
 The natural man’s inability to receive the things of the Spirit 
 of God must be considered in its twofold source. He must be 
 contemplated as a creature, and as a fallen creature. As a 
 creature his understanding is finite, and as a fallen creature his 
 affections are corrupt. The things of the Spirit of God are great 
 and good; too great for a finite understanding, too good for 
 corrupt affections. These are combined in the apostle’s discus- 
 sion of this great subject ; and much clearness results from keep- 
 ing them distinctly in view.' In the first chapter of his Epistle 
 to the Corinthian Church, St. Paul tells us he was sent to preach 
 the gospel, not with wisdom of words, after the manner of the 
 various schools of the philosophers, with their <abstract reason- 
 ings and logical deductions, appealing in the last resort to human 
 wisdom as the judge of all possible truth. Those who did so 
 could not, of course, announce anything above human reason ; 
 and had he done so he must have obscured the cross of Christ 
 so as to make it of no effect ; for the cross of Christ, by which 
 he plainly means the whole revelation of the gospel, contains 
 much that, instead of commending itself as wisdom to fallen 
 men, is rejected by them as‘foolishness. It contains the things 
 of the Spirit of God, too great for the creature to receive, too 
 good for the fallen creature to relish. The Godhead, containing 
 in itself personal resources fer the wondrous work of redemption 
 —the sovereignty of the Father in appointing that work before 
 the world was—the incarnation of the Eternal Word by the 
 power of the co-eternal Spirit, and of the substance of a fallen 
 woman—the experience of Christ τῇ the flesh—the substitution 
 
 of One for many—the obedience of One counted to many—the 
 
 
 
 
 
190 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 sufferings of One accepted for many—the resurrection of One 
 the victory of many—the gracious love manifested in all this 
 from heaven—the holy love produced by all this upon earth— 
 these are too great for a man as a man, and too good for a man 
 as a sinner. They are indeed “the power of God and the wis- 
 
 ‘dom of God unto salvation ;” and by men who are saved they — 
 
 are recognised as such, but by the natural man they are con- 
 sidered foolishness. The apostle was fully aware that this was 
 the case. It had, indeed, been a theme of prophecy; for it is 
 written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring 
 to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the 
 wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this 
 word? Hath not God made féolish the wisdom of this world ? 
 For, after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom 
 knew not God, it pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, 
 to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign, and the 
 Greeks seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, unto 
 the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness ; 
 but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, 
 the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolish- 
 ness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is 
 stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how 
 that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not 
 many noble, are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things 
 of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the 
 weak things of the world to confound the things which are 
 mighty : and base things of the world, and things which are 
 despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to 
 bring to nought things that are, that no flesh should glory in 
 His presence ” (1 Cor. i. 19—29). 
 
 The apostle did not attempt to disguise or withhold the mys- 
 terious truth because of such reception among men. He knew, 
 indeed, and declared that, left to themselves, they could not 
 receive this ; but he knew, at the same time, and declared, that, 
 whatever else they might receive, they could not be saved unless 
 
 ‘they received this ; and concerning himself and others who had 
 received this, he declared that they had not been left to them- 
 
 Be ν 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 191 
 
 
 
 selves. He excludes the eye, the ear, the heart of man as the 
 source of divine knowledge, and declares that God is the revealer 
 of Himself in man by His Spirit. “ Eye hath not seen, nor ear 
 heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things 
 whieh God hath prepared for them that love Fis: but God 
 hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit, for the iinth search- 
 eth all things, yea, the deep things of God. Now we have re- 
 ceived, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of 
 God:'that we might know the things that are freely given to 
 us of God” (1 Cor. ii. 9, 10, 12). 
 
 The Spirit of God meets man’s necessity in both its parts, as 
 he is a creature, and as he is a fallen creature. As he is a 
 creature with a finite understanding, the Spirit reconciles him 
 to willing acquiescence in his remaining ignorance of many 
 things. It does indeed teach him much, and leads him on 
 higher and higher in the saving knowledge of God the Father, 
 and of Jesus Christ, whom He hath sent. But beneath the deep 
 things so taught there are deeper things, which no finite mind 
 can fathom; and the Holy Spirit leads the Christian not only 
 to cease to murmur and object because of mysteries, but sweetly 
 to enjoy his position as a creature, finishing in adoring praise 
 the contemplations which have begun in intelligent holy love. 
 
 As a fallen creature, with corrupt affections, communicating 
 a baleful bias to his mind, the Spirit meets his necessity by 
 renewing his affections and shedding abroad the love of God, 
 the constraining love of Christ, in his heart. This is the basis 
 of true apostolicity in a man, and therefore in a Church, which 
 is composed of men. “If any man be in Christ, he is a new 
 creature. Old things are passed away ; behold, all things are 
 become new.” ὦ 
 
 But further: it is not itianaly that which was manifestly 
 sinful in the natural man which is changed by this process, but 
 all that was apparently religious alsois changed. There is much 
 that is apparently religious in the natural man. A conscious- 
 ness of guilt, an acknowledgment of immortality, a sense of 
 duty towards God and towards man, a zeal for those parts of 
 
 τ 2 Cor. v. 17, 
 
192 The Church and the Churches, 
 
 duty which either do not interfere with natural corruptions, or 
 are supposed to be substitutions for punishment incurred by the 
 indulgence of those corruptions; these exist in various degrees 
 in different countries, and in different men. But they may be 
 truly said to be natural to man. The natural man can and does 
 receive them; but he receives them, and judges of them, and is 
 influenced by them, on natural principles, according to the 
 covenant of works, which neither he nor any who have gone 
 before him can fulfil. Viewing things in the light of that 
 covenant, he can approve of the practical duties of religion; he 
 honestly, and perhaps zealously, approves of them; and there- 
 fore he feels himself libelled when he is told that he cannot 
 receive or approve of the things of the Spirit of God. And yet 
 this is true. He approves of the duties, considered in them- 
 selves ; but he does not approve of the position which those 
 duties hold in the covenant of grace, the only position in which 
 they are well pleasing unto God, however well pleased with 
 their outward performance ἀρ νϑὶ men may be. In the 
 covenant of grace, every duty has a peculiar relationship to 
 the merits and mediation of Christ, and to the indwelling effi- 
 ciency of the Holy Ghost. It is in this relationship alone that 
 they are accepted of God; and it is precisely in this relation- 
 ship that they are refused by the natural man, and nauseated as 
 enthusiasm. Let duties be presented as conditions of salvation, 
 according to the covenant of works—‘This do and thou shalt 
 live ”—and the natural man can receive the saying. He can- 
 ’ not, indeed, perform the work according to the tenor of the 
 covenant without a flaw; but he can receive and approve of 
 the doctrine, a doctrine which condemns himself. Like the 
 
 Jews of old, “he has one that accuses him, even Moses, in . 
 
 whom he trusts.” + But let duties be presented as gifts of God, 
 
 “of whose only gift it pomp that His faithful people do, or 
 
 can do, any laudable service,’ according to the covenant of 
 
 grace ; Jesus Christ exalted a prince et a. saviour to give 
 
 Fepantante and faith ; the Holy Ghost sent as an indweller to 
 
 work all our works in us; ourselves God’s workmanship, created 
 1 St. John νυ. 45, 
 
 ae. See 
 
. The Church of God in Christ. 193 
 in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained 
 - that we should walk in; and then the natural man rejects the 
 doctrine, a doctrine wherein alone there is salvation. 
 
 True Christianity consists of the things of the Spirit of God; 
 and if the natural man cannot receive those things, what must 
 become of Christianity? It must be confined to spiritual men! 
 Clearly and undeniably so. “If any man have not the Spirit 
 of Christ, he is none of His.”1 But the profession of Chris- 
 tianity is not and never has been confined to spiritual men, 
 neither is that profession in every case a hypocritical profession. 
 In many thousands of instances it is perfectly sincere. But how 
 can this be? How can natural men be sincere in a profession 
 of Christianity? In order to render this possible, there must 
 be some things in what they consider Christianity which are 
 not the things of the Spirit of God. Such has been the fact. 
 Instead of natural men always and uniformly rejecting Chris- 
 tianity as a thing too spiritual for them, they have invented, or 
 borrowed from heathens, or Jews, or both, a-carnal system, and 
 cailed it Christianity. A few particulars here will show how a 
 Church with “a name to live”? has continued, while genuine 
 apostolicity, was abandoned. | 
 
 (1) Among the things of the Spirit of God, the objects of 
 true apostolical religion, the chief and most important of all is 
 the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. He is the sun of the system, 
 the first and the last. Is God the subject? He is “ the bright- 
 ness of the Father’s glory, the express image of His person,” the 
 sender also of the Holy Ghost, the Comforter. Is creation the 
 subject? His is the power by which it sprang into being: He 
 is the base upon which it all rests; in Him all things consist.” 
 Is the Church the subject? He is the head. Is pardon the 
 subject ? He is the purchaser of it by Hisblood. Is righteous- 
 ness before God the subject? He is the performer of it in 
 His life. Is faith the subject? He is the author and finisher 
 of it. Is hell the subject? He is the only refuge from it. Is 
 heaven the subject? He is the light and glory of it. 
 
 In His Godhead He is invisible; in His manhood He is 
 
 1 Rom. viii. 9, 2 Apoc, iii. 1, 
 ! 
 
 18 
 
194 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 absent. How then is He to be presented to men that they may 
 receive Him? He is presented to our faith in the Word, by the 
 Spirit (St. John xvi. 13—15, and xx. 31). To spiritual men 
 this is effectual (2 Cor. iii. 18). But what are natural men to 
 do with all this? They cannot receive it. While it is genuine 
 in itself, it is foolishness unto them; there is “no form nor, 
 comeliness” in it, no power, no beauty, ‘no glory in it to their 
 minds, that they should admire it.. They have no capacity for 
 it. It is music indeed, but they have no spiritual ear; it is 
 meat indeed, but they have no spiritual hunger; it is drink 
 indeed, but they have no spiritual thirst. What is to be done, 
 then? Shall they resist and reject it altogether? Hither this 
 or corrupt it. What has been done? They have corrupted it, 
 and debased it down to the thing which the natural man could 
 receive; they have represented the Lord Jesus Christ in His 
 incarnation, miracles, sufferings, death, resurrection, and ascen- 
 sion, to the eyes of men. Instead of “speaking the truth” that 
 “faith might come by hearing, and hearing by the word of 
 God,” they have managed to do without faith, by presenting 
 Christ in gold, silver, and ivory, wood, stone, and painted 
 canvas. These are fines of the senses of men, not of the 
 Spirit, of God. These the natural men can receive; these 
 they have received; these they miscall Christianity, and the 
 Church which deals in these things they miscall an apostolical 
 Church. 
 
 (2) The worship of God, under the ministration of the Spirit 
 in the Gospel, is beautiful and glorious; but its beauty is the 
 beanty of holiness, and its nae is a glory of spirituality. In 
 this it excelleth in glory the Old Testament ministration (see 
 2 Cor. ii. 7,11). The object is the invisible God, the medium 
 
 the invisible Saviour, the agent the Holy Ghost.. “Through. 
 
 Him, Christ, we both have access by one Spirit unto the 
 Father.” In this glory it excels. In anything external or 
 visible it does not excel or equal the old. What comparison is 
 there between the worship in Lydia’s house or Paul’s lodgings, 
 
 and the worship in Solomon’s temple or Aaron’s tabernacle ? © 
 
 | Bph, ii, 18, 
 
 — .. Ὁ 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 195 
 
 In dress, in pomp, in show, in all that is received by the senses 
 of the natural’ man; which excelled? The old. But in true 
 spirituality, in all that is appreciated by the hearts of apostolic 
 men, which excelled? The new. This is satisfactory to spiri- 
 tual men; but what are natural men to do-with all this? They 
 cannot eve it. While it is genuine in itself, it is foolishness 
 to them. What was to be done, then? Should they resist and 
 reject it altogether? Hither this or corrupt it. What has been 
 done? They have corrupted it and debased it down to what 
 natural men can receive; they have made Christian worship, as- 
 they call it, to consist in varied and gorgeous dresses and deco- 
 rations, postures of the body, sprinklings of the flesh with. 
 water falsely called holy, and soft sounds of elaborate music 
 exciting the imagination, and creating the deceitful appearance 
 of devotional feeling. 
 
 (3) The great distinguishing doctrines of Christianity con-- 
 cerning sin and the pardon of sin are spiritual. Sin is the 
 transgression of the law. The law is spiritual, holy, and just, 
 and good. ‘The penalty of transgression is-death. The life of 
 the flesh is in the blood. Without death, without shedding of 
 blood, is no remission. Only Christ, God and man, honours. 
 the law.and suffers the penalty; and as He only, so He per- 
 fectly, exclusively, and finally, once for all. In Him there is 
 no condemnation; out of Him there is nothing but condemna~ 
 tion. ‘This is received by faith, and to spiritual men it is satis- 
 factory (Rom. iii. passim, and viii. 1; Heb. ix.. and x. ;. James 
 ii. 10). But what are natural men to make of all this? They 
 cannot receive it. While it is genuine, its principles are fool- 
 ishness to them. What was to be done then ἢ Reject or. corrupt 
 it. They have corrupted it down to the principles natural to 
 men. Sin is dealt with, not as essentially opposed to God, but 
 as in measures injurious to man; and pardon is dealt with in 
 measures also. ‘The sacrifice of Christ is acknowledged to be 
 ineffectual, and as such is repeated, and in the repetition drama- 
 tised to the senses: and being still ineffectual to procure pardon 
 of sin, as it must be if it needs repetition, penances are added, 
 and pilgrimages and discipline, in things which the natural man 
 
Ψ 
 
 τοῦ The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 can receive. All these are felt to be ineffectual. After experi- 
 ence of them all, conscience clamours still. What then? <A 
 final:step is held out, which it is confidently promised shall be 
 effectual at'last. This is equally carnal and ineffectual in itself ; 
 and the delusion would be dissipated if this were open to the 
 
 test of experience; therefore the time of it is postponed till 
 
 after death, and as no one returns to tell of the disappointment, 
 the imagination is kept up. ‘And connected as it is declared to 
 be with the continued suffrages and services of the Church on 
 earth, it is made the fruitful source of disgraceful traffic. When 
 a sorcerer of old suggested a connexion between the payment 
 of money and the procuring of spiritual blessings, St. Peter 
 said, with holy indignation, “Thy money perish with thee, 
 because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be pur- 
 chased with money. Thou hast neither part nor lot in this 
 matter; for thy heart is not right in the sight of God.”? 
 
 The contrast is painful with a ‘Church which boasts its descent 
 from St. Peter, but which cannot for shame pretend to have 
 inherited any portion of his holy indignation against trading in 
 the things of the Spirit-‘of God. How could the justice of the 
 
 ancient proverb ‘have been felt, in its application to Rome eccle- ° 
 
 siastical, “Omnia Romae venalia,”’ if Rome had continued an 
 apostolical Church ? 
 
 It is sufficiently remarkable that where all these corruptions 
 are most notorious, the high exclusive pretension to apostolicity 
 is most vauntingly arrogated. Assuaredly, however, the holy 
 fellowship and uncorrupted doctrine of the apostles are indis- 
 pensable towards genuine apostolicity. Where these are found, 
 genuine members of the Church of God in Christ are found ; 
 where these are obscured, the genuineness of the Church is 
 proportionably obscured ; and where these are lost, Christianity 
 itself is lost. For the want of these no outward succession can 
 compensate, no pretence to authority, no claims to infallibility, 
 not even the presence, if it existed, of supernatural gifts and 
 miracles. : 
 
 If it pleased Almighty God to allow real miracles to be 
 
 1 Acts viii, 20, 21, 
 
 
 
 ——- ΝΣ μο 
 
The Church of God in. Christ. 197 
 
 
 
 wrought in avowed confirmation of false doctrine and unrigh- 
 teous practice, it would not. be to attest the claims of those who 
 wrought the miracles, but to try the faith and constancy of those 
 who believed the doctrine and practised righteousness. “ If 
 there arise among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and 
 giveth thee a sign or a wonder, and the sign.or the wonder 
 come to pass whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go 
 after other gods (which thou hast not known), and let us serve 
 them, thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, 
 or that dreamer of dreams: for the Lord your God proveth 
 you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your 
 heart and with all your soul.”’ What is here supposed and pro- 
 vided for under the Old Testament dispensation, is, in the New 
 Testament, predicted as one of the trials of the Christian Church 
 in the latter days. The wicked one who shall eventually be 
 destroyed by the brightness of the Lord’s coming shall in the 
 meantime practise and prosper after the working of Satan, “ with 
 all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceivable- 
 ness of unrighteousness in them that perish,” ” There would be 
 no deceivableness about an open enemy, but this wicked one is 
 predicted as a professed friend, whose words are smooth as butter, 
 while a dagger is in his heart. He comes in the boasted aposto- 
 lical succession, saying, “ Lord, Lord,’ while he systematically 
 
 1 Deut. xiii. 1—3. 
 
 2 2 Thess. ii.,9, 10. “La prediction de 5, Paul dans la seconde epitre au 
 Thessaloniens, chap. ii., achéve de s’accomplir dans |’Kglise de Rome. Car 
 enfin, 5. Anselme explique ce passage de l’Eglise Romaine, ἃ cause des abus et 
 des vices qui y regnent. Il y ades auteurs qui sont de ce meme sentiment. 
 Je sgai bien aussi qu’on donne d’autres interpretations ἃ cet endroit. Dieu veuille 
 avoir pitié de nous, et ne nous punir pas autant que nos pechez le meritent.”— 
 
 Vargas, p. 237. See also pp. 222, 230. 
 
 It was thus that a zealous Romanist, when under some compunctions of con- 
 science, felt himself constrained to speak, while he was an eye and ear witness 
 to the proceedings of the Council of Trent. Instead ofjallowing fair discussion 
 in that notorious assembly, the pope’s legate acted the part of an overbearing 
 tyrant. ‘‘ Le legat-tache de nous epouvanter, en parlant avec hauteur et fierté. 
 Il traite les evéques come des esclaves : il menace, et il jure de s’en aller. ... .” 
 —Ibid., p. 218.“ Le concile ne peut rien faire par lui meme. On l’a depouillé 
 de son autorité. 1] n’y a point de liberté. Le legat est le maitre, il tient tout 
 dans sa main,’—did., p. 203. 
 
‘198 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 makes void the commandments of thé Lord. It is as Christ, in 
 nomine Domini, that he comes; and “ Behold,’ said Christ Him- 
 self, “there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall 
 show great signs and wonders, insomuch that (if it were possible) 
 they shall deceive the very elect.”1 Where, then, shall we look 
 for the apostolicity of the Church? Not in Rome, as 1 have 
 endeavoured to show; not in Unitarianism either, in any of its 
 modifications, Arian or Socinian, where the essential Godhead 
 of the Saviour, and the vicarious character of His sacrifice, are 
 explained away under cever of figurative language, or by the 
 plausibilities of philosophy falsely so called. No; neither the 
 Romanism which repeats the great sacrifice as still incomplete, 
 nor the moralism which rejects it as unphilosophical; neither 
 the superstition which multiplies sacraments, invents relies, and 
 propagates “lies.in hypocrisy,” nor the abstraction which turns 
 away from Christ’s own appointments for the bodies of His 
 worshippers, can expound the mind of God, or meet the neces- 
 -sities of man. or the true apostolicity of the Church of God, | 
 we must look among those who repudiate both, and “ receive ἢ 
 with meekness the engrafted word,” and nothing else, as God’s 
 communication for the salvation of men. Such persons, it is 
 true, differ in many things one from another. Without a con- 
 tinued miracle controlling men’s minds and hearts into a degree 
 -of similarity which has never yet characterised men’s faces, no, 
 not the faces of brothers, the sons of one mother, such disagree- 
 ments cannot be avoided. ‘They are the essential features of 
 free and fallible sincerity, but they extend not to the vitals of 
 the body. The difficulty of drawing an-exact line of demarta- 
 tion between ‘essentials and non-essentials, is freely admitted; — 
 ‘still the distinction itself is a good and true one, and salvation is 
 nowhere said.of God to depend upon the apostolical succession 
 -of ministers in a Church, as it is distinctly said to depend on 
 ‘the full and :true acknowledgment, reception, and enjoyment of 
 the great comprehensive truth that “Jesus is the Christ,” and 
 that “Jesus Christ is come in the flesh.” Salvation is never 
 said, of God, to depend on the episcopal government, liturgical 
 
 1 Matt, xxiv. 24. 
 
 ee =, 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 199 
 
 services, or sacramental ordinances of a Church, as it is said to 
 depend on a new creation in Christ by the Holy Ghost unto 
 good works. 
 
 I greatly prefer, because I think I can by fair inference main- 
 tain, the episcopal government of the Christian Church, but 
 
 τς upon this and kindred topics I am not insensible to the argu- 
 
 ments and inferences of others. Upon all such grounds we 
 meet only Israelities, to whom the language of the Patriarch 
 may well be addressed : “See that ye fall not out by the way, 
 for ye are brethren.” And if we cannot so entirely agree as 
 to continue in one company, then let patriarchal example show 
 us how to separate as friends. “ If thou wilt go to the right, I 
 will go to the left; and if thou wilt go to the left, I will go to 
 the right.” But when a fundamental falsehood presents itself, 
 behold an Egyptian ;—“ kill him and bury him in the sand!” * 
 
 ' Gen. xly. 24. 2 Gen, xiii. 9. 3 Exod. ii, 11—13, 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 _ THE CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST—ITS SECURITY AND VISIBILITY. 
 
 What the Security of the Church does not mean—First, 2 Peter ii. 22. Second, 
 St. Matt. vii. 22,23. Third, Rev. iii. 1. Fourth, Rom. vii, 23: Gal. v. 27 
 —What the Security of the Church does mean—1 Peter i. 5—The Rock, 
 St. Matt. xvi. merpos-rerpa—Dr. Barrow’s Interpretation in answer to 
 Bellarmine—Indefectibility of the Church on Earth, different from. the 
 Security of the Church against “the Gates of Hell ”—the Visibility of the 
 Church not yet—* The Manifestation of the Son of God ”’—The Resurrection 
 of the Body—Attempts to prove present Visibility answered—Our Lord’s 
 Prayer for the whole Church, St. John xvii. 
 
 In the light of holy Scripture, our only infallible guide, we have 
 . been tracing the Church of God in Christ—its component parts, 
 its true catholicity, its unity, its holiness, its apostolical cha- 
 racter: and we now proceed to consider its security, unto that 
 day which St. Paul calls “the day of the Lord Jesus,” and the 
 day of “the manifestation of the sons of God,” when the whole 
 Church shall stand forth in glorious visibility—the bodies: of 
 their humiliation being fashioned like unto the glorious body of 
 their returning Lord. It is thus that the security and the 
 visibility of the Church are combined with one another, and both 
 with the resurrection of the body. 
 
 Jesus said, “ This is the Father’s will which hath sent me, 
 that of all which He hath given me I should lose nothing, but 
 should raise it up again at the last day.” “ And this is the will 
 
 of Him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son and - 
 
 believeth on Him, may have everlasting life, and I will raise 
 him up at the last day” (St. John vi. 39, 40). In these words 
 we have two descriptions of the members of the Church of God ; 
 one referring to the perfect purpose of God before the world 
 
 ih een Ὁ kd i ei es le 
 
 pee os 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 201 
 was; the other to the progressive fulfilment of that purpose in 
 the world. And concerning the members of the Church, thus 
 variously described, the same assurances of security and resur- 
 rection are repeated. 
 
 Inthe former of these verses, the members of the Church are 
 thus. described : “All which He (the Father) hath given me.” 
 This refers to His “eternal purpose which He purposed in 
 Christ Jesus our Lord.” ‘Then follow the assurances of their 
 security and resurrection. It is the Father’s will that none of 
 them should be lost, and it is the Son’s determination to raise 
 up every one of them at the last day. 
 
 In the latter verse they are described thus: “ Mvery one which 
 seeth the Son and believeth on Him.” This refers to the pro- 
 gressive fulfilment of the Divine purpose, as each predestinated 
 member is successively quickened to the personal exercise of the 
 grace of faith. And then follow, as before, assurances of their 
 security and resurrection. It is the Father's will that every one 
 of them should have everlasting life, and it is the Son’s deter- 
 mination to raise up every one of them at the last day. 
 
 1. The truth first in order is the security of the Church; and 
 it will conduce to much clearness to consider, first, What this 
 great truth does not mean; and secondly, What it does mean. 
 
 (1) It does not mean that all persons who “ profess and call 
 themselves Christians,” have everlasting life, and shall be surely 
 preserved through this world, and saved in the next. 
 
 On the contrary, among those who call themselves and are by 
 others commonly ¢alled Christians, there are multitudes who 
 answer to the tares in the field where the wheat is also; to the 
 bad fishes in the gospel-net; to the guest without a wedding- 
 garment seated at the marriage-supper. The Lord’s servants 
 gather together all, as many as they find, both bad and good, 
 and the wedding is furnished with guests. It is not till the 
 king comes to see them that the distinction is made visible. 
 (St. Matt. xxii. 10—14). None of the king’s servants can 
 accurately distinguish between the genuine disciple and the 
 deceiver ; and therefore Christ said, “ Let both grow together 
 
202 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 till the harvest.” Then indeed a separation shall be made 
 between them, as wide as between the “heavenly garner” and 
 “¢ hell-fire.” 
 
 In the meantime, hewever, some of those who are only tares - 
 
 make the melancholy fact but too manifest. Whatever outward 
 decorum may have been observed for a time, circumstances 
 -arise whick detect their unchanged hearts; they forsake the 
 holy commandment delivered wnto them; and by plunging into 
 worldly corruptions they verify and ieee the disgusting 
 images presented by that true’ proverb, ‘ The dog is turned to 
 ‘his own yomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wal- 
 lowing in the mire ”’ § (2 Peter ii. 22). 
 
 Such falls, especially when they have been recon by a 
 ‘creditable course of some duration, incur the reproach of the 
 Church’s enemies, darken the truths of the Church's security, 
 and excite perplexing anxieties and apprehensions in some of the 
 real and true members of the Church. It should, however, be 
 carefully noticed, that such things are plainly oxo for in 
 the Scriptures; ‘that we are τρμθΑ θεῖς warned of their inevit- 
 ‘able occurrence; and that none of them, however grievous and 
 
 however multiplied, interfere in the slightest epee with the © 
 
 great truth of the security of the Church of God. 
 It is thus, and, as it appears to me, only thus, that the scrip- 
 
 tural predictions of apostacy among professors can be harmonized , 
 
 with the scriptural accurances of security to all true believers. 
 To allege that such predictions' were uttered concerning per- 
 sons who may be saved, is to accuse God of prophesying falsely; 
 and to allege that such assurances” were given concerning per- 
 sons who may be lost, is equally to accuse God of false promises. 
 But “ distinguite personas, et concordabunt scripture.” : 
 
 (2) This truth does not mean, that all persons who have had 
 eminent gifts, even miraculous, and who in the exercise of those 
 gifts have been eminently useful, and greatly distinguished 
 amongst men, have everlasting life, and shall be surely pre- 
 served. 
 
 On the contrary, the most wonderful gifts may be in full 
 
 ' 2 Peter ii, 1—3,. * St. John x, 27—30, 
 
 
 
The Church of God iin Christ. 203 
 
 exercise where there is no real grace. They have been and 
 may be bestowed on persons who are not members of the 
 Church of God; and who may therefore at any time make ship- 
 wreck of their profession, and be engulfed in the corruptions of 
 this wicked world. Of this distinction St. Paul writes with 
 animating earnestness. After commending gifts for their ap- 
 propriate uses, he announces “a more excellent way,” and then 
 enlarges .on that Jove which is inseparable from saving grace. 
 “Though I speak with the tongues of men and ‘of angels, and 
 have not love”—ayamn—compare 1 John iv. 7, 8. ‘“ God is 
 love ”—ayarn—“ 1 am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling 
 eymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and under- 
 stand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all 
 (miracle-working) faith, so that I could remove mountains, and 
 have not love, 1 am nothing” (1 Cor. xii. 31, and xiii. L, 3). 
 
 What the apostle thus states as a general Re puaerdal truth 
 of universal application, our Lord Himself makes awfully 
 solemn, by a startling prophecy that in many instances thus 
 indeed it shall be. ‘“ Many will say to me in that day, Lord, 
 Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name, and in Thy name 
 cast out devils, and in Thy:name done many wonderful works ? 
 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart 
 from me, ye that work iniquity ” (St. Matt. vii. 22, 23). 
 
 But what then? Miraculous gifts have indeed been bestowed ' 
 upon false professors of Christianity, but no member of the 
 Lord’s body has been amputated; no bone of Him has been 
 broken; and nothing has occurred to interfere in the least degree 
 with the @verlasting and indefeasible security of the Church of 
 God in Christ. | 
 
 (3) This truth does not mean, that all visible Churches, at 
 any time possessing scriptural truth, enjoying scriptural wor- 
 ship, and living in scriptural practice, shall continue to do ‘so, 
 while the individuals composing them change by births and 
 deaths from generation to generation. 
 
 On the contrary. The candlestick (which is the ee own 
 emblem for a visible Church) may be removed from any place, 
 however brightly the light of truth may have shone upon it in 
 
204 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 time past. In point of fact, many have been removed, and the 
 word of God contains no promise of security to any of those 
 which still remain. The candlestick may remain, and the true 
 bright ‘light upon it, a visible Church witnessing for the Lord 
 in her constitution and doctrine, and containing a goodly pro- 
 portion of the Lord’s true children among her members; or the 
 light may be removed, and the candlestick only in name and 
 appearance remain; or both may be removed, and not even the 
 name of Christian left behind. 
 
 When the Lord Jesus addressed the seven churches of Asia, 
 Ephesus had the candlestick, and the light also; and the light 
 was pure and brilliant, save only that He who seeth not as man 
 seeth, perceived a slight decline from its original brightness, and 
 reproved that departure from first love. 
 
 Sardis had the candlestick; but the light was gone, or so 
 nearly gone, that addressing her in the aggregate the Lord said, 
 “Thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead:”1 a name 
 that thou livest! the appearance externally and the reputation 
 among men of being still a Christian Church, having visible 
 ordinances, and an ecclesiastical constitution; abundantly satis- 
 factory doubtless’ to the vast majority of the members, who 
 would have deemed it an unwarrantable and uncharitable 
 calumny to deny their spiritual life; but He whose eyes are as 
 a flame of fire, and out of whose mouth goeth a sharp two-edged 
 sword, said to them, “ Thou hast a name that thou livest, and art 
 dead.” 
 
 There were indeed a few in Sardis who had not defiled their 
 garments, but the body as such was dead. ; 
 
 Since that time, not the light of life only, but the candlestick 
 itself, even the name of Christian, has been removed from many 
 places where Churches flourished. Jerusalem herself is trodden 
 underfoot of the Gentiles, and the crescent of the false prophet 
 of Arabia waves triumphantly where once a Christian candle- 
 stick exhibited apostolical light. Antioch also, where the disci- 
 ~ ples were first called Christians, is utterly forsaken. Rome, like 
 erie has the candlestick still, but the pure light is extinguished 
 
 » Rey. jii. 1. 
 
Ἂς 
 
 The Church of God in Christ. 205 
 
 —or so nearly so, by the accumulated incrustations of human 
 traditions, that she may well be addressed as Sardis was, “ Thou 
 hast a name that thou livest, and art dead.” 
 
 There are indeed a few even in Rome who have not defiled 
 their garments, and to them the Lord says, “ Come out of her, 
 my people ;” but to herself, thow art dead. - 
 
 But what then? The true light has emigrated, but not one 
 spark which the Lord has kindled, indeed, has been, or can be, 
 finally extinguished. 
 
 Thus the fall and ruin and utter removal of true Christianity, ° 
 or of even the profession and name of Christianity, from one 
 city and country after another, does not interfere in the least 
 degree with the security of the Church of God in Christ. 
 
 (4) This truth does not mean that all the true members of 
 the Church of God shall be preserved through the remainder of 
 their lives from all lapses into sin, or what the prophet Jeremiah 
 calls “ backslidings,” or from all spiritual darkness and desertion 
 as to their present enjoyment of God. 
 
 On the contrary, the most spiritual among them are forced to 
 feel, that while they delight in the law of God after the inward 
 man, there is another law in their members warring against the 
 law of the mind, and bringing them into captivity to the law of 
 sin which is in their members (Rom. vii. 23). “ For the flesh 
 lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh, and 
 these are contrary the one to the other, so that they cannot do 
 the things that they would” (Gal. v. 17). 
 
 Sometimes, alas! they do the things they would not, and 
 incur thee gracious chastenings from their heavenly Father 
 which restore them, and prevent them from being condemned 
 with the world. So St. Paul speaks, “ For if we would judge 
 ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we,are judged, 
 we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned 
 with the world” (1 Cor. xi. 31, 32). Condemned we deserve to 
 he, and condemned we most assuredly should be, if left to our- 
 selves; but the sure promise of God to each of the members of 
 His dear Son is, “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee ” 
 (Heb. xiii. 5). The plain unequivocal language of the apostle 
 
206 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 concerning every one who is truly in Christ Jesus, is, that 
 “there is no condemnation to him ;” that he has “‘ blessedness of 
 the man whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are 
 covered : of the man “to whom the Lord will not impute sin;” 
 of the man “unto whom God imputeth righteousness without 
 works.” And the conclusive argument which the apostle 
 grounds upon the blessedness. so bestowed, is, “If, when we 
 were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His 
 Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life ” 
 (Rom. iv. 6—8'; v. 105. viii. 1). 
 
 God exercises His saving powers in His children by giving 
 them a penitent susceptibility to sin.. His new creation in them 
 is of so delicate a texture, that although it does: not necessarily 
 and uniformly exclude sin, yet by sin it is so painfully wounded, 
 that it cannot rest at ease, but utters earnest and bitter cries for 
 pardoning mercy and healing grace. True it is indeed that the 
 Christian is already pardoned, as it is written,“ God for Christ’s 
 sake hath forgiven him,” “forgiven him all. trespasses”’ (Eph. 
 iv. 82; Col. iii. 13). And not only so, but God will not impute 
 sin to him, and “he shall not come into condemnation ” (St. John 
 y. 24). But though it is written, and may therefore be fully 
 relied on, that the Christian shall not come into condemnation 
 with God, it is nowhere written: that he shall not contract guilt, 
 and fall into self-condemnation. On. the contrary, “if he say he 
 has no sin, he deceives himself, and the: truth is not in him ;” 
 but in the light of truth he knows he has sin, and when he con- 
 fesses his sin, “ God is faithful and just to forgive him his sin.” 
 Thus forgiveness, as it respects the mind of God, who sees the 
 end from the beginning and changeth not, is perfect. There is 
 and can be no condemnation in this sense; God will not so 
 impute sin. But as it respects the susceptible and penitent 
 experience of the Christian, forgiveness is not perfect. In the 
 course of every hour he contracts some stain of sin, and there- 
 fore at the end of every hour he requires some washing of mercy 
 in the fountain opened for sin and uncleanliness. For this he 
 prays in humble confession and earnest supplication, encouraged 
 by the revealed mind of his heavenly Father towards him. Has 
 
 Cine — 
 =. > i A ι- 
 St ae 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 207 
 
 there a day passed without any special sin which he ean parti- 
 cularise in his confession? The cause 'may be his want of 
 watchfulness to detect, or his want of spiritual sensitiveness to 
 feel; and fully alive to this, he can then exclaim in all sincerity, 
 Lord, “ who can tell how oft he offendeth? Cleanse Thou me 
 from secret faults”? (Psalm xix.) Such prayers are welcomed in 
 heaven. The pardoning mercy of the Lord endureth for ever. 
 
 - This truth is beautifully illustrated by the occurrence recorded 
 in the thirteenth chapter of St. John. Our Lord’s washing of 
 the disciples’ feet was emblematical of this continuous forgive- 
 ness. Peter did not understand it so, and looking no further 
 than the outward act, and what seemed to him the needless con- 
 descension of Jesus in it, he objected, saying, “Thou shalt never 
 wash my feet.” The Lord’s reply, “If I wash thee not, thou 
 hast no part with me,” showed him how deeply important it 
 was ; and then, in his excited feelings, he went wrong on the 
 other side, exclaiming, “ Lord, not my, feet only, but also my 
 hands and my head.” The answer of Jesus is full of explanation 
 and consolation: ‘‘ He that is washed needeth not save to-wash 
 his feet, but is clean every whit.” He that is justified needeth 
 not to be justified again as at the first, but only to be kept clean 
 by a continuous washing from daily contracted defilement. The 
 beloved disciple applied this afterwards in writing to the Church. 
 After a glorious statement of sanctifying truth, he says, “ My 
 little children, these things,”—the things he had just stated con- 
 cerning Jesus Christ,—“ write I unto you,’—with this intent,— 
 “that ye sin not.” And then he adds, “ And if any man ”’— 
 among You—“ sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus 
 Christ the righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins a 
 (1 John i., and ii. 1, 2). 
 
 But although Neve be thus an open door for the Chistian to 
 return to fis pardoning Father, a door which no man can shut, 
 yet is the re-entrance at it preceded by much bitterness. Sins 
 of unfaithfulness raise clouds of darkness and storms of terror. 
 These agitate the soul to its centre, and force from it cries of 
 agony, because of unbelief. ‘ Will the Lord cast off for ever ? 
 and will He be favourable no more? Is His mercy clean gone 
 
208 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 for ever? Doth His promise fail for evermore?” (Psalm xxvii. 
 7—9). Then it is that the Christian learns, not in an intellectual 
 theory, but in the experience of a broken and contrite heart, 
 what an evil thing and bitter it is to depart from the living God. 
 Then it is that he realizes what the attention of “ the wise” is 
 called to by the Psalmist,—“ the darkness, the shadow of death, 
 the binding in affliction and iron, the abhorring of all manner of 
 meat, the drawing near unto the gates of death, the melting of 
 the soul because of trouble, the reeling to and fro and staggering 
 like a drunken man ”’ (Psalm evii.) 
 
 But what then? Members of Christ have indeed incurred 
 spiritual desertion and fatherly discipline, leading to cries of 
 agony almost amounting to despair; but nothing has occurred 
 to interfere in the smallest degree with the covenanted security 
 of the Church of God. Just the reverse. “They ery unto the 
 Lord in their trouble, and He delivers them out of their dis- 
 tresses: He breaks the gates of brass, and cuts the bars of iron 
 asunder; He sends His word and heals them; He maketh the 
 storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. Then are they 
 glad, because they be quiet: so He bringeth them into their 
 desired haven. Oh that men would therefore praise the Lord 
 for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children 
 of men! Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even 
 they shall understand the loving-kindness of the Lord” (Psalm 
 0011.) 
 
 Having thus cleared some things out of our way, which, if 
 not noticed, might have presented themselves as objections to 
 this great and precious truth, we proceed to say— © 
 
 What the security of the Church does mean. 
 
 It does mean that the genuine members of the Church of God, 
 objects of His distinguishing love, being each, at His appointed 
 time, quickened by the Holy Ghost, adopted and renewed, united 
 to Christ, and made partakers of the divine nature, shall never 
 fall from the relationship to God into which they are thus taken, 
 shall never lose the vital principle of His upholding and sancti- 
 fying grace, shall never be entirely forsaken by His Holy Spirit, 
 shall never sink into a state of corruption and condemnation ; 
 
 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 209 
 
 but shall be “kept by the power of God through faith unto 
 salvation ready to be revealed in the last time ”’ (1 Peter i. 5). 
 
 Most-express was the assurance which Jesus gave of this 
 security when Simon Peter confessed Him as the true Messiah, 
 the Son of the living God. This truth is the great foundation. 
 God manifest in the flesh.. This is the Rock which verily was 
 foreordained, and concerning which Jehovah had said by the 
 prophet Isaiah, “ Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, 
 a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth 
 shall not make haste” (Isa. xxviii. 16). This truth can be 
 attained to by no human sagacity. When Peter avowed it, 
 Jesus perceived that God had taught it to him, and said, 
 “ Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona : for flesh and blood hath not 
 revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And 
 I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I 
 will build my Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
 against it”? (St. Matt. xvi. 17, 18). 
 
 This truth so revealed to thee, and confessed by thee, is the 
 rock indeed. And I say also unto thee, that thou art a stone 
 (πετρος); a lively stone, built upon this rock (πετρα)ὴ: and 
 upon this rock will I build, not thee only, but also my whole 
 Church; and the gates of hell,the combined powers and ma- 
 licious counsel and skill of all the fallen angels, shall not prevail 
 against it; no, not against a single stone of it, for it shall be 
 perfect for ever. 
 
 To this figure St. Peter refers in his preaching and in his 
 writing. ih his preaching, when called before the Jewish 
 council te answer concerning the impotent man, by what means 
 he was made whole, he said, “ Be it known unto you all, and 
 to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of 
 Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, 
 even by Him doth this man stand before you whole. This is 
 the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is 
 become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in 
 any other” (Acts iv. 10—12). In his writing, also, he says to 
 the members of the Church, concerning their Head and Lord, 
 “To whom coming as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of 
 
 14 
 
210 Tit Chak and Pe Chipties 
 
 
 
 men, but chosen of God and precious; ye also as lively stones 
 are built up a spiritual house ᾿ (1 Peter ii. 3—6). 
 
 St. Paul adopts the same figure, when speaking of himself and 
 his fellow-labourer in the gospel; he calls them builders, and to 
 the members of the Church he says, “ Ye are God’s building;” 
 but concerning the foundation he says, “ Other foundation can 
 no man lay, than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ’ (1 Cor. iii. 
 9—11). 
 
 In adopting and defending the interpretation here given of 
 our Lord’s celebrated address to Simon Peter, I have no wish to 
 lose sight of the fact—or to conceal it from any of my readers— 
 that other interpretations can plead highly respectable authority. 
 In Dr. Barrow’s treatise on the assumed ‘ Supremacy of the 
 Pope,” the matter is fully and candidly stated. My readers will 
 be edified by the following extract :— 
 
 “The last argument which I shall use against this primacy, 
 shall be the insufficiency of those arguments and testimonies 
 which they allege to warrant and prove it. 
 
 “Tf this point be of so great consequence as they make it; if, 
 as they would persuade us, the subsistence, order, unity, and 
 peace of the Church, together with the salvation of Christians, 
 do depend on it ;? if, as they suppose, many great points of truth 
 do hang on this pin; if it be, as they declare, a main article of 
 faith, and ‘not only a simple error, but a pernicious heresy, to 
 deny this primacy;’” then it is requisite that a clear revelation 
 from God should be producible in favour of it (for on that ground 
 only such points can firmly stand); then it is most probable that 
 God (to prevent controversies, occasions of doubt, and, excuses 
 of error about so grand a matter) would not have failed to have 
 declared it so plainly as might serve to satisfy any reasonable 
 man, and to convince any forward gainsayer; but no such reve- 
 lation doth appear: for the places of scripture which they allege 
 do not plainly express it, nor pregnantly imply it, nor can it by 
 fair consequence be inferred from them: no man, unprepossessed 
 with affection to their side, would descry it in them; without 
 _ thwarting St. Peter’s order, and wresting the Scriptures, they 
 ? Bellarmine, preef, ad, 110, de Pontiff, R. * Bell. de Pont. R. i, 10, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 211 
 
 
 
 cannot deduce it from them. This, by examining their allega- 
 tions, will appear. 
 
 “ They allege those words of our Saviour, uttered by Him on 
 occasion of St. Peter’s confessing Him to be the Son of God: 
 ‘Thou art Peter, and on this rock will I build my Church.’ 
 Here, say they, St. Peter is declared the foundation, that is, the 
 sole governor of the Church. 
 
 -“ To this I answer: 
 
 “1. Those words do not clearly signify anything to their 
 purpose; for they are metaphorical, and thence ambiguous, or 
 capable of divers interpretations; whence they cannot suffice 
 to ground so main a point of doctrine, or to warrant so huge a 
 pretence; these ought to stand on downright, evident, and indu- 
 bitable testimony. 
 
 “It is pretty to observe how Bellarmine proposeth this testi- 
 mony. ‘ Of which words,’ saith he, ‘the sense is plain and obvious; 
 that it be understood, that under two metaphors the principate 
 of the whole Church was promised:’” as if that sense could be 
 so plain and obvious which is couched under two metaphors, and 
 those not very pat or clear in application to their sense. 
 
 “2. This is manifestly confirmed from that the fathers and 
 divines, both ancient and modern, have much differed in expo- 
 sition of these words. 
 
 “ἐς Some,’ saith Abulensis,* ‘say that this rock is Peter ; others 
 say, and better, that it is Christ; others say, and yet better, that 
 it is the confession which Peter maketh.’ 
 
 “ For some interpret this rock to be Christ Himself, of whom 
 St. Paul saith, ‘Other foundation can no man lay than that 
 which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.’ 
 
 “St. Kastin telleth us, in his Retractations, that he often had 
 expounded the words to this purpose, although he did not abso- 
 lutely reject that interpretation which made St. Peter -the rock ; 
 leaving it to the reader’s choice which is the most probable.* 
 
 “Others (and those most eminent fathers) do take the rock 
 to be St. Peter's faith or profession. ‘On the rock,’ saith the 
 
 1 P. Gelas. i. Dis. 21, cap, 3. 5. Tostat. in Matt, xvi, qu. 67. 
 2. Bell, de Pont. i, 10, 4 Aug. Retr. 1, 21, 
 
212 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 prince of interpreters; ‘that is, on the faith of his profession:’ * 
 and again, ‘Christ said that He would build His Church on 
 Peter’s confession:’? and again (he or another ancient writer 
 under his name), ‘ On this rock, He said, not on Peter; for He 
 did not build His Church on the man, but on his faith.’* 
 
 “Our Lord,” saith Theodoret, ‘did permit the first of the 
 apostles, whose confession He did fix as a prop or foundation of 
 the Church, to be shaken.’ * 
 
 “Whence Origen saith that every disciple of Christ is the rock,’? 
 in virtue of his agreement with Peter in that holy confession. 
 
 “ This sense even popes have embraced.° 
 
 “ Others say, that as St. Peter did not speak for himself, but 
 in the name of all the apostles,! and of ali faithful people, repre- 
 senting the pastors and people of the Church; ‘so, correspon- 
 dently, our Lord did declare that He would baild His Church 
 on such faithful pastors and confessors. 
 
 “ Others do indeed by the rock understand St. Peter’s person, 
 but do not thereby expound to be meant his being supreme 
 governor of the apostles, or of the whole Church.° 
 
 “The divines, schoolmen, and canonists of the Roman com- 
 munion, do not also agree in exposition of the words; and 
 divers of the most learned among them do approve the interpre- 
 tation of St. Chrysostom, 
 
 ““ Now, then, how can so great a point of doctrine be firmly 
 
 ‘grounded on a place of so doubtful interpretation? How can 
 any one be obliged to understand the words according to their 
 interpretation, which persons of so good sense and so great 
 authority do understand otherwise? With what modesty can 
 they pretend that meaning to be clear which so perspicacious 
 eyes could not discern therein? Why may I not excusably 
 agree with St. Chrysostom or St. Augustine in understanding 
 the place? May I not reasonably oppose their judgment to the 
 
 1 Chrys. in Matt. xvi. 18. 4 Theod. Ep. 77. 
 
 2 Chrys. in John i. 50. 5 Orig. in Matt. xvi. p, 275. 
 
 3 Jb. tom. v. Or. 163. Hil. de Trin. 6. 5 Greg. M. Ep. iii. 33. Felix iii, Ep, δ. 
 τ Cypr. Ep. 55, Aug. Ep. 165. Hier in loc, 
 5. Vide Rigault. in Cypr. Ep. 27, 40, 70, 71, 73. 
 
 - Ox 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 213 
 
 
 
 opinion of any modern doctors, deeming Bellarmine as fallible — 
 in his conceptions as one of them? Why, consequently, may I 
 not without blame refuse their doctrine, as built on this place, 
 or disavow the goodness of their proof? 
 
 “3. It is very evident that the apostles themselves did not 
 understand those words of our Lord to signify any grant or 
 promise io St. Peter of supremacy over them; for would they 
 have contended for the chief place if they had understood whose 
 it of right was by our Lord’s own positive determination ? would 
 they have disputed about a question which, to their knowledge, 
 by their Master was already stated. Would they have troubled 
 our Lord to inquire of Him who should be the greatest in His 
 kingdom, when they knew that our Lord had declared His will 
 to make St. Peter viceroy? Would the sons of Zebedee have 
 been so foolish and presumptuous as to beg the place which they 
 knew, by our Lord’s word and promise, fixed, on St. Peter? 
 Would St. Peter, among the rest, have fretted at that idle over- 
 ture, whereas he knew the place, by our Lord’s immutable 
 purpose and infallible declaration, assured to him? And if 
 none of the apostles did understand the words: to imply this 
 Roman sense, who can be obliged so to understand them? 
 Yea, who. can wisely, who can safely so understand them? for 
 surely they had common sense, as well as any man living now; 
 they had as much advantage as we can have to know our Lord's 
 meaning. Théir ignorance, therefore, of this sense being so 
 apparent, is not only a just excuse for not admitting this inter- 
 pretation, but a strong bar against it. 
 
 “4, This interpretation also doth not well consist with our 
 Lord’s answers to the contests, inquiries, and petitions of His 
 disciples concerning the point of superiority ; for doth He not 
 (if the Roman expositions be good) seem on those occasions, not 
 only to dissemble His own word and promise, but to disavow 
 them, or thwart them? Can we conceive that He would in 
 such a case of doubt forbear to resolve them, clearly to instruct 
 them and admonish them of their duty?” } 
 
 To this I add another extract of a more popular and not less 
 
 Ὁ Barron, Sup. of the Pope, Suppo. i, 
 
214 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 convincing character. “ Although Iam not fond of mere verbal 
 criticisms, or disposed to build much upon them, they are some- 
 times necessary. This is particularly the case where much of 
 the strength of our opponent’s cause is rested on the meaning of 
 
 a word or phrase. The surname Peter signifies in the Greek: 
 
 language, a stone ; and hence, when our Lord says, ‘ Thou art 
 Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,’ Roman 
 Catholics would fondly persuade themselves that He meant the 
 person of Peter in both cases ; as if He had said, Thou art rock, 
 and upon thee, this rock, I will build my Giural: but unfor- 
 tumately for their cause, the word in the original expressing the 
 foundation of the Church, is not the same as tie apostle’s surname. 
 The words are, ‘1 say also unto thee, that thou art πετρος, 
 Petros, and upon this wetpa, Petra, I will build my Church.’ 
 Roman Catholics, indeed, assert that these two words have 
 exactly the same meaning, but for this assertion they have no 
 _ proof, The word Petros occurs nowhere in the New Testament 
 except as the apostle’s name, so that we cannot ascertain its 
 exact import from the Scriptures. In Homer,’ it signifies a 
 
 1 In confirmation of this remark, Dr. Stewart refers without citation to 
 “ Tiad, Book vii. v. 270; and Book xvi. v. 411.” For the classical reader 
 
 I now add,’ 
 ὀλοοιτροχος ὡς ἀπὸ πετρῆς, 
 
 Ὄντε κατὰ στεφάνης ποταμος χειμαῤῥοος. won, 
 
 ρηξας ασπετῳ ομβρῳ αναιδεος ἐχματα merpys, 
 
 υψι τ' αναθρωσκων πετεται, κτυπει δε θ᾽ vm αὐτου 
 
 ὑλη" ὁ δ᾽ ἀσῴφαλεως Meer ἐμπεδον ὁφῥ αὖ ἵκηται 
 
 ἰσοπεδον τοτε δ᾽ ours κυλινδεται, εσσυμενος περ. 
 ILIAD xiii. 137. 
 
 Heyne, in his note on this passage, understands zrerpos as the substantive for 
 é\oorrpoxos. All the remaining adjectives, participles, or relatives are in the 
 masculine gender, whereas zrerpys is in the genitivefem. Thus it is the fragment 
 from the great rock to which Hector is compared. 
 
 Damm also (and these both may be regarded as final authorities about 
 Homeric Greek), in his lexicon, translates or paraphrases the clause thus: 
 “ Sicut grandis rotundus lapis a petra decurrens,”’ ubi πέτρα, est, τὸ opos πετ- 
 pwoes, εἕ ob ὁ ὀλοοιτροχος ομβρώ πολλω απορραγεις, ιεται κατὰ yns; and this use of 
 πετρα in Homer, he supports by many references, viz., Book 2, 88 ; 4, 107; 9, 
 15; 15, 4: and πετρος, the smaller stone, as for ex βαλων uuhperdee TET PW, 
 εσσυμενον βαλεπετρω. 
 
 On the passage in Matt. xvi. Bishop Burgess (in his letter to sii, clergy of the | 
 
 ~ 
 
 me 
 
Fhe Clas of God τὲ Christ 215 
 
 
 
 stone or fragment of rock. It is used in the same sense by 
 Pindar; but in no instance in Greek does it signify an extended 
 or fixed rock. The word Petra often occurs in the New Testa- 
 ment, and is indeed always the word in the original, where in 
 our translation we find rock." 
 
 You see then that the word ‘ Petra,’ upon which our Lord 
 said He would build His Church, signifies an extensive, im- 
 movable, or fixed mass of rock; whilst the word ‘ Petros,’ the 
 surname of the apostle, when applied to inanimate objects, sig- 
 nifies only a fragment of rock, or what is commonly called a 
 stone. Now, had it been. our Lord’s intention to announce 
 to Peter his supremacy by informing him that the Church 
 should be built upon his person, why should He have 
 used a different word to express the Church’s foundation from 
 “what He had before assigned to the apostle as a surname? 
 Why should it not have been Petros in both cases? This 
 reasoning derives not a little additional force from the circum- 
 stance that God is so frequently termed a Rock in Scripture, 
 especially by the prophets, and in the Book of Psalms. It is, 
 indeed, the common image by which the servants of the Lord 
 express their conviction of Jehovah’s stability and faithfulness. 
 
 Our Lord Jesus Christ also is denominated a Rock in the 
 New Testament (1 Cor. x. 4), and the original word there is the 
 same, πέτρα, Petra; but in. no instance do we find this word 
 applied to a mere man. 
 
 * * * Ἃ * 
 
 “ Jesus is styled a Rock, in a figurative and relative sense. 
 
 diocese of St. David, p. 13 of his volume of tracts) writes thus: “ He was not 
 Petra but Petrus; and Petrus when distinguished from Petra, certainly means 
 not a rock but a stone ;’’ and this opinion he fortifies ably both by argument 
 and authorities. I find also, on the first page of the advertisement to this 
 letter, the following quotation :— 
 
 “ Petra enim Christus multis modis et figuris predicatus est.” —Zertullian 
 ady. Judzos, p. 100. 
 
 “Non dictum est Petro, Tu es Petra, sed Tu es Petrus; Petra autem erat 
 Christus, quem confessus Simon dictus est Petrus.” —Augus. Retract. lib.i.,ch. 21. 
 
 1 St. Matt. vii. 24, xxvii. 51—60; Rom. ix, 33. 
 
 ' 
 
216 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 He is like a rock for stability, durability, and safety to those 
 who know and feel their need of Him. Messiah is essentially 
 the ‘ Rock of ages;’ but as mediator, He is a rock only when 
 rested upon by sinful man. As many parts of the earth’s surface_ 
 are suitable for building, but are termed foundations only when 
 some structure is commenced or erected on them, so Christ, 
 although at all times a foundation of salvation in God’s purposes 
 of mercy, becomes actually such only when He is known and 
 confessed as He was by the apostles. ‘ Whosoever believeth 
 that Jesus is the~Christ ix-pori-of God’ (I John’v. 1). ‘The 
 apostles, “eonfession was both sincere and spiritual. From 
 they ye first acquaintance with their Master, they appears to have 
 ‘ntertained no doubt that ‘Jesus was the Christ;’ and this 
 knowledge they received, not from flesh and blood, from human 
 calculation, but from the Spirit of God. Their nowiglee of 
 their Master was far from being perfect; for Peter was ignomant 
 of that most important fact, that it was expedient that Christ 
 should suffer (St. Matt. xvi. 22). But their knowledge was 
 correct as far as it extended. They believed that Jesus was the 
 Messiah, although of the extent of the Messiah’s character and 
 offices they had not at that time adequate ideas. 
 
 “Tt may be further asked, Why did our Lord use the 
 
 * : ee Ἵ J say also unto thee, that Pgh art Peter’? Why did 
 
 He at all mention the apostle’s surname if He had no allusion to 
 its signification ἢ ? This question is answered by the apostle 
 himself, in his First General Epistle (chap. ii. 5), where he 
 states that believers are ‘lively stones,’ built upon the Lord as a 
 ‘living stone,’ so that they become ‘a spiritual house.’ Our 
 Lord made, therefore, a most appropriate and graceful allusion 
 to the signification of the name Peter; and it was entirely owing 
 to that signification, that the promise of power and authority 
 which was intended for all the apostles, and afterwards actually 
 fulfilled to them all, was made in the singular number, as though 
 it were confined to Peter alone. The apostles had all, through 
 Peter, declared that Jesus had been revealed to them as the 
 Christ, the foundation-stone; and as Simon’s surname signified 
 a stone, one of the usual materials of which buildings are con- 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 217 
 
 
 
 structed, the Redeemer confined His reply, on this occasion,‘ 
 to him .... Were additional evidence wanted to show that 
 the confession which Peter made, and not Peter himself, was the 
 rock upon which the Church is to be built, it is supplied by the 
 concluding verse of this paragraph: ‘ Then charged He His dis- 
 ciples that they should tell no man that He was Jesus the Christ.’ 
 
 “Had Jesus invested Peter with supremacy in the preceding 
 part of the conversation, it would have been natural to Him to 
 have concluded it with a charge to the disciples not to tell that 
 He had appointed a chief officer to preside in His approaching 
 kingdom; or He mifsht with great propriety have concluded the 
 conversation with a charge to the other disciples to submit them- 
 selves dutifully to Peter, or with a recommendation to that 
 apostle to cultivate a spirit of moderation in the expectation and 
 afterwards in the enjoyment of his new dignity. Such a termi- 
 nation of the conversation would have been not only natural, 
 but on many accounts necessary, had our Lord bestowed upon 
 Peter the alleged supremacy. He gives no such charge: but to 
 Show that. the discovery and confession of His character and 
 office were the most important part of the conversation, He 
 charged them to tell no man as yet what only they were apprised 
 of, viz., ‘that He was Jesus the Christ.’”’ ? 
 
 Reverting then to our Lord’s words, and agreeing in the in- - 
 terpretation of them, excusably I hope, with Chrysostom, 
 Augustine, and Barrow, I hail in them the indefeasible security 
 of the Church of God. “ Faithful is He who promised, who 
 also will do it.” The promise so made to the Church includes 
 every member of it: and the terms of the promise, in their em- Ὁ 
 phatic completeness, would fail, if through the malice or inge- 
 nuity of the devil, any individual chosen of God the Father, and 
 given to the Son to be builded on the rock, should be omitted ; 
 or if any, when once builded thereon, should be broken off again 
 and cast away. 
 
 1 Much of what was said on this occasion in the singular number, as to Peter 
 alone, was said on another occasion (St, Matt. xviii, 18) in the plural number, 
 to them all, A 
 
 2 Papal Supremacy Examined: A Sermon by the Rey. Dr. Stewart, 
 
218 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 This promise is sometimes applied to the continuance of a body 
 
 professing Christianity on the earth throughout all ages: and so 
 taken it is understood to secure, against all opposition and per- 
 secution, an uninterrupted succession of Christian people to the 
 end of the world. This is what Roman Catholic writers call ἴδο 
 indefectibility of the Church. 
 
 This, to say no more of it, is a low, worldly view of the sub- 
 ject, confining our Lord’s promise to this present life: because, 
 if the interests of eternity be included, the promise can apply 
 only to the real and true believers in each successive generation; 
 seeing that over all the others the devil does prevail, and prevail 
 for ever, as they successively die. , 
 
 It appears to me to be wretchedly unworthy of our Lord’s 
 gracious promise to apply it to the mere preservation upon earth 
 of a corporate body, millions of whose members may never be 
 in heaven.! That such a body exists, and will continue to exist 
 as a visible corporation, or combination of corporations, till the 
 second coming of Christ, is not denied: but # includes both 
 good and bad, holy and unholy, and it must not be identified 
 with the Church of God, which is holy. It includes adulterous 
 
 ςς. . . 
 Pe 1 “Our Lord’s promise to His Church, that the gates of hell should never 
 pr 
 
 evail against it, may be understood either individually or collectively. In the 
 one sense, it promises personal protection and final salvation to every faithful 
 member; and in the other, perpetuity of privilege and protection to the whole 
 Church. As the word Hades, in this promise translated hell, literally signifies 
 the grave, or state of the dead, the promise may be victory over death, or re- 
 surrection and immortality to each member of the Church. Or, if we suppose 
 it to mean here the infernal regions, as the gates are a common expression for 
 counsel and power, the promise will amount to an assurance, individually and 
 collectively, that the Church shall be protected from temptation and final per- 
 dition. 
 
 ‘* Although these distinctions are commonly made by divines, they are in my 
 mind unnecessary. As the Church collective is composed of individuals, and 
 death and hell are represented as united both in their opposition to man’s happi- 
 ness, and in the Messiah’s victory over them, I think the amount of the promise 
 is, that every descendant of Adam who ‘ obtains like precious faith’ with Peter 
 and the other apostles, shall be protected, supported, and sanctified in time, and 
 raised up and glorified in eternity: and that of such individuals, to a greater 
 or less amount, the Lord will have a Church, in every age, even to the end of 
 the world,”—Dr, Stewart. 
 
s 
 
 The, Church of God in’ Christ. 219 
 
 idolaters as well as chaste worshippers in spirit and in truth, 
 and it must not be identified with the Bride, the Lamb’s wife. 
 It includes wood, hay, stubble, and must not be identified with 
 the Lord’s jewels. 
 
 The bride, considered as such, is veiled. The jewels, as such, 
 are hidden, until that day when the Lord shall make them up as 
 His completed treasure. Then, in that day which wiil burn like 
 an oven, there shall be effectual separation and consequent clear 
 discernment between the righteous and the wicked; between him 
 that serveth God, and him that serveth Him ποὺ ;' between him 
 to whom the promise is made that the gates of hell shall not 
 prevail against him, and him who shall be found, after all, a child 
 of the devil. 
 
 ii. This leads to a consideration of the visibility of the Church 
 of God in Christ. 
 
 _ During this life, although the members of the Church of God 
 while on earth are as visible as other men, yet not as members 
 of that Church. They are clearly visible as men to all around 
 them, but to all around them they are doubtful as Christians. A 
 real Christian may, indeed, and ought to have assurance of his 
 own relation to his Lord—may, in that sense, be visible to him- 
 self: and several such living together may have good hope, 
 amounting to confidence, concerning one another: and so the 
 true Church, in certain localities and at certain seasons, may 
 approximate in glimpsés to visibility. But, taken asa whole, 
 the language of Hooker is clearly and beautifully descriptive of 
 it. . 
 “That Church of Christ, which we properly term His body 
 mystical, can be but one: neither can that one be sensibly dis- 
 cerned of any man, inasmuch as the parts thereof are some in 
 heaven already with Christ, and the rest that are on earth— 
 albeit their natural persons be visible—we do not discern under 
 this property, whereby they are truly and infallibly of that- 
 body. Only pur minds by intellectual conceit (fancy) are able 
 to apprehend that such a real body there is—a body collective, 
 
 because it containeth a huge multitude; a body mystical, be- 
 
 1 Mal. iii, 17, 18, and iv. 1, 
 ᾿ . 
 
220 Lhe Church and the Churches. 
 
 cause the mystery of their conjunction is removed altogether from: 
 sense. Whatsoever we read in Scripture concerning the endless 
 love and the saving mercy which God showeth towards His 
 Church, the only proper subject of it is this Church. Concern- 
 ing this flock it is that our Lord and Saviour hath promised, ‘ I 
 give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither 
 shall any pluck them out of my hand.’ They who are of this 
 society have such marks and notes of distinction from all others, 
 as are not objects unto our sense: only unto God, who seeth 
 their hearts, and understandeth all their secret cogitations, unto 
 Him they are clear and manifest. All men knew Nathanael to 
 be an Israelite; but our Saviour, piercing deeper, giveth further 
 testimony of him than man could have done with such certainty 
 
 as He did, ‘ Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no | | 
 
 guile!’ ” ? 
 
 1 
 
 Thus the matter stands: “The Lord ”—and, the Lord alone Bro: 
 
 —“knoweth them that are His.”?> And thus it must continue, 
 till the Lord shall “accomplish the number of His elect and - 
 hasten His kingdom.”? Then shall be presented to a wondering 
 creation the TRUE CHURCH VISIBLE, or what the apostle calls 
 “the MANIFESTATION of the sons of God.” * The sons of God, 
 _ though a real body, are not till then a manifest body. They 
 “have indeed already the spirit of adoption whereby they ery 
 Abba, Father; but they are “waiting for the adoption,” as the 
 apostle declares in the same context—not clearly the inward 
 spirit of adoption which they already enjoy, but outward visible 
 adoption, to wit, “the redemption of the body.’* The Head of 
 the Church Himself was “declared to be the Son of God by the 
 resurrection from the dead:”’° and the declaration or manifesta- 
 tion, or visibility of His body, the true Church, waits and must 
 wait for the resurrection of the body. 
 
 Vain are all the attempts made to prove that the true Church 
 of God is a visible, that is, a distinguishable body, from all 
 
 others, during the present dispensation. Our Lord’s parables 
 1 Eccl. Pol. book iii. sec. 1. 4 Rom. viii. 23, comp. Υ. 15. | 
 
 2 Burial Service. 5 Rom, i, 3, 4. 
 3 Rom, viii. 19. 
 
The Church of God ἐμ Christ. 221 
 reprove such attempts, inasmuch as in the various illustrations 
 of the gospel kingdom they describe a continued mixture of 
 
 - good and bad until His coming again, and an awful separation 
 
 at His coming. The mixture is so subtle that no true and cer- 
 tain separation can now be effected. πὸ separation shall be 
 so complete, that no mixture, however subtle, can then be con- 
 tinued. 
 
 To this agree the apostolical epistles. They address the mem- 
 bers of the true Church of God, warning them of the dangers 
 by which they are surrounded—dangers from “false brethren” 
 among others. They describe “a form of godliness,” without 
 
 the reality or power of it, as characteristic of this dispensation 
 “in its last days. They describe the ungodly multitudes—not 
 
 heathen, but professors of a form of godliness—as living in care- 
 
 ᾿ less ease, and saying to themselves and to one another, “ Peace 
 
 and safety,” till the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven, 
 and sudden destruction shall fall upon them. They represent 
 
 the true servants of Christ as enduring persecutions and tribu- 
 ~~ lations, and encourage them in the exercise of patience till the 
 
 coming of the Lord. Then hidden things shall be made manifest 
 —visible vengeance on the one side, and visible glory on tke 
 
 _ other: “seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense 
 
 tribulation to them that trouble His real saints, and to those 
 who are troubled, rest; when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed 
 from heaven, with His mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking 
 vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the 
 gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall be punished with 
 everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from 
 the glory of His power, when He shall come to be glorified in 
 His saints, and to be admired in all them that believe in that 
 ΠΗ τὸ ἃ ; 
 
 Unable to find in the New Testament even the appearance of 
 proof for the alleged visibility of the Church during the present 
 dispensation, the advocates of that opinion have recourse to the 
 Old Testament; and prophecies concerning the restored Jewish 
 nation have been dislocated by them from their contexts, and 
 
 } 2 Thess. i, 6—10, 
 
222 ‘ The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 applied without proof, or even ραν, to the Christian 
 Church. 
 
 The most notable example of this occurs in the case of a pas- 
 
 sage from Isaiah, which is cited in every Romish catechism as a 
 
 scriptural proof of the visibility of the Church. The words are 
 these: “It shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain 
 _ of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the moun- 
 tains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall 
 flow unto it. And many people shall go, and say, Come ye, 
 and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,.to the house of 
 the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we 
 will walk in His paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, 
 and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem ”’ (Isa. ii. 2, 3). 
 
 It is taken for granted that the “last days” here predicted 
 signify the Christian dispensation from its commencement, and 
 that the “ mountain of the Lord’s house” signifies the Christian 
 Church. Whereupon it is triumphantly exclaimed, What more 
 _ visible than a mountain? and how absurd it is to talk of that 
 Church as an invisible Church, which the prophet: predicts under 
 the emblem of a mountain! I am not aware, however, that any 
 respectable writer has ever exposed himself to the charge of this 
 absurdity. 
 
 The general interpretation of the prophecy here given is _ 
 indeed loosely adopted by many Christian writers. I venture 
 to say loosely, because those writers have felt themselves com- 
 pelled by the context to modify, so as in truth to contradict, 
 their own statements. Thus Mr. Scott, in his commentary, after 
 applying the second and third verses of the prophecy to the 
 establishment of the gospel ‘and the calling of the Gentiles, when 
 he advances to the fourth verse, makes this most. just obeeee 
 tion upon the whole: “There needs no other proof that the 
 grand accomplishment of this prophecy is reserved for some 
 future period, than the consideration, that nothing in any measure 
 answerable to such forcible expressions has yet occurred on 
 earth.” 
 
 Then, after quoting with approbation ites sentiments from 
 Bishop Lowth, he adds, “ Whether the restoration of Israel to 
 
The Church of God in Christ. | 223 
 
 their own land, and of Jerusalem to its pristine glory, of being the 
 capital city of the religious world, be intended, events will show; 
 but certainly something far beyond the crushing of the opposing 
 _ powers is meant by men’s ‘learning war no more.’” 
 
 It is of no small importance that this matter should be ex- 
 amined carefully ; for the consequences involved in the interpre- 
 tation of this and similar prophecies are serious in the extreme. 
 
 By the interpretation usually given, a visibility is ascribed to 
 the Christian Church, and this is all which many who adopt it 
 intend to admit; but it is quite impossible consistently to stop 
 short at this, because the language of the prophecy, so under- 
 stood, predicts not only a visibility of the Church, but a pre- 
 eminence of one Church, or of the Church in one place, over all 
 the rest. There is not only a mountain, but that mountain is 
 
 ‘established in the top of the mountains, and exalted above the hills. 
 If the mountain signify the Christian Church, then many Chris- 
 tian Churches are predicted, some as inferior mountains, some as 
 hills, while one is presented to view in high headship over all the 
 rest. This is, of course, eagerly seized by the controversialists 
 
 of Rome, who say that their Church is intended—the mother 
 and mistress of all Churches. 
 
 Protestant interpreters are not prepared to yield this, but 
 having yielded the first step, they find themselves involved in 
 difficulty or inconsistency—not indeed by the facts or truth of 
 the case, but by their own rash and, as I cannot but feel, 
 unscriptural admissions. Certainly there is no approach ‘towards 
 any visible fulfilment of this prophecy, thus interpreted, in this 
 dispensation; there is not even any claim advanced, except by 
 the usurpation of Rome; and if it can indeed be proved that the 
 prophecy belongs to the present dispensation, it cannot, I think, 
 be denied that it supplies a strong confirmation of Rome’s claim 
 to be the head of all the Churches. If, on the contrary, it can 
 be proved that the prophecy refers to a different ‘period and 
 a different subject altogether, then not only Rome’s claim to 
 pre-eminence, but also Rome’s argument for the visibility now 
 of the true Church of God—so far as they rest on this portion 
 of holy Scripture—must be relinquished. 
 
224 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 The fourth verse of this prophecy is, “And He shall judge 
 among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; and they 
 shali beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into 
 pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, 
 neither shall they learn war any more.” 
 
 It cannot be pretended that this is characteristic of the 
 Christian dispensation. Well and truly has Mr. Scott written, 
 that “nothing in any measure answerable to these forcible 
 expressions has yet occurred on earth.” Yet to give the 
 passage some appearance of application he writes thus: “ By 
 the establishment of the gospel, the Lord becomes judge among 
 the nations who willingly submit to His authority, and make Him 
 the arbiter of their differences: and by His rebukes and con- 
 victions, the instructions that He gives, and the grace which He 
 bestows, He promotes peace as well as purity. If all men were . 
 consistent Christians, there could be no war,” ete. 
 
 Doubtless it is the tendency of the gospel to promote peace, 
 and all true Christians ought to live peaceably ; but. to apply to 
 this the language of the prophet, is io confound prediction 
 with precept. It is to represent the sure prophecies of the God 
 of truth as nothing more than descriptions of duty, frustrable 
 by disobedient men—that is, as no prophecies at all, 
 
 But the application now before us is open to a still more 
 special refutation. It represents Isaiah as using these words 
 among others, while describing, in the Spirit, the Christian 
 dispensation, “ Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, 
 neither shall they learn war any more;” but our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, standing at the opening of the Christian dispensation, 
 and prophesying of its progress, said, “ Nation shall rise against 
 nation, and kingdom against kingdom,” and “ when ye shall 
 hear of wars and commotions, be not terrified: for these things 
 must first come to pass; but the end is not by and by.” ἢ 
 
 There can be no mistake in the application of our Lord’s 
 prophecy to the Christian dispensation; but to apply the 
 - prophecy of Isaiah to the same period is to set the prophet 
 and the Saviour in direct verbal contradiction to each other; 
 
 1 St. Matt. xxiv. 7; St. Luke xxi, 9, 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 225 
 
 it follows, therefore, that the language of the prophet now 
 under consideration cannot with truth be applied to the same 
 period. 
 
 To what, then, is it to be appiied, and when ? 
 
 I answer, to the Jewish nation, restored from their present 
 dispersion, and all the other nations of the earth then at peace, 
 perfect peace and harmony, under Jewish dominion. 
 
 And where is the proof of this ?? 
 
 1 A very few years have elapsed since it was a serious risk to any man’s 
 reputation, I will not say for sound judgment and cautious discretion, in the 
 interpretation of Scripture, but even for common sense and ordinary prudence, 
 to avow his expectation of the restoration of the Jewish people to the land of 
 their fathers, and their subsequent national glory under their great king, the son 
 of David. In vain the “sure word of prophecy ” was cited; in vain the literal 
 interpretation was defended; in vain the facts which have already fulfilled 
 some prophecies were appealed to, in proof that in those instances the literal 
 interpretation was imperative ; in vain it was shown that if the literal interpre- 
 tation of unfulfilled prophecy be rejected, the evidence hitherto derived from 
 fulfilled prophecy must be relinquished. In this field of scriptural argumenta- 
 tion and “ evil report,” the author of these pages, with a few brethren who were 
 deemed equally visionary, was content patiently to labour. Some of his fellow- 
 labourers have fallen asleep ; but he has been permitted to see the fruit of his 
 labours, and with thankful joy to find interpretations and arguments which he 
 preached and printed in London twenty years ago now transcribed into tne 
 pages of the, most discreet, as well as the most devoted and distinguished of the 
 presbyters and prelates of the English Church: 
 
 The following are specimens :— 
 
 “There is a concurrent testimony resulting from the prophetic writings, that 
 Israel shall be restored to favour, shall be gathered from their dispersion, shall 
 be collected into their own land, shall again be employed as the instrument of 
 God’s mercy, shall again be the means of renewing the face of the earth, and of 
 influencing the destiny of man; and as I must be conscious that the gracious 
 purpose of God towards man is not yet accomplished, as darkness still covers, 
 the earth, and gross darkness the people, I must believe—for the evidence seems 
 too clear to be resisted—that the purpose of God is to resume its former channel, 
 when it resumes its onward progress, and hastens the completion of its work; 
 that Israel is to be employed, even as Israel has been employed; that the Lord 
 will arise and have mercy upon Zion, ‘ when the time to favour her, yea, the set 
 time, is come’ (Psalm cii. 13): ‘That the Lord shall arise upon Israel, and His 
 glory shall be seen upon them; and the Gentiles shall come to their light, and 
 kings to the brightness of their rising’ (Isa. lx. 2, 3). In justification of these 
 assumptions, and to avoid the wearisomeness of verbal criticism and multiplied 
 references in making good the interpretation I contend for, let me ask you to 
 bear in mind the present state of Christendom, and to consider the little pro- 
 
 15 
 
226 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 I appeal, in the first place, to the inspired heading of the 
 prophecy itself, as written in the first verse of the chapter: 
 “The word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw, concerning Judah 
 and Jerusalem.” This designates, with sufficient plainness, the 
 subject of the prophecy; and to cut off all pretence of ambiguity 
 
 gress which the gospel has made in the world since the day when the Jews 
 ceased to beits preachers. Let me next ask you to consider whether there does 
 not appear to be a cause for introducing some fresh instrumentality, a necessity 
 for some new agency towards the accomplishment of that which we believe to 
 be the will and the purpose of Jehovah, And, finally, let me ask you to con- 
 sider whether we are not warranted by past experience in expecting that they 
 may be the most successful preachers of the gospel wliom we know to have 
 been the chosen instruments for making known the will of God in former ages.” 
 —Sermon before the Jews’ Society, 1842, by the Rev. Henry Raikes, M.A., Chan- 
 cellor of the Diocese of Chester. 
 
 “Tt has been too customary with Christians to look upon the Jews as a 
 people who, having performed the part allotted to them in God’s moral govern- 
 ment of the world, have been laid aside, as an instrument which has done its 
 work, and will be no more required by the artificer. The story of their for- 
 
 tunes has been regarded as belonging altogether to the annals of the past. Their | 
 
 continued existence, indeed, has been pointed out as ‘a verification of the word 
 of God ; but their future bearing upon the Church of Christ, and upon the 
 spiritual state of mankind, was too long overlooked. Of later years it has been 
 more clearly seen that the thread of their destiny is interwoven with the history 
 of the world, from the moment when it first fell under captivity to sin to the 
 time when it shall be finally delivered from its thraldom; that there are 
 prophecies still unfulfilled, the accomplishment of which is certain, foreshowing 
 that the Jews have still an important part to act in the development of the 
 Christian dispensation ; and that they are to be principal agents in its closing, 
 .as.they were in its opening scenes. . . . And that which is here (Deut. xxx.) 
 spoken of as a possible contingency, is distinctly foretold by later prophets as 
 an event which will assuredly come to pass. The eighth and the three last 
 chapters of Zachariah cannot, we think, without‘ doing violence to all the laws 
 of interpretation, be so explained as not to imply a future restoration of the 
 Jews to their ancient and covenanted inheritance, and the re-establishment of 
 their national polity. This is, of necessity, connected with a re-instalment of 
 the holy city of Jerusalem in splendour and strength. Jerusalem, says the 
 prophet, shall be safely inhabited. It shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her 
 
 place; and men shall dwell in it, and there shall be no more utter destruction. 
 “Tt is scarcely possible to understand these words in a purely spiritual sense 
 of the heavenly Jerusalem; and if there were no other ground of objection to 
 such an interpretation, it would be precluded by the prophetical declaration of 
 our blessed Lord. They shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led 
 away captive into all nations; and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the 
 Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled; from which words it is a 
 / 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 227 
 
 
 
 in this mention of the Jewish nation, I refer, in the second 
 place, to the parallel prophecy in Micah. 
 
 _ After a strong reproof of the Jewish people, their princes, 
 their judges, their priests, and their prophets, for their 
 divers iniquities, he says, “ Therefore shall Zion for your sake 
 
 necessary inference that when the times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled, Jeru- 
 salem shall cease to be trodden down, and shall be restored to her ancient state. 
 As the city of Jerusalem was trodden down, so the city of Jerusalem shall 
 be built up.”’—Sermon before the Jews Society, 1844, by the Lord Bishop of 
 London. 
 
 Ican but instance one further ἐπούδον proclaimed by the unanimous voice 
 of prophecy, in connection with the conversion of the Jews, and as either con- 
 temporaneous with, or immediately preceding, or immediately subsequent to 
 that event—their restoration to the land of their fathers. From Deuteronomy 
 to the Apocalypse, this promise is reiterated again and again, with a redundance 
 of testimony which can scarcely be paralleled in reference to any other object 
 of prophetical declaration. The only question, if question there be, is whether 
 Jerusalem, in its renewed glory, the holy city, and the holy mount, their own 
 land, the land of Jacob and of their fathers, are to be understood of the literal or 
 spiritual Jerusalem, of the literal or spiritual Zion, of the literal or spiritual 
 Israel, of the land of type and metaphor, or the actual and geographical ter- 
 ritory. Shall we try the question by the ordinary rules of constructive 
 criticism? They seem to lead of necessity to the literal interpretation. Or by 
 the comparison of texts confessedly literal with texts confessedly figurative ? 
 The result is the same. Or by the analogy of prophecies accomplished, with 
 prophecies yet to receive their completion—of events past with events future? 
 The answer is not different. Or by the difficulties of admitting the other 
 hypothesis? Still we can arrive at no other conclusion. Or by the concurrent 
 opinion of the safest and soundest expositors? The adoption of one and the 
 same solution of this mighty problem is still forced upon our minds, and under 
 
 ‘the weight of irresistible convictions we yield an assent which we cannot with- 
 hold, ‘ Lord, I believe; help Thou my unbelief.’ Bern mow before the Jews 
 Society, 1844, by the Lord Bishop of Winchester. 
 
 “ And yet, my brethren, an interest in the’ Jewish nation is an interest in the 
 Gentile‘also. Surely unbelief must be banished from the earth, if the world 
 were allowed to see the fulfilment of our hopes, and the completion of prophecies 
 uttered in so remote an ag2; to see the Jewish people re-settled in the land of 
 their forefathers, ‘worshipping David their king ’—the real spiritual David. 
 It is the anticipation which the apostle himself indulges. ‘For if the casting 
 away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them 
 be but life from the dead?’ When the apostles turned away from their unbe- 
 lieving countrymen, and addressed themselves to the Gentiles, it was ‘the 
 reconciling of the world ;’ and to effect reconciliation, to bring nations which 
 had been alienated from God to love and serve Him, is great and glorious. But 
 
 _ to restore life is more glorious still; and when the Jew ceases to be unbelieving 
 
228 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, 
 and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest. 
 But in the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain 
 of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the 
 mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people 
 shall flow unto it. And many nations shall come, and say, 
 Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to 
 the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us His 
 ways, and we will walk in His paths: for the law shall go forth 
 of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He 
 shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar 
 off ; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and 
 hair spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up a sword 
 against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. But 
 hey shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig-tree : 
 and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the Lord of 
 hosts hath svoken it.” ? : 
 
 What now, I ask, is intended here tay “the mountain of the 
 house eA Zion aren be ploughed as a field, Jerusalem shall 
 become heaps, and the mountain of’ the house as the high places 
 of the forest.”” Is not the Jewish nation brought to dosolaheea? 
 “But in the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain of 
 the house shall be established in the top of the mountains.” 
 Does the mountain of the house mean something different here 
 from what it meant in the preceding verse? Or is it not here 
 also the Jewish nation, at a different period, and in a condition 
 contrasted with her desolation in the interim? Let the sequel 
 of the prophecy give answer: “In that day, saith the Lord, 
 will I assemble her that halteth, and I will gather-her that is 
 and receives the gospel, such an event will cause an awakening which can only 
 be compared to the resurrection of the dead to new life and being. 
 
 “May God in His mercy bring about this blessed consummation, remember 
 the cause of His elect, and hasten His kingdom !”—Sermon before the Jens’ 
 Society, 1845, by the Lord Bishop of Chester. 
 
 1 Micah iii. 12, and iv. 1—4. 
 
 * On this verse Mr. Scott comments thus :—‘‘To punish, therefore, their 
 hypocrisy and iniquity, the city would certainly be desolated and become heaps 
 
 of rubbish; and the mountain on which the temple stood would be rendered as 
 waste and unfrequented as the forests and deserts.” 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 229 
 driven out, and her that I have afflicted; and I will make her 
 that halted a remnant, and her that was cast off a strong nation: 
 and the Lord shall reign over them in mount Zion from hence- 
 forth, even for ever. And thou, O tower of the flock, the 
 stronghold of the daughter of Zion, unto thee shall it come, 
 even the first dominion” (in the top of the mountains, and 
 above all the hills); “the kingdom shall come to the daughter 
 of Jerusalem.” ! 
 
 To whom can these descriptions, with fairness and impar- 
 tiality, be applied —“ her that halteth,” “ her that is driven out,” 
 “her that was cast far off”?? Not, surely, to the Christian 
 Church. When was she driven out? When was she cast far 
 off? Never. But these expressions accurately describe the 
 state of the Jews during this dispensation; and to her who is so 
 described is the promise*given, from the mouth of the Lord of 
 hosts, that she shall be a strong nation, and have the kingdom, 
 even the first dominion. To this, which is the revealed will of 
 God at the close of the Christian dispensation, the prophecy 
 does of right belong, and not to the Christian Church; there- 
 fore no argument can be fairly derived from it in support of the 
 alleged visibility of the Church of God in Christ. 
 
 No. The visibility of the “ man child,” the mystical Christ, 
 
 ! Micah iy. 6—8. 
 
 * This part of the prophecy is felt by Dr. Henderson as a difficulty in the way 
 of the ordinary interpretation. He applies the first four verses to the Christian 
 Church; but feeling that the expressions in the sixth, seventh, and eighth 
 yerses cannot be so applied, but must signify the restoration of the Jews, he has 
 recourse to a supposed abrupt return of the prophet to the period of the deli- 
 verance of his people from their captivity in Babylon. In his heading of the 
 chapter, he thus describes the contents of verses 1—4:— 
 
 ** He (the prophet) predicts the establishment of the kingdom of Christ upon 
 the ruins of idolatry ; and the accession of the Gentiles, 1, 2; the peaceful 
 nature of His reign, 3; and the security of His subjects, 4.” 
 
 Then, in his note on verses 6—8, he says, “‘ That the subject of these verses is 
 the restoration from Babylon, and the re-establishment of the Jewish state, and 
 not any spiritual gathering of men generally into the Church of God, is placed 
 beyond dispute by the prediction that the scattered and afflicted remnant of 
 Israel was again to become a strong nation, ver. 7; and by the use of the phrase 
 the former rule, or first dominion, ver. 8, which can only be interpreted of 
 the theocratic government at Jerusalem.”—ZHenderson on the Minor Prophets, 
 in loc. 
 
230 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 waits for His birth, and His birth for the last of His members. 
 He cannot be born defective. The patriarchal believers com- 
 posed only a part of His body, and must wait for the remainder. 
 The Jewish believers composed another part, and must, in like 
 manner, wait for the remainder. The primitive martyrs com- 
 posed another part: and when they complain, saying, “How 
 long, O Lord, holy and true, dost Thou not judge and avenge our 
 blood on them that dwell on the earth?” they are told that 
 they should “ rest yet a little season, until their fellow-servants 
 also, and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, 
 shall be fulfilled.” Christian believers, up to the present day, 
 compose only another part of the same body; and, like their 
 predecessors, must wait for the remainder. The trav a goes on, 
 and the child is not to be discerned as such, till, all the weenie 
 being ready, the perfect man shall stand up in “ the measure of 
 the stature of the fulness of Christ.”? 
 
 It was for this manifestation in one body, of all who shall 
 believe in Him, that Jesus prayed when He said, ‘‘ Neither pray 
 I for these” (the apostles) “alone, but for them also who shall 
 believe on ne through their word; that they all’? (not a few of 
 them in any one age or place, but all of them, from the first and 
 to the last inclusive: can anything less than this be the true 
 and full meaning of our Lord’s words, that they all?) “may be 
 one; as Thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also 
 may be one in us; that the world may believe that Thou hast 
 sent me.’’? 
 
 This concluding clause, “ that the world may believe that 
 Thou hast sent me,” is urged against the interpretation of the 
 prayer here given, It is alleged that this clause contains a 
 prayer for the conversion of the world, to be brought about by 
 means of manifested unity in the Church; and that, con- , 
 sequently, the unity intended must be manifested in the present 
 state of things, while there remains a surrounding world to be 
 _ influenced by it. So understood, it is a prayer that the world 
 may, in fact, become the Church—that there may be no unbe- 
 lievers left. 
 
 ? Rom, viii, 18—23; Rey. vi. 9—11; Eph. iv. 13, 2 St. John xvii. 20, 21. 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 23 
 
 
 
 To represent our Lord as haying so prayed with reference’ to 
 the present or any past period of the world’s history, is to 
 represent Him as having prayed in vain. His prayer, so under- 
 stood, has not been heard. This appears to me to be fatal to 
 the’ interpretation so far, because “the Father heard Him 
 always.” He prayed “according to the will of God,” and He 
 prayed “in faith;” and all such prayers are heard. If His | 
 intercession in this instance be in vain, what real reliance can 
 be placed upon it in any instance ? 
 
 To say that this prayer had reference to a period of the 
 world’s history still future, and that in the sequel it will be fully 
 answered—that the Church in all its sections shall, in answer to 
 this prayer, become so united and harmonious as thereby to lead 
 to the conversion of the world—is to represent our Lord as 
 having prayed for a result in this dispensation totally irrecon- 
 cilable with His own and His apostles’ predictions of what the 
 result shall be. The result predicted is separation at the second 
 coming of Christ.- Till then, evil, widespread and increasing 
 evil, is to mark the course of the world, and keep the Church in 
 trouble. Evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, 
 deceiving and being deceived, and the world, stupified in its 
 worldliness, will be boasting of its peace and safety, till sudden 
 destruction shall come upon it at the appearing of Jesus Christ.! 
 
 And, further, to represent our Lord as praying in this clause 
 for the conversion of the world, is to place this clause in direct 
 opposition to a preceding clause in the same prayer, where He 
 says, “I pray not for the world, but for them which Thou hast 
 given me, for they are Thine.” 
 
 Of course it will be asked, For what then did He pray? His 
 words are, “That the world may believe that Thou hast sent 
 me.” Let this be carefully observed. He does not pray that 
 the world may believe in Him—the phrase which He usually 
 adopts to describe faith unto salvation—but that the world may 
 believe that the Father sent Him, which is a very different thing. 
 The devils believe it now, and tremble. The world does not 
 believe it now, and is careless. But the world shall believe it 
 
 12 Tim. iii, 18; 1 Thess, v. 1, 2. 
 

 
 
 
 never prayed in vain—then, when God shall judge the world by 
 the man whom He had ordained and sent to redeem the world 
 —and then it is that the unwilling confession, so frequently 
 anticipated in the prophetic Scriptures as giving glory to God, 
 shall be extorted from the world; they shall believe that the 
 Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world; they shall 
 be compelled to recognise the righteousness of His retribution 
 in judging the world; “ Verily,” they shall say, “verily, after 
 all, there is a reward for the righteous; verily, there is a God 
 that judgeth in the earth.” 
 
 It is my deliberate conviction that this prayer of our Lord, 
 rightly understood, cannot be justly cited in support of the 
 visibility, as one, of the Christian Church during the present 
 dispensation. The visible unity here prayed for must be such 
 as shall arrest the observation of those who are not included in 
 it; yet it must be such as shall include ‘all who shall believe” 
 on Jesus Christ. Contemplating the successive generations of 
 the Church of God among men, we observe that of those “ who 
 shall believe” on Jesus Christ, and for whom He here prays, 
 but a very small number have ever been at any one time upon 
 the earth; and that even those few have been so separated, 
 inevitably so, as not to have been conscious, save by vague 
 report, of one another’s existence. But the unity here prayed 
 for must be such as shall include them al/—such is the Saviour’s 
 expression—in conscious enjoyment. It is plainly impossible 
 that this should be fulfilled in any one passing generation of the 
 Church, and still less in any small geographical section of a 
 generation. : 
 
 It is true that the individuals composing each successive 
 generation, and each geographical section of a generation, are 
 exhorted to unity ; and it is true that, notwithstanding all their 
 outward diversities, a unity has existed, and does now exist, 
 among them,—a unity which has been, and is, an object of faith, 
 not of sight; a unity in the essential saving truth which God 
 teaches, and which is the same always and everywhere. God 
 teaches no falsehood, and concerning the members of the true 
 
The Church of God in Christ. 233 
 
 
 
 Church it is written, “They shall be all taught of God.” But 
 in addition to this teaching, they are all taught of man also in 
 many things. Hence the diversities among them; and these 
 diversities affect, in a greater or less degree, their views of what 
 is taught them of God, and of the consequences which should 
 practically result therefrom. This is inevitable, if men, variously 
 constituted as they are, be left free agents. Genuine Christian 
 union, in the practice of mutual kindness and mutual forbear- 
 ance, need not be interfered with by these diversities; but the 
 general effect must be to render it impossible to distinguish 
 accurately between those who are indeed taught of God, and 
 those who have only the appearance of being so. In other 
 words, the real Church of God in Christ, to which the promise 
 is made that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, cannot, 
 in any of its passing generations, be a visible company, separated 
 by any palpable line of demarcation from the rest of mankind. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH—THEIR 
 ORDINANCES, 
 
 An exclusively Spiritual State of Things: Salvation without Ordinances 
 conceivable—But not the existing State of Things—Visible Ordinances’ 
 Instituted from the Beginning—Man’s Compound. Creation—His Religion 
 suitable thereto—The Tree of Knowledge—The Bleeding Sacrifice—The 
 Rainbow—Circumcision—The Mosaic Types—The Person and Ministry of 
 Jesus—And now, Ordinances rest on the same Authority with Spiritual 
 Truth. / 
 
 Tue blessings we have hitherto considered are purely spiritual, 
 and as such belong exclusively to the true members of Christ’s 
 mystical body. . But now we approach a more complicated state 
 of things. The blessings now to be considered are not spiritual 
 only, but material also. The material or visible part may be 
 separated from the spiritual, and given to persons who have no 
 participation whatever in the spiritual part. Hence, in reference 
 to these matters, we have a mixed company to deal with; and 
 as the name which belongs of right to the spiritual is given also 
 to the visible, we have now a “ πἰβήυ Church.” 
 
 “ And because this visible Church doth enfold the often ia 
 one mass doth contain the good ore and base alloy; as one floor 
 the corn and the chaff; as one field the wheat and the tares; as 
 one net the choice fish and the refuse; as one fold the sheep and 
 the goats; as one tree the living and the dry branches); because 
 this society is designed to be in appearance what the other is in 
 reality, the same with the other; because, therefore, presump- 
 tively every member of this doth pass for a member of the otaer 
 (the time of distinction and separation not yet being come); 
 because this, in its profession of truth, in its sacrifices of devotion, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 235 
 
 
 
 in its practice. of service and duty to God, doth communicate 
 with that: therefore, commonly, the titles and attributes of the 
 one are imparted to the other. 
 
 “¢ All,’ saith St. Panl, ‘are not Israel who are of Israel ;’ nor 
 “is he a Jew that is one outwardly; yet in regard to the con- 
 junction of the rest with the faithful Israelites, because of 
 external consent in the same profession, and conspiring in the 
 same services, all the congregation of Israel is styled ‘a holy 
 nation,’ and ‘ peculiar people.’ 
 
 “So likewise do the apostles speak to all members of the 
 Church as to elect and holy persons, unto whom all the privi- 
 leges of Christianity do belong; although really hypocrites and 
 bad men ‘do not belong to the Church,’ nor are concerned in 
 its unity, as St. Austin doth often teach.’’ —Barrow.' 
 
 It is quite conceivable that the persons composing the. true 
 Church of God might be renewed in the spirit of their mind, 
 
 and so essentially united to Christ by the Holy Ghost working 
 effectually in their hearts, and that after being so changed they 
 might be preserved in a spiritual state of mind throughout the 
 remainder of their lives, and then taken to heaven ; and all this 
 without any visible instrumentality employed, but entirely by 
 the unseen ministry of angels, or by the immediate power of the 
 omnipresent God. 
 
 Such a constitution of things is conceivable. It is not indeed 
 the actual one which God has been pleased to institute; but for 
 the sake of the contrast to follow, and the consequent clearness, 
 it is, I think, profitable to make the mental effort necessary for 
 imagining such a state of things. 
 
 A chosen company out of mankind, saved in each successive 
 generation since the beginning of the world by the unseen 
 agency of God or angels, or both, without any visible means 
 used, or any intimation given to the rest of mankind, that these 
 their fellows were of so very different a character, and going to 
 so very different an eternity from themselves. 
 
 1 Non ad eam pertinent avari, raptores, feeneratores. Videntur esse in 
 Ecclesia, non sunt. Aug. de Bapt. contr.,Don. iv. 1, vi. 3. Ecclesiam veram 
 intelligere non audeo, nisi in sanctis et justis. JZbid. vy, 27.. ἡ 
 
 7 
 
"236 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 This is not unlike the notion which some spiritual persons 
 seem to entertain as the actual truth of the case. They repre- 
 sent religion as consisting exclusively in an unseen commerce 
 or communion between God and the believing soul; and they 
 repudiate as foreign to it, and injurious to it, all outward forms 
 and observances. 
 
 I would ask such persons what they conceive to be the appro- 
 priate and characteristic duties of Christians from the time of 
 their conversion till the time of their death. Are they to live 
 on in wordliness and sin like those around them? surely not. 
 What then? Are they to live no longer as other men live, but 
 to be a peculiar people, loving God with all their hearts, and 
 their neighbours as themselves? Are they to manifest this love 
 in acts of worship towards God, and acts of affectionate interest 
 and brotherly kindness among their neighbours, especially de- 
 sirous of their eternal happiness? Grant this, and the fancied 
 spirituality unencumbered with outward means, is immediately 
 dissipated; because you have these Christians employing means, 
 which in their use of them must be visible, on behalf of their 
 friends and neighbours around them. In such a case, all the 
 means adopted would be of man’s devising, and might or might 
 not be judicious, but some visible means would be inevitable. 
 I have said this to show that the divine institution of outward 
 ordinances, instead of being a needless encumbrance, is in truth 
 a kind and considerate condescension to our infirmities. It 
 belongs, indeed, to our complex creation, as described in the 
 Book of Genesis. “And the Lord God formed man of the 
 dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of 
 life, and man became a living soul” (chap. ii. 7). 
 
 God is a Spirit; God has created spirits, angels, and princi- 
 palities and powers. The communications which those created 
 spirits hold with the great Father of spirits, is simply and exclu- 
 sively spiritual. That is, the religion of angels, if we may use 
 such an expression, is suitable to the nature of angels. They 
 being spirits and nothing else, their religion is spiritual and 
 nothing else. 
 
 God has created man a compound being, consisting of both 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 237 
 body and spirit. The communication which this compound 
 being holds with God, that is, the religion of man, must be suit-' 
 able to his compound nature. There must be something spiritual 
 in it, answering to His spirit; and there must be something 
 visible and corporeal in it, answering to His body. 
 
 From these simple elements it will follow that the man who 
 makes his religion to consist in visible and corporeal acts and 
 forms, falls short of the truth, forgetting his spirit; and, on the 
 other hand, the man who confines his religion to spiritual and 
 invisible communion, falls short of the truth, forgetting his 
 body. And without meaning any unnecessary or irritating re- 
 proach to any one, but simply for the sake of illustration and 
 consequent clearness, I may add that the Church of Rome has 
 erred on the one side, and the Society of Friends on the other. 
 
 In strict conformity with this reasoning, we find, on reference 
 to the Word of God (the only infallible source of information 
 upon this subject), that in every stage of Jehovah’s dealings 
 with this world, since the creation, not only has man been called 
 to a spiritual worship of God, but also visible bodily observances 
 have been enjoined upon him in the exercise of that worship. 
 The high place—the highest place of true religion is spiritual, 
 for God is a Spirit. But in the case of man, the ascent to that 
 place, and the enjoyment of it when reached, have at all times, 
 and under all circumstances, been aided by the authoritative 
 appointment of something visible. The hidden spring of true 
 religion is spiritual; but in every instance in the history of 
 man, God has accompanied it with a visible index. This state- 
 ment may be exemplified and confirmed by detailed reference to 
 the circumstances of Adam before his original transgression, 
 and after that transgression; of Noah after the deluge; of 
 Abraham after his call to’ leave his home, and country; of the 
 Mosaic ritual, and, finally, of the Christian dispensation. 
 
 1. Take the case of Adam in his primeval blessedness, created 
 in the image of God, and placed in the garden of Eden. The 
 characteristic of this state was holy dependence. All crea- 
 tures are, and must be, completely and absolutely dependent 
 upon the great Creator. This principle might have been stated 
 
238 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 to Adam’s mind in words, or communicated to his soul by some 
 spiritual process, and doubtless so it was: but we observe now, 
 as a matter of fact, that it was also exhibited to his body. His 
 body was as dependen® for natural life, as his soul was for 
 spiritual life. And accordingly we see in his case not only 
 spiritual communion with God, but also an outward and visible 
 appointment or ordinance corresponding thereto, a corporeal 
 restriction, a reserved tree, a visible sign of spiritual dependence. 
 A most significant sign,—for whose did it prove the garden to 
 be, with all its fruits? Not Adam’s own, or he would haye 
 been under no restrictions from a higher authority. The pro- 
 hibited tree, daily before his eyes, was a daily remembrance of 
 the covenant of reservation, so to speak, which formed a part of 
 his lease. This, therefore, was a standing memorial to him, and 
 as he daily refrained from it, it was an outward and visible 
 acknowledgment by him that he was a tenant and not the pro- 
 prietor of the garden. And as neither lives nor years were 
 specified in his lease, he was further reminded, and he did con- 
 stantly acknowledge, that he was a ‘ tenant at will,” subject to 
 ejectment by his great landlord at any moment. 
 
 Thus the revelation of God’s absolute sovereignty over all 
 the works of His creation was the part of the dispensation 
 answering to the spirit of His creature man; and the reserved 
 tree was the part of the dispensation answering to the body of 
 the creature. The medium through which the former was 
 effectual to man’s happiness was willing submission, and that 
 submission was assisted by the latter. 
 
 This will explain the depth and malignity of Adam’s trans- 
 gression. God reserved a token of His own sovereignty as the 
 great proprietor of all things. Under Him Adam. had the 
 dominion. Of the trees of the garden, in all their rich pro- 
 fusion, he might freely eat; but he was a creature, and the 
 
 garden contained one outward and visible sign to him of ἃ 
 
 creature’s dependence. The nature of his transgression was 
 
 therefore a usurpation of independence ; or, in other. words, ἃ 
 
 declaration of rebellion against God’s sovereignty. It was 
 saying, I will be no longer dependent, I will no longer hold 
 
 | .. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 239 
 Ee 
 this garden under any restrictions from anothers! will have no 
 covenant of reservation in my lease, yea, I have no lease at all; 
 the garden is my own. I will be a god to myself. I will be as 
 God, independent. His transgression*was therefore but too 
 faithful a response to the lying temptation of the devil, “ Ye 
 shall be as gods 1} 
 
 Here also we see the true answer to the infidel’ cavil against 
 the divine history, grounded on the alleged absurdity of so tre- 
 mendous a punishment being elated: upon Adam and his 
 posterity for so small an offence as eating an apple. Eating an 
 apple was not Adam’s offence. His offence was rebellion 
 against that state of dependence in which God had placed him. 
 The reserved fruit (there is no evidence of what fruit it was— 
 the Jews think it was the grape) was the symbol of that de- 
 pendence. The smaller the restriction, the more unprovoked 
 and unjustifiable the rebellion. Adam’s sin, therefore, instead 
 of being palliated or lessened by the insignificance of the 
 fruit, is thereby aggravated to the uttermost. Surrounded 
 by rich and precious fruits in untold abundance, he did, for 
 the paltry inducement of one fruit more, fly in the face of the 
 Almighty, and blasphemously presume to assert his own in- 
 dependence. 
 
 How instructive is this view of the subject! The mind that 
 measures human guilt by the quantity of the transgression, and 
 not by the principle transgressed ; the mind that estimates the 
 wickedness of a theft, for instance, by the amount of property 
 stolen, and not by the intrinsic rectitude of the principle of 
 honesty,—that mind is thoroughly alienated from God, and dead 
 to His glory. Alive it may be to the claims of man upon his. 
 fellow-man, to all that constitutes what men call equity and fair 
 dealing,—this is indeed the basis of all human jurisprudence : 
 guilt is estimated and punishment awarded, not on the grounds 
 of principle infringed, but of the eatent of crime committed. 
 Punishment is apportioned to crime, from the smallest fine or 
 shortest imprisonment, up to the loss of life. This is human 
 equity, but the application of it to religion is fraught with incal- 
 
 ' Gen, iii. δ. 
 
240 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 culable mischief. It has engendered the idea, that although 
 notorious sinners may deserve hell, yet the same hell cannot 
 possibly be deserved by comparatively small sinners. Hence 
 the purgatory of the heathen, adopted and systematised in the 
 Roman Church; hence a deceitful complacency among the 
 more moral of all denominations, no less destructive than the 
 doctrine of purgatory. The divine law estimates guilt, not by 
 extent, but by principle; for thus saith the Holy Ghost by an 
 apostle, “ There is no difference, for all have sinned and come 
 short of the glory of God.” THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE! And 
 by another apostle, He saith, “ Whosoever shall keep the whole 
 law, and yet offend in ONE point, HE IS GUILTY OF ALL. For He 
 THAT SAID, Do not commit adultery, SAID ALSO, Do not kill,” ete. 
 (Rom. iii. 22; James 11. 10, 11). 
 
 Here God’s reference is to the principle of law violated; and’ 
 an estimate of guilt by the extent of the violation is rejected as 
 ungodly. Beware of human maxims in religion. Is it not a 
 little one ?—exclaims the treacherous heart which has regard only 
 to human injury, and no regard to the divine glory. If the 
 matter in hand be a violation of punctuality, it is only a few 
 minutes; if it be a violation of truth, it is only a slight exaggera- 
 tion; if it be a violation of honesty, it is only the value of a few 
 pence. Children are taught this even in their eating and drink- 
 ing, receiving things prohibited and hearing it excused by “ It 
 was only a little.” Beware, beware !—this principle, or rather 
 want of principle, which, as a minister of Christ’s Church, I feel 
 it my duty to expose and condemn, is the deyil’s bait to quiet 
 the clamours of haman conscience. Yes! 7ὲ is only a little, is 
 a well-contrived opiate which soothes thousands and tens of 
 thousands of rational responsible creatures to everlasting dam- 
 nation. 
 
 But to return: Adam in his unfallen state had an outward and 
 visible ordinance in his religion, as well as inward and spiritual 
 communion with God. 
 
 2. Consider, in the second place, fallen man under the first 
 step of the divine dispensation to him. The characteristic of his 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 241 
 state was ruin. And the characteristic of the appropriate re- 
 ligion which God revealed to him was remedy. This was an- 
 nounced to him in words, when the seed of the woman was 
 promised to endure bruising from the serpent, and eventually to 
 (lestroy the poisonous enemy. But such a revelation to his 
 spirit was not enough; he wanted a corresponding exhibition to 
 his body. And he received it in the institution of sacrifice. The 
 animal was taken; its blood which was its life was poured forth 
 unto death; and its skin supplied a covering for the nakedness 
 of man’s shame. Here the spiritual principle, of the divine 
 remedy was most significantly made visible. The ruined man 
 beheld that death which had been threatened upon himself in- 
 flicted upon another; and he found the covering of the slain 
 substitute transferred to be his own covering. Thus the revela- 
 tion of the bruised and bruising seed of the woman was the part 
 of God’s dispensation answering to the spirit of His creature; 
 and the sacrificed animal supplying a coat for the man, was the 
 part of God’s dispensation answering to the body of His crea- 
 ture. The medium through which the former was to be effectual 
 was faith; and that faith was assisted by the latter. 
 
 3. The next distinct step in the divine dispensations was the 
 Deluge. Consider man after the Deluge. The characteristic of 
 his state, in addition to his original dependence and the ruin 
 already incurred, was terror lest another flood should overwhelm 
 him. And the characteristic of the revelation which God made 
 to him, in addition to the remedy already revealed, was consola- 
 tion: special consolation in an assurance that the earth should 
 no more be drowned with water. This was announced to him 
 in words when God said, “ And I, behold, I establish my cove- 
 nant with you, and with your seed after you; and with every 
 living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and 
 of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the 
 ark, to every beast of the earth: and I will establish my. cove- 
 nant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the 
 waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to 
 destroy the earth” (Gen. ix. 9—11). | But this revelation to his 
 
 16 
 
242 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 spirit was not enough—he wanted a corresponding exhibition to 
 his body, and he received it, when God most graciously added, 
 “ And this is the token of the covenant which I make between 
 you and me, and every living creature that is with you, for per- 
 petual generations: I do set iny bow in the cloud, and it shall be 
 for a token of a covenant between me and the earth. And it 
 shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the 
 bow shall be seen in the cloud: and I will remember my cove- 
 nant, which is between me and you and every living creature of 
 all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy 
 all flesh. And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon 
 it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God 
 and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth. 
 And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant 
 which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon 
 the earth”? (Gen. ix. 12—17). Thus the promise that there 
 should not be any more a flood to destroy the earth, was the 
 part of God’s dispensation answering to the spirit of His ecrea- 
 ture; and the bow visible in the cloud was the part of God’s 
 dispensation answering to the body of His creature. The 
 medium through which the former was to be effectual, was 
 faith; and that faith was assisted by the latter. 
 
 4, The next step was the call of Abraham. It is thus 
 narrated by Stephen, the proto-martyr: “ Men, brethren, and 
 fathers, hearken: The God of glory appeared unto our father 
 Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in 
 Charran, and said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and 
 from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall show 
 thee. Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt 
 in Charran: and from thence, when his father was dead, he 
 removed him into this land wherein ye now dwell. And he 
 gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his 
 foot on: yet he promised that he would give it to him for a 
 possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no 
 child” (Acts vii. 2—5). The special characteristic of Abraham’s 
 ase when so called, was personal destitution. He had neither 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 243 
 
 
 
 parent, nor child, nor home, nor country; but was a wandering 
 stranger in his old age, with his wife also old. The characteristic 
 of God’s special revelation to him was personal distinction, as the 
 father of a family more numerous than the stars of heaven; 
 and the possessor of a land, a good land and a large, a land 
 flowing with milk and honey. This gracious purpose of God 
 concerning him was made known to him in words when God 
 said, “This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come 
 forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. And he 
 brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now towards heaven 
 and tell the stars, if thou be able tonumber them. And He said 
 unto him, So shall thy seed be’ (Gen. xv. 4,5). ‘ And I will 
 give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou 
 art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting posses- 
 sion, and I will be their God” (xvii. 8). But this revelation to 
 his spirit was not enough, he wanted a corresponding exhibition 
 to his body ; and he received it in the outward and visible sign 
 of circumeision. This was personal; distinguishing him and 
 his family throughout their generations from all other people 
 upon the earth, and distinguishing the possessors of the pro- 
 mised land from all other nations. Thus, God’s assurance. to: 
 him of a family, and a possession, was the part of the divine 
 dispensation answering to his spirit; and the circumeision of 
 himself and of his son, was the part of the dispensation answering 
 to his body. The medium through which the former was to be 
 effectual was faith, and that faith was assisted by the latter. He 
 had faith in God’s promise first; that is, his spirit responded truly 
 to God’s spiritual communication, and it was counted unto him 
 for righteousness. And then, “he received the sign of cireum- 
 cision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith w hieh afd had yet 
 being uncircumcised ” (Rom. iv. 11). 
 
 5. The next step in the dispensations of God, presents us with 
 a long list of outward and visible ordinances of divine worship. 
 
 When the time of, the promise drew nigh, which God had 
 sworn to Abraham, He brought forth His people out of Egypt 
 like a flock, by the hand of Moses and Aaron. Unto them was 
 
/ 
 
 244 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the gospel preached as well as unto us. The law of cere- 
 monies given to them, had a shadow of good things to come. 
 Moses was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony 
 of those things which were to be spoken after. Before the eyes 
 of the Israelites were exhibited in most expressive types, the 
 sufferings of Christ, and the glory which shall follow. 
 
 It were a subject in itself, and a voluminous one, to enter 
 into the particulars of this Mosaic preaching of the everlasting 
 gospel. I need only remark at present, that this dispensation 
 was in strict harmony of principle with its predecessors. Truth, 
 sanctifying, saving truth, was the part of it answering to the 
 spirits of the children of Israel; and the visible ceremonial of 
 the Levitical priesthood, and the tabernacle services, formed the 
 part of it answering to their bodies. 
 
 But though it is unnecessary here to enlarge upon those details 
 of Judaism which are so fully discussed by the Apostle to the 
 Hebrews, it will be interesting, and, with reference to our 
 next chapter, most profitable, to note some of those Jewish 
 practices which, though founded upon and growing out of 
 divine institutions, are not so plainly detailed in the sacred 
 volume. For this purpose I refer to Wall’s “ History of Infant 
 Baptism: ”’— 
 
 ον “First, then, it is evident that the custom of the Jews before 
 
 our Saviour’s time (or, as they themselves affirm, from the 
 beginning of their law), was to baptise as well as circumcise 
 any proselyte that came over to them from the nations. This 
 does fully appear both from the books of the Jews them- 
 selves, and also of others that understood the Jewish customs 
 and have written of them. They reckoned all mankind beside 
 themselves to be in an unclean state, and not capable of being 
 entered into the covenant of Israelites without a washing or 
 baptism to denote their purification from their uncleanness. 
 And this was called the baptizing of them unto Moses. 
 
 © They take notice that Moses (Numb. xv. 15, 16) orders 
 thus, ‘One ordinance shall be both for you of the congregation, 
 and also for the stranger’ (or proselyte) * that sojourns with you. 
 An ordinance for ever in your generations. As you are, so , 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 24 
 
 in 
 
 shall the stranger be before the Lord. One law, and one 
 manner, shall be for you and for the stranger,’ etc. Now they 
 reckon that the Israelites themselves were, at their entering 
 into covenant with God at the time of their receiving the law in 
 Mount Sinai, all of them washed or baptized. So they under- 
 stood those words (Hxod. xix. 10, 11), ‘And the Lord said 
 unto Moses, Go unto all the people and sanctify them to-- 
 day and to-morrow, and let them wash their clothes, and be 
 ready against the third day: and the third day the Lord will 
 come down,’ etc. They understand the meaning of that com- 
 mand by which Moses was to sanctify the people on those 
 two days, to be the washing of them; and so that word to 
 sanctify, does commonly signify in the Jewish law (as several 
 writers have shown by many instances, and I also do in this 
 book give some), especially when it is spoken of a man sanctify- 
 ing other men. And Maimonides, Mickvaoth, it, More Nebo- 
 chim, pt. 3, c. 33, says, This is a rule, that-wheresoever in the 
 law the washing of the body or garments is mentioned, it means 
 still the washing of the whole body; and the same is affirmed,, 
 Gemara, Babyl. Tit. Jabimoth, ec. 4, fol. 46. And so Aban Ezra, 
 on that place of scripture} where Jacob being to meet God at 
 Bethel, said to his household, ‘Be clean, and change your 
 garments,’ understands the washing of their bodies; and Selden”; 
 shows by the expositions which the Jewish commentators give 
 on Levit. xi. 25, 28, 40, xiv. 8,47; Numb. xix. 10, 21, xxm. 
 24; and several other texts. where washing of garments 
 is mentioned, that they always understand washing of the 
 whole body. And for the like understanding of the aforesaid 
 place in Exod. xix. 10, quotes Mechilta, Nachmanid, R. Bechai. 
 Moses Mikotsi, ete. . 
 
 “ That they gave this (baptism of the Jews, and the command _ 
 for proselytes to be as the Jews were) as a proof that proselytes 
 must be baptised, appears by the words of Maimonides. For 
 he first says thus: By three things did Israel enter into | 
 covenant, by circumcision, and baptism, and sacrifice. Cireum- 
 cision was in Egypt, as it is written, ‘No uncircumcised* person. 
 
 ᾿ Gen. xxxy. 2: 2 De Synedr.\.i.c. 3. 8. χοᾶ. xii. 48, 
 
246 The Church and the: Churches. 
 
 shall eat thereof,” etc. Baptism was in the wilderness, just 
 before the giving of the law, as it is written, ‘Sanctify them to- 
 day and to-morrow, and let them wash their clothes.’ And 
 sacrifice, as it is said, ‘And he sent young men of the sons of 
 Israel, which offered burnt-offerings,’ * ete. 
 
 “ And so in all ages, when an ethnic is willing to enter into 
 the covenant, and gather himself under the wings of the majesty 
 of God, and take upon him the yoke of the law, he must be 
 circumcised and baptised, and bring a sacrifice; or if it be a 
 woman, be baptized and bring a sacrifice. As it is written, ‘ As 
 you are, so shall the stranger 6. How are you? By circum- 
 cision and baptism, and bringing of a sacrifice. So likewise the 
 stranger (or proselyte) through all generations, by circumcision 
 and baptism and bringing of a sacrifice. And what is the 
 stranger’s sacrifice? A burnt offering of a beast, or two turtle- 
 doves, or two young pigeons, both of them for a burnt-offering. 
 
 “ And at this time, when there is no sacrificing, they must be 
 circumcised, and baptized, and when the temple shall be built, 
 they are to bring the sacrifice. 
 
 “A stranger that is circumcised and not baptized, or baptized 
 and not circumcised, he is not a proselyte till he be both cireum- 
 cised and baptized. And he must be baptized in the presence of 
 three, etc. 
 
 “Even as they circumcise and baptise strangers, so do they 
 circumcise and baptise servants that are received from heathens, . 
 into the name of servitude, ete. 
 
 “When a man or woman comes to join as a proselyte, they 
 make diligent inquiry concerning such, lest they come to get 
 themselves under the law for some riches that they should 
 receive, or for dignity that they should obtain, or for fear. If 
 it be a man, they inquire whether he have not set his affection 
 on some Jewish woman; or a woman, her affection on some 
 young man of Israel. If no such like occasion be found in 
 them, they make known unto them the weightiness of the yoke 
 of the law, and the toil that is in the doing thereof, above that 
 which people of other lands have, to see if they will go back. 
 
 1 Exod. xix. 10. * Exod. xxiv. 5. 3 Numb, xv. 15, 
 
Churches Mititant on Earth. 249 
 
 
 
 If they take it upon them, and withdraw not, and they see that 
 they come of love, then they receive them, ete. 
 
 “Therefore, the judges received no proselyte all the days of 
 David and Solomon. Not in Davyid’s days, lest they should 
 have come of fear; nor in Solomon’s, lest they should have 
 come because of the kingdom and great prosperity which Israel 
 then had. 
 
 “For whoso comes from the heathens for anything of the 
 vanities of this world, he is no righteous proselyte. 
 
 “The books do speak of this washing or baptism as absolutely 
 necessary, and an ordinance without which none was to be 
 counted a proselyte. 
 
 “So Gemara Babylon, ad Tit. Cherithoth, c. 2:—The prose- 
 lytes entered not into covenant but by circumcision, baptism, 
 τὸ sprinkling of blood. 
 
 “And Tit. Jabimoth, ο. 4:—He is no soil unless he be 
 circumcised and baptized. And, if he be not. baptized, he 
 remains a Gentile (or pagan). And there is in that chapter a 
 proof given of that opinion of the necessity which I shall have 
 occasion by and by to mention. 
 
 “ Maimonides says the same thing, as we saw in the chapter 
 I quoted before." 
 
 “ Also the Talmud, Tract Repudii, ΕΓ ΎΓΡΗΝ of J ey Moses’ - 
 father-in-law :— 
 
 “He was made a proselyte by circumcision and immersion in 
 water. 
 
 “This custom of the Jews continued after Christ's time, and 
 after their expulsion from the Holy Land, and continues (as 1 
 have showed from Leo Modena) to this day; if there be any 
 that now-a-days do turn proselytes to their religion. Wherever 
 they sojourned, if they found any of that country that chose to 
 be of their religion, they would not admit him unless he would 
 ‘first be washed or baptized by them. And some heathen writers 
 do express a great deal of scorn and disdain at this their 
 valuing themselves upon their own purity, in comparison with 
 other nations. 
 
 1 Isuri, Bia, c. 13. 
 
248 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 “The: ancient Christians, especially such of them as lived in 
 places where they could have converse with the learned Jews, 
 and might learn from them the meaning of the Hebrew phrases 
 used in the Old Testament, do also speak of this baptism: of the 
 Jews.. 
 
 “So Gregory Nazianzen, Orat. 39, showing the vickendilih of 
 the Christian baptism before the Jewish, says, ‘Moses gave a 
 baptism, but that was with water only. ae before that they 
 were baptized in the cloud and in the sea. But these were but 
 a type (or figure) of ours, as Paul also understands it.’ 
 
 “ And before them all, Tertullian having in his Book of 
 Baptism, c. 5, shown by several particulars that the heathens 
 had used of old a certain rite of baptizing, which they said was 
 for their regeneration, and for the forgiveness of their sins, 
 applies to it this observation, ‘ Here we see the aim of the devil 
 to ape (or imitate) the things of God. Since he also sets up a 
 baptism for his disciples.’ ”? 
 
 6. The next dispensation is the Christian. No essential 
 change took place when the temple was built by Solomon. 
 It was built after the pattern of the tabernacle, and, though 
 in outward splendour it vastly excelled, the priesthood and 
 services remained unaltered. 
 
 The dispensation of the grace of God, under which we now 
 live, resembles all the former dispensations in this essential 
 characteristic, that it contains a part answering to the spirits of 
 men, and a part answering to their bodies. When the fulness 
 of the time was come, there was not only a proclamation of 
 God’s love made to man’s faith, but there was also a manifesta- 
 tion of that love made to man’s sight. The Eternal Word was 
 made flesh, and dwelt among men, and they beheld His glory. 
 On this the apostle John iniists (St. John i. 1, 14; 1 Johni.1, 2). 
 
 His body was not a spiritual thing, revealed to man’s faith; 
 it was an actual, visible, tangible thing, presented to man’s 
 bodily senses. 
 
 His righteousness was not only inward and spiritual, to be 
 
 ? Wall, Hist. Inf. Bap., Intr. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 249. 
 
 
 
 seen of God, but outward, moral, and ceremonial also, to be 
 seen of men. His sufferings were not only inward and spiritual, 
 but outward and visible also. It was not only true that His 
 soul was sorrowful, but also that His body was tortured. _ His 
 death was not only inward and spiritual, but outward and 
 visible also. It was not only true that His soul was forsaken 
 of God, which is spiritual death, but also that His heart’s blood 
 flowed from His pierced side, which is bodily death. His resur- 
 rection, in like manner, was not only inward and spiritual, but 
 outward and visible also. It was not only true that His human 
 soul was sustained’ in high and holy communion with God, 
 which is spiritual resurrection (and in which sense the members 
 of His body, the Church, are already risen with Him), but also 
 that His human body was quickened in the sepulchre, and, 
 instead of falling into corruption, was transformed into an 
 incorruptible immortal body, which is outward, visible, corporeal 
 resurrection. His glory, also, which shall be revealed, is not 
 inward and spiritual only, but outward and visible also. Of 
 this His disciples on Mount Tabor had a specimen; and in this 
 all His disciples shall have participation at His second advent 
 (Phil. iii. 20, 21). 
 
 But it may be objected that this combination of spiritual and 
 visible in Christ Himself is not characteristic of the whole dis- 
 pensation; that it was exhibited to but a very few of His 
 disciples; and that, since His ascension to heaven and the 
 mission of the Holy Spirit, this is purely and exclusively a 
 spiritual dispensation, and the worship of God purely and 
 exclusively spiritual, without any intermixture of visible 
 ordinances. But what is the fact? A fact which proves most 
 conclusively the principle laid down in this chapter to be of 
 invariable application. The fact is that even now, under the 
 dispensation of the Spirit; now, when the great Anti-type is 
 come, the one offering once offered, the everlasting Priest 
 entered into the true holy place; now, when spiritual worship 
 and inward communion are explained beyond what they were 
 under any former dispensation; now, when the Lord has said, 
 “God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him 
 
250 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 in spirit and in truth” (St. John iv. 24); even now, man is not 
 called to an unmixed, unassisted ‘spiritual service, as though he 
 had no body, or as though his body were mere clay, to be despised 
 now and corrupted forever. No; the fact is that even now out- 
 ward visible things are instituted in Christian worship. God treats 
 us still suitably to the two component parts of our creation, soul 
 and body. True it is, indeed, that the outward things now 
 commanded are reduced in simplicity to the easiest possible 
 access, and the most universal convenience for their use; still, 
 they are to be used. We proceed to consider them. 
 
 But, first, a brief expostulation with some who, though still 
 among us as members of our congregations, are in a very un- 
 satisfactory state of mind on the subject of ordinances. I do 
 not mean those only, nor do I now refer to those chiefly, who 
 are still, unhappily, in a worldly state of mind, and really un- 
 concerned about this or any other branch of true religion; but 
 to those who are spiritual, and whose spirituality is itself the 
 cause of their embarrassment in this matter. They cannot see 
 their way, clearly and comfortably, to the use of the outward 
 and visible elements of this fallen world in the exercise of 
 spiritual religion. They say, or rather they think, when the 
 subject presents itself to their minds, that the kingdom of God 
 is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in 
 the Holy Ghost—that what enters into a man’s mouth can 
 neither defile nor sanctify the man—that neither is he that 
 eateth any better, neither he that eateth not any worse—that 
 the heart is the seat of true religion—that with the heart man 
 believeth unto righteousness. 
 
 Knowing nd feeling the precious truth expressed by such — 
 portions an Holy Scripture, and not seeing what washing or — 
 sprinkling with water, eating bread, or drinking wine, can have 
 to do with it; persuaded, also, that if there be anything valuable 
 in the outward ordinance, it can only be in its bearing upon the 
 inward and spiritual blessing which they feel they already 
 possess ; and naturally preferring the greater above the lesser, 
 they are disposed to be contented with the thing signified, and 
 so not to attach any great importance to the sign. In this they 
 
Churches Militant.on Earth. 251 
 are the more confirmed by reaction from the extravagant, 
 amounting to superstitious, reverence paid by many to mere 
 outward observances. 
 
 It is not my intention to attempt to interfere with, as I should 
 indeed be deeply grieved in any way to diminish, the high esti- 
 mate which such persons set upon spiritual religion. That lovely 
 plant is truly in its topmost bough an affair of the heart by faith, 
 the fellowship of man’s spirit with the Father of spirits through 
 Jesus Christ; and outward ordinances are valuable in themselves 
 only as they become means of affecting and sanctifying the 
 heart. Agreed! agreed! No readercan feel this more strongly 
 than it is the writer's hearty desire to teach and impress it. But, 
 where have we learned this? And how do we know it? We have 
 learned it in the Holy Scriptures, the sacred Word of our God. 
 Even so. For the reality of our best blessings, our warmest 
 emotions, and most cherished hopes, we appeal to the Scriptures. 
 We are too deeply impressed with the treachery of the heart, 
 and the waywardness of the imagination of fallen man, to place 
 dependence upon any feelings or experiences, however apparently 
 excellent, which will not stand the test of reference to the 
 written and unchanging word of God. This is our security. 
 
 It is so; and let its legitimate consequence be fairly con- 
 sidered. Referring to the written Word of God, we must take 
 it as we find it. We are not at liberty to take selections of it 
 only, rejecting or neglecting . the remainder. We must, in 
 fairness, take it without partiality; and, doing so, while we find it 
 our security for all that is inward and spiritual in true religion, 
 we find it also our warrant and authority for the use of certain 
 outward and visible ordinances. It is written, “The kingdom 
 of God is not meat and drink.” True; and it is written again, 
 “Take, eat; drink ye all of this.” It is written, “ Repent, and 
 believe the gospel.” ‘True; and it is written also, “ Repent, 
 and be baptized.” Thus, these outward ordinances rest upon the 
 same authority with spiritual religion; the one cannot be 
 defended without a reference to Holy Scripture; and with such 
 a reference, fairly made, the other cannot be neglected. 
 
 But though upon the same footing with regard to the 
 
252 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 ‘authority from which they emanate, these things are not upon 
 the same footing with regard to the appeal they make to man’s 
 moral sense and inward experience. We can see a reason for 
 the one, and not for the other. Well, supposing this to be the 
 ‘ase, and that we equally receive and dutifully comply with 
 both,—in which case are we most simply and absolutely obeying 
 the will of God? In the case where we see another reason for 
 the thing in addition to His will? or in the case where we can 
 see no reason but simply and exclusively that He has desired it? 
 Was it concerning such a state of mind as this invites us to that 
 Christ said, “‘ Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God 
 as a little child, he shall not enter therein”? And may not 
 this be indeed the high reason for positive institutions, that God 
 requires of us obedience of faith as well as obedience of under- 
 standing ? | 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH— 
 BAPTISM. 
 
 Baptism a Divine Institution—Its Origin Jewish—Its Practice familiar previous 
 to the Commandment of the Lord Jesus concerning it—Its Adoption into 
 the Christian Church—Reason for Positive Institutions—The Form of 
 Baptism as appointed by Christ includes: 1. The Use of Water: 2. An 
 Acknowledgment of the Trinity—Does not include: 1. Any precise Form 
 of Words; 2. Any precise Description of Persons as its administrators : 
 3. Any precise Mode or Measure in the application of the Water—The 
 proper Subjects for Baptism: 1. Adults who Believe, wherever the 
 Gospel comes ; 2. Adults who Profess to Believe; 3. The Infant Children of 
 Baptized Parents—-The Nature of the Efficacy of Baptism—-Death, Burial, 
 Resurrection. with Jesus Christ—When genuine “ Baptism doth Save ”— 
 But it may not be genuine—Then it does not Save—How should a Christian 
 Church speak of it, but as the Apostles did; though they have many 
 Failures such as the Apostles had ?—The English Church Service. 
 
 THat Christian Baptism is of divine institution, is express and 
 clear. On this point, there does not seem to be any room left 
 for difference of opinion among those who receive the Scriptures 
 as the Word of God. On many questions connected with the 
 continuance, the mode of administration, and the efficacy of 
 baptism, important differences of opinion exist; but that baptism 
 itself was commanded by our Lord Jesus Christ is not disputed. 
 I do not, therefore, specify this point as a matter requiring 
 proof, but as a preliminary statement, needful for clearness’ 
 sake, 4nd important because it reminds us that whatever diffi- 
 culties or embarrassments may attend the details of this subject, 
 the Lord’s express appointment remains unquestioned, and 
 that consequently no one professing real reverence for the 
 ‘Lord’s authority can be, consistently, unconcerned in this 
 “matter. 
 
254 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 I propose to consider—I. The origin of Baptism; II. Its 
 adoption as an ordinance of the ee Church; ITI. Its 
 form of administration; IV. Its proper subjects; and V. The 
 nature of its efficacy. 
 
 I. The origin of Baptism. 
 
 Jesus said to His disciples, “Go ye and teach all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost.” 
 
 These celebrated words do not contain the original institution 
 of baptism; though they do contain the authoritative adoption 
 of it as an ordinance of the Christian Church. We have already 
 seen that years before these words were uttered, baptism was 
 commonly practised among the Jews. It is spoken of at the 
 commencement of the New Testament, as a thing with which 
 the reader is supposed to be familiar, and which consequently 
 did not require any formal explanation. No definition of it is 
 given; no account of its origin; but we are at once, and 
 abruptly, introduced to it as a matter of fact in the history of 
 John the son of Zacharias. ‘In those days came John the 
 Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judzea, and saying, 
 Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand... . Then 
 went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region 
 round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jordan, con- 
 fessing their sins.” '! On the supposition of baptism being quite 
 a new thing, then and there propounded for the first: time, this — 
 is a most unaccountable narrative. And such a supposition is 
 rendered more than unaccountable, it is rejected as absolutely 
 impossible, by the remonstrance addressed to John by the depu- 
 tation sent to him from Jerusalem. “ This is the record of John, 
 when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask 
 him, Who art thou? And he confessed, and denied not; but 
 confessed, 1 am not the Christ. And they asked him, What ἡ 
 then? Art thou Elias? And he saith, 1 am not. Art thou 
 that prophet? And he answered, No.... Then said they unto 
 him, Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that Christ, nor 
 
 1 St, Matt, iii, 1, 2, δ, 6 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 255 
 
 
 
 Elias, neither that prophet ?’’? It is here clearly inaplied, that 
 in the person of Messiah, or of Elias, or of that prophet, bap- 
 tism would not have been any matter of surprise; but it was a 
 matter of surprise in a person who denied himself to be any of 
 these expected characters. This proves that the subject of 
 baptism, in some sense, was familiar to the Jewish Church. 
 
 For instruction in some of the customs of that Church 1 refer 
 to St. Mark, at the commencement of the seventh chapter:— 
 “There came together unto Him the Pharisees and certain of 
 the Scribes which came from Jerusalem: and when they saw 
 some of His disciples eat bread with defiled (that is to say, with 
 unwashen) hands, they found fault.. For the Pharisees, and al! 
 the Jews”—it was a catholic custom among them—“ except 
 they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the 
 elders. And when they come from the market, except they 
 wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which 
 they have received to hold, as the washing of cups and pots, 
 brazen vessels, and of tables,” or beds. 
 
 Here we learn the existence of a practice of ceremonial sepa- 
 ration, or consecration, to God’s service, by the washing of 
 water. These washings are called by the Evangelist baptisms— 
 βαπτισμοὺς. The Jews considered themselves, on their return 
 from the, market, unclean until they were baptized. They con- 
 sidered also that their vessels and couches were unclean, unless 
 they were frequently baptized. This is indeed enumerated 
 amongst the traditions of the elders, and therefore I do not 
 refer to it in justification of the practice, but merely as witness- 
 ing to the fact, and thereby proving the familiarity of the Jews 
 with baptism of some sort. Whence could this have arisen ? 
 Of what truth were these traditions an abuse? Of what duties 
 were these practices superstitious exaggerations ? 
 
 There was an ordinance of the law of Moses, an abuse of 
 which seems clearly to have given rise to the practices in ques- 
 tion, and to have rendered familiar to Jewish minds a con- 
 nexion between washing or sprinkling with water, and separation 
 from everything unclean to the peculiar and holy service of 
 
 ? St. John i, 19—25, 
 
256 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 (rod. I refer to the nineteenth chapter of the book of Numbers. 
 After describing the burning of the red heifer, and the mixing 
 of the ashes with water, the commandment of God to Moses 
 was to keep it for the congregation, “for a water of separation, 
 ἃ purification for sin,... And it shall be unto the children of 
 Israel, and unto the stranger that sojourneth among them, for a 
 statute for ever.” And “ whosoever toucheth the dead body of 
 any man, and purifieth not himself, defileth the tabernacle of 
 the Lord; and that soul shail be cut off from Israel: because 
 the water of separation was not sprinkled wpon him, he shall be 
 unclean; his uncleanness is yet upon him.” ὦ 
 
 Here we have the original divine institution of the sprinkling 
 of water on the flesh as an ordinance of religion. Hence the 
 connexion between peculiar sanctity and washing or sprinkling 
 with water. Hence, also, the peculiar force of the Lord’s lan- 
 guage by the prophet Hzekiel, in his beautiful promise of final 
 sanctifying mercy to the Jewish nation. 
 
 “1 will take you from among the heathen, and gather you 
 out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. 
 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be 
 clean; from all your filthiness and from all your idols will I 
 cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you; and a new 
 spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony 
 heart oué of your flesh, and 1 will give you an heart of flesh. 
 And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in 
 my statutes,” ete.” 
 
 That the Jews, in after ages, should have superstitiously 
 abused this ordinance, as they did most others, is natural 
 enough. Anxious to diminish, even to the extent of making 
 void, the moral commandments of God, they were not content 
 with the amount of ceremonial observances divinely prescribed, 
 but loaded them with human additions. But here, in the sacred 
 record, is the ordinance itself, instituting the connexion be- 
 tween washing or sprinkling with water, and cleanness of 
 separation to the service of God in the tabernacle. - These 
 washings were baptisms; and hence the obyious and ready 
 
 1 Num. xix. 13: 2 Tizek. xxxvi. 24—27, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 257 
 
 _ connexion between any peculiar call to sanctity, and some special 
 baptism. 
 
 When John the Bapfist came, exposing the iniquity of the 
 nation, and calling men to repentance, his ministry proved 
 effectual to make multitudes feel their uncleanness. And an 
 impression going abroad that he was Messiah, at whose coming 
 they expected a call to peculiar sanctity, it became their obvious 
 course to seek at his hands a water of separation, a washing, or 
 sprinkling, or baptism, of peculiar efficacy. This renders the 
 history of John, as narrated by the evangelists, perfectly easy 
 and natural. He came preaching in no ordinary strain, in the 
 wilderness of Judea. The people were in expectation, and all 
 men mused in their hearts concerning John, whether he was 
 the Christ or not. The more they heard of his penetrating calls 
 to repentance, the more they felt their own uncleanness; and 
 being in the habit of having recourse, in seasons of uncleanness, 
 to some washing, or sprinkling, or baptism, they now flock in 
 multitudes to John, and receive his baptism, confessing their 
 sins. Such is the narrative in the third chapter of St. Matthew. 
 This throws light upon another circumstance of deep and lively 
 interest recorded in the same chapter, “Then cometh Jesus 
 from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him; but 
 John forbade Him, saying, I have need to be baptized of Thee, 
 and comest Thou to me? And Jesus answering said unto him, 
 Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all 
 rightedusness. Then he suffered Him.”* 
 
 How was it a matter of righteousness in Jesus to be bap- 
 tized? If baptism had not been commanded of God, there 
 could have been no righteousness in submitting to it. We have 
 seen, however, that it was commanded, and existed as a stand- 
 ing ordinance in the Jewish Church, of which Jesus was a 
 member. The occasion of using it was upon any uncleanness 
 being contracted. In the case of Jesus no uncleanness was, or 
 could be, contracted personally ; but if, standing as the sinner’s 
 substitute, and so considered an unclean Re arts He was made 
 sin for us?—He was now to be separated to that peculiar ser- 
 
 1 St. Matt. iii, 13—15, ? 2 Cor. v. 21. 
 17 
 
258 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 vice of God which constituted the ministry of the last three 
 years of His life; it was most fitting that His entrance on that 
 ministry should be marked by,some appropriate ordinance, as 
 His entrance into the Jewish Church had been marked by cir- 
 cumcision. There was an ordinance prescribed in the law of 
 Moses. It had been abused by the nation, and superstitiously 
 corrupted. The ministry and baptism of John called to national 
 reformation. It was the clear, bounden, righteous duty of 
 every Jew to obey this call; and Jesus was forward to fulfil 
 this, as well as every other particular of perfect righteousness, 
 as man. 
 
 This explains, also, why the followers of Jesus, as well as the 
 followers of John, were baptized, Seeing His miracles, hearing 
 His discourses, Geis His divine mission, feeling their own 
 uncleanness, and allede to a new and devoted service of God, 
 they entered upon it by water of separation. They were bap- 
 tized. | 
 
 Such were the circumstances, with reference to this matter, 
 under which the period arrived when Jesus was to depart from 
 this world, and entrust the management of His Church to 
 human instrumentality. 
 
 Had He designed to cut off all connexion (as some allege) 
 between the Old Testament and the New, to dislocate the Chris- 
 tian Church altogether out of the Jewish framework which had 
 hitherto existed, and to institute, de novo, ordinances of ἃ totally 
 different character from anything hitherto known or practised, 
 surely the most obvious course would have been to employ 
 Gentile men, who were in no way implicated in Jewish habits 
 or observances, and who would, therefore, set forth on the new 
 work with a singleness and simplicity unalloyed by national 
 prepossessions. Or if, for other reasons, Jewish men must be 
 employed, surely common prudence would have suggested that 
 they should not be desired to adopt into the new system any 
 practice inseparably connected with the old. Or, at the very 
 least, if such a practice must be adopted, it would have been no 
 more than was demanded by common honesty and candour, 
 plainly and distinctly to have apprised them of the essential dif- 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 259 
 
 
 
 ference between the old and the new modes of exercising it; 
 and warned them in a way not to be mistaken, against carrying 
 any of their Jewish habits into their new mission. Instead of 
 this, however, we find Him employing Jewish men, adopting a 
 Jewish ordinance, and giving no warning against the Jewish 
 use of it. 
 
 And thus we are led, from the origin, to consider, in the 
 second place, 
 
 _ IL. The adoption of sr se as an ordinance of the Christian 
 Church. 
 
 This, as a matter of fact, ae been anticipated. Jesus com- 
 manded His disciples to go and make disciples of all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, aad 
 πῇ the Holy Ghost. 
 
 It is only as a matter of fact that we are capable of taking 
 cognizance of this institution. We are wholly incompetent to 
 pronounce, or to form, any correct judgment of the wisdom or 
 propriety, in the abstract, of such an appointment as this. 
 “Vain man would be wise; ”’ and when he can assign no reason, 
 he would hastily conclude that no reason can be assigned. But, 
 in some things, God giveth no account of His matters. He 
 refuseth to be arraigned at the bar of created intelligence; and 
 - then it becomes the highest and most perfect exercise of finite 
 wisdom, to bow without a question or a murmur before the well- 
 attested announcements of infinite sovereignty. To such sub- 
 jects belong the positive institutions, as contrasted with the moral 
 commandments of revealed religion. Man can assign a reason 
 to himself, and thereupon becomes satisfied with the propriety 
 of God’s commandments, against murder, adultery, and theft, 
 These crimes do harm, such harm as man is competent to appre- 
 ciate. But he cannot so satisfy himself of the propriety of God’s 
 commandment against bowing down to an image—for what harm 
 can that do? or of God’s ἜΣ ΤῊΣ ΓΝ ΤΗ to observe the seventh 
 day rather than the sixth, or the eighth, or the tenth; or of God’s 
 commandments to wash or sprinkle with water, and to eat bread 
 and drink wine as religious duties. 
 
260 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 The allegiance of men’s hearts in general to these positive 
 institutions, is very different from their allegiance of heart to 
 moral laws; making it but too manifest that they are influenced 
 vastly more by their own reason than by (God’s authority. The 
 moral laws which claim and receive their deference, do so, not 
 as expressions of God’s authority, but as commending them- 
 selves to man’s reason. This is clear; because if expressions of 
 God’s authority, as such, had power over men, positive institu- 
 tions would be as carefully and conscientiously attended to as 
 moral laws. What, then, if this should be the reason, or at 
 least one reason, and an important one, for such positive institu- 
 tions, that they should be for a sign between God and men, to 
 try whether men will indeed attend to God’s commandments as 
 His, without any additional or collateral inducement derived 
 from the deductions of man’s own reason, or the apparent injury 
 or advantage of his fellow-men? And what if the highest 
 characteristic of a man’s religion, its godliness, its real unfeigned 
 regard to God Himself, be supremely tested, not by his truth or 
 honesty, or charity, or any other moral virtue, which he may be 
 induced to practise by other and lower considerations, but by 
 his remembrance of the Sabbath-day, to keep it holy, and by his 
 dutiful reverence for Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which 
 urge their claim upon him, more singly and exclusively as wit- 
 nesses for God ? 
 
 We proceed to consider in the third place, 
 
 Ill. The form of Baptism as adopted and commanded by 
 our Lord. 
 
 On this point it would be highly satisfactory to ascertain what 
 things the mode of administering Baptism, as appointed by. 
 Christ, did include, so that their presence is absolutely essential. 
 to the integrity of the ordinance; and what things, afterwards 
 introduced and practised by man, the Lord’s appointment did 
 not include, so that their presence is not essential. 
 
 The form of Baptism, as commanded by Christ, did include, 
 
 (1) The use of water. 
 
 That the apostles so understood their divine Master, is very 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 260 
 
 obvious. It is proved by their preaching and by their conduct, 
 as recorded in the Book of their Acts. Their preaching contained 
 the oft-repeated exhortation, “ Repent, and be baptized for the 
 remission of sins.’ And in performing, for those whe heard 
 them, the act thus commanded, it was their practice literally to 
 use water. 
 
 Should any member of the Society of Friends—for objectors 
 to this part of our subject are chiefly confined to that Society — 
 be induced to read, or listen to what is here written, I would 
 affectionately request him to weigh fairly and dispassionately 
 the evidence contained in the one narrative of Philip the deacon 
 and the Ethiopian Eunuch. It is not necessary to cite the 
 - introductory circumstances, but in the sequel we read that the 
 Eunuch asked Philip concerning a passage in Isaiah, “ Of 
 whom speaketh the prophet this? of himself, or of some 
 other mar? Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the 
 same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus. And as they 
 went on their way, they came unto a certain water; and the 
 Eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be 
 baptized ἢ ”+ 
 
 ‘Here let us pause, and ask ourselves candidly what but 
 Philip’s preaching upon the subject of baptism, and baptism by 
 water, as the duty of every believer in Jesus, could have sug- 
 gested to the Eunuch the proposal which he made on seeing 
 water by the wayside? If Philip had made no mention of bap- 
 tism; or if, in mentioning it, he had confined it to spiritual feel- 
 ing excited in the Heath, by the Holy Ghost, where would have 
 been the connexion between such instruction on his part, and the 
 proposal made to him by the Eunuch ? 
 
 If it be alleged that there was no such connexion in reality, 
 and that the Eunuch’s proposal was an unauthorised fancy of his 
 own, we reply first, the supposition is wholly gratuitous and 
 most unnatural ; but chiefly we reply, how is it to be accounted 
 for, that the inspired instructor treated, as he did, the unautho- 
 rised fancy of this heathen man? He spoke in answer to it, in 
 the most solemn manner, approving of it, and saying, “ If thou 
 
 * Acts vill. 34—36, 
 
262 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.” And then he acted 
 upon it. When the Eunuch confessed his faith in Jesus Christ 
 as the Son of God, Philip commanded the chariot to stand still : 
 ‘¢ And they went down both of them into the water, re and 
 the Eunuch, and he baptized him.” * 
 
 On the supposition of the use of water being a part of the 
 divine institution, and so understood, preached and practised by 
 the apostles, the whole narrative is simple and natural. The 
 Eunuch’s proposal, and Philip’s treatment of it, are satisfactorily 
 accounted for. On any other supposition, the facts here re- 
 corded are wholly inexplicable. 
 
 This is corroborated by the language of St. Peter to Cornelius 
 and his household. They had received the Holy Ghost, not only 
 in His inward influence, but also in some of His miraculous 
 gifts. The believing Jews who had accompanied Peter to the | 
 house of Cornelius were astonished, “because that on the Gen- 
 tiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost; for they 
 heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God.” Had it 
 been lawful, in any case, to consider the use of water super- 
 seded by the previous bestowal of spiritual gifts, here was the 
 occasion; but, instead of this, the apostle did precisely the 
 reverse. He said, “Can any man forbid water, that these 
 should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as 
 well as we?’’? 
 
 We fairly conclude, therefore, that the apostolical practice, 
 and consequently the divine institution of Baptism, included the 
 use of water, and of course, as the inevitable result, that they 
 who haye not received baptism by water, have not received the 
 baptism which our Lord Jesus Christ commanded—have not 
 complied with this condition, which the Lord combined with” 
 faith, as generally indispensable to salvation. 
 
 How far they who have received such baptism, but who are 
 living in habitual disregard of the water part of it, as a mere 
 unmeaning form, are partakers of this guilt in the sight of the 
 Lord, it may be very profitable for themselves to inquire. 
 
 (2) The form of Baptism as commanded by Christ, did 
 
 1 Acts viii. 37, 38, 2 Acts x, 44—47, 
 ‘ | 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 263 
 
 include an acknowledgment of the three persons in the Godhead 
 —the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. 
 
 This is the name of the true God, and this is His memorial 
 for ever, and there is none other God but He. Into this name 
 the Lord Jesus Christ commanded His disciples to be baptized : 
 not into the name of the supposed God of nature or providence, 
 —the idol of the deist, and the object of slothful unexamined 
 acknowledgment by tens of thousands who profess and call 
 themselves Christians,—but into the name, the one comprehen- 
 sive name, of the one only living and true God, Creator, Redeemer, 
 Comforter ; possessing Pe resources at once for the mani- 
 festation of His love, and the vindication of His Law; the God 
 of salvation, the just God of free salvation. That the divine in- 
 stitution of Baptism included an open acknowledgment of this 
 glorious name, is manifest from the language of Jesus already 
 .cited—“ Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in, or 
 into, the name (one name) of the Father, and of the, Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost.” 
 
 It is true we find the apostle Peter commanding the brethren 
 to be “ baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.” } But this isa form 
 of expression, involving—as the apostles used it—an acknow- 
 ledgment of the whole Godhead. For the Father—as they 
 taught—was manifested in the Son, Jesus Christ the Lord; and 
 no man could truly call on, or truly receive, Jesus Christ as 
 Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Although, therefore, a variation 
 in the language to be used might be pleaded as allowable, 
 because of the difference between the words οὗ Jesus and the 
 words of His apostle, yet there is no difference in the acknow- 
 ledgment of the Godhead in Trinity, involved in the language of 
 both. 
 
 It is true we read of some persons who had been baptized, 
 and who upon inquiring afterwards, said, “ We have not so 
 much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.’ But those — 
 persons had not received Christian Baptism. Their case is re- 
 corded at the beginning of the nineteenth chapter of the Acts, 
 and the context is strongly corroborative of our position. “ It 
 
 ’ Acts ii. 88... 
 
264 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 came to pass while Apollos was at Corinth, that Paul having 
 passed through the upper coasts, came to Ephesus; and finding 
 certain disciples, he said unto them, Have ye received the Holy 
 Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have 
 not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.” 
 Upon this the apostle expressed his astonishment, asking, ‘“ Unto 
 what then were ye baptized?” As if he had said, You cannot 
 possibly have been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus; for 
 if you had, you must have heard of and acknowledged the Holy 
 Ghost: unto what then were ye baptized? It appeared, on 
 explanation, that they had been baptized only “to John’s 
 baptism.” I say only, implying that John’s baptism stopped 
 short of Christian Baptism; because I find the expression, and 
 the implication it contains, in full force in the twenty-fifth 
 verse of the preceding chapter.’ Having been baptized with 
 “only John’s baptism,” the disciples at Ephesus had not yet. 
 heard of the Holy Ghost; but had they been baptized in the 
 name of Jesus Christ, as the apostles used that name, they must 
 have heard of the Holy Ghost. Paul explained the difference, 
 and then “they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.” ” 
 
 We conclude, therefore, that the apostolical practice, and con- 
 sequently the divine institution of Baptism, included an an- 
 nouncement on the part of the baptizer, and an acknowledgment 
 on the part of the baptized, of the persons in the sacred Trinity; 
 and of course, as an inevitable result, that they who have not 
 received a baptism which acknowledges and proclaims the 
 Trinity, have not received the baptism which the Lord com- 
 manded—have, not complied with the condition which the 
 Lord combined with faith, as generally indispensable to salva- 
 tion. 
 
 These two—the use of water, and the acknowledgment of the 
 Trinity—are the only things which I find in Scripture so in- 
 separably essential to Baptism, as that the absence of either of 
 _them does, and must, ipso facto, vitiate the ordinance. 
 
 It will be profitable to consider some of those things, after- 
 ? Acts xviii, 24, 26, 2 Acts xix. 1—6, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. ὁ 265 
 
 
 
 wards introduced and insisted on by men, which the Lord’s 
 appointment and the apostle’s practice did not include; and 
 which, therefore, may or may not be present without vitally 
 _ affecting the divine institution. 
 
 (1) No precise form of words is prescribed as of necessary 
 use in Christian Baptism. 
 
 We have already seen that there is a variation between the 
 words of Jesus in His commandment. to His disciples, and the 
 very words used by the apostles Paul and Peter. The com- 
 mandment of Jesus was that baptism should be “into the name 
 of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” The 
 way in which the apostles obeyed this command in the instances 
 referred to, was by baptizing or commanding to be baptized 
 “in the name of the Lord Jesus.” This phrase, as they used 
 it and explained it, was inseparable from an acknowledgment 
 of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. There- 
 fore, in using it as they did concerning baptism, they were 
 substantially obeying their Lord’s commandment, though not 
 reciting His identical words. And now, whether we use our 
 Lord’s own words, without any deviation even in the letter, or 
 adopt the apostolical mode of expression, in the apostolical 
 meaning and explanation of it, which is tantamount to our 
 Lord’s words, we are complying with all that, on this point, is 
 declared in Holy Scripture to be essential to the institution. 
 
 We, of the Church of England, use the Lord’s own form of 
 words in the very act of Baptism. But in our service con- 
 nected therewith, we have added and prescribed many, very 
 many, words besides. These all, however valuable for other 
 purposes, may, or may not, be used without. vitiating the or- 
 dinance. They may not indeed be omitted, or altered, any of 
 them, without violating the compact by which. we minister in 
 the English Church; but they may be wholly omitted, or more 
 or less altered, or others may be used instead of them or in 
 addition to them, without any real vital interference with the 
 Lord’s appointment. They belong to those ceremonies “ or- | 
 dained only by man’s authority,” concerning which it is truly 
 said by our English Reformers, that they need not “be in all places 
 
266 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 one and utterly alike; for at all times they have been divers, 
 and may be changed according to the diversities of countries, 
 times, and men’s manners, so that nothing be ordained against 
 God’s Word.”* 
 
 Let it be understood, then, that in defending our Church 
 baptismal service, we design only to prove that nothing is or- 
 dained in it contrary to God’s Word written; and that the use 
 of it, as it is, is indispensable towards true filial affiance to the 
 Church of England: but that we have no design to prove, or to 
 assert—neither do we wish to feel, far otherwise—that agree- 
 ment in our service, or the use of it, is necessary to true and 
 valid Christian Baptism. 
 
 (2) No precise description is given of the persons qualified 
 to baptise. 
 
 On this point we are left to inferential reasoning from the 
 facts recorded; and the conclusion to be drawn appears to me 
 to be, that the qualification in question was not confined to any. 
 one class of persons.. It is written generally concerning “ the 
 twelve,” that they baptized.’ It is clear that St. Paul, although 
 he declares his mission to have been “not to baptise, but to 
 preach the gospel,” yet in some instances did himself baptise.* 
 We. have seen that Philip baptized. All these persons were 
 ordained to a sacred office: the twelve by the Lord Himself on 
 earth, St. Paul by a special manifestation of the Lord from 
 heaven, and Philip by the laying on of the apostles’ hands. 
 Had the scriptural narrations of baptisms been confined to these, 
 though without any direct and specific precept upon the subject, 
 the fair inference would surely be that no persons are scripturally 
 qualified to baptise except persons ordained, either by extra- 
 ordinary miraculous interference from heaven, or by the ordinary 
 laying on of hands. 
 
 But there are other incidents in the sacred narrative rendering 
 such a conclusion, to say the least, doubtful,—too doubtful to 
 bear the tremendous weight which some seem disposed to build 
 upon it. 
 
 There is no proof that the person who baptized Saul of Tarsus 
 
 1 Art, xxxiy. 2 St. John iv. 2, 51 Cor, i, 14—17, 
 
 
 
 \ 
 
‘ 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 267 
 
 
 
 had himself been ordained, In the narrative there is no intima- 
 tion of it, and the unforced inference from the whole seems to 
 me that he was not. He is indeed called a “ disciple,” but so 
 were all those who were converted, and not those only who were 
 ordained.!. St: Luke describes him thus: “ There was a certain 
 disciple at Damascus, named Ananias;’’” and St. Paul, speaking 
 of him afterwards, says, “ One Ananias, a Jevout man according 
 to the law, having a good report of all the Jews that dwelt there, 
 came unto me.”* 
 
 The absence in such a case of all mention of, or allusion to, 
 his office as an ordained minister of the Church, is in itself 
 expressive; and the fact that he had a good report of all the 
 Jews who dwelt at Damascus is scarcely compatible with his 
 exercise of the Christian ministry in that city. When Saul 
 began to exercise that ministry there, instead of having still a 
 good report of the Jews, he became an object of their inveterate 
 hostility. “They took counsel to kill him .... and they 
 watched the gates, day and night, to kill him.”* 
 
 It would séem rather that Ananias, a devout man according 
 to the law, was a private disciple of Jesus, whose avocations had 
 not engaged him in any open aggressive advocacy of Christianity; 
 so that, Christian though he was, he still retained a fair reputa- 
 tion among the Jews. And if this be so, then we have here an 
 instance of baptism administered by a Christian in private life, 
 not ordained to any office in the Church, and not heard of 
 except on this single occasion. 
 
 If it be urged that the Lord’s own special mission of this 
 man, by a supernatural communication to him in a vision, was 
 of itself sufficient authority, and superseded the necessity of 
 ordination in his case, it may be fairly replied that, granting 
 this fully, we have here an instance of our Lord Himself selecting 
 and sending for the administration of this ordinance a private 
 unordained Christian. The Lord’s supernatural appearance to 
 Saul of Tarsus did not-supersede the necessity of his baptism, 
 because baptism was indispensable to Christian discipleship. 
 
 1 Acts xi. 26. * Acts xxii, 12. 
 2 Acts ix,-10, 4 Acts ix. 23, 24. 
 
268 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Upon what principle, then, could the Lord’s supernatural 
 appearance to Ananias supersede the necessity of his ordination, 
 had ordination been indispensable to the administration of 
 baptism ? 
 
 Who baptized Cornelius the centurion and his household? 
 We have no sufficient reason for ‘believing that the apostle Peter 
 did it. The language of the narrative is, not that he baptized 
 them, but that “ he éommanded them to be baptized in the name 
 of the Lord.”* It would seem that feeling, as his brother Paul 
 felt, that Jesus had sent him, not to baptise but to preach the 
 gospel, and beholding in the case of Cornelius and his household 
 the glorious effects of his preaching, he had delegated to others 
 the baptism of these Gentile believers. Then the question recurs, 
 To whom? We learn in the narrative that some converted Jews 
 from Joppa, “certain of the, circumcision which believed,’”? 
 accompanied Peter to the house of Cornelius; but we have no 
 reason to suppose that there was any ordained minister of the 
 company except Peter himself. To whom, then, could he have 
 delegated the administration of the ordinance of baptism, but to 
 some private unordained Christian ? 
 
 The uncertainty, to say no more, which is thus introduced, as 
 to the description of persons by whom Christian baptism may be 
 administered, is full of merciful consideration of our cireum-' 
 stances. For if it were unequivocally proved that no baptism is 
 valid except that which is given by an ordained minister, and that 
 no ordination is valid except that which is in succession, without 
 a link wanting from the apostles, it would be a matter, I say, not 
 of difficulty, but, in the present state of our ecclesiastical history, 
 a matter of impossibility, for any man in Christendom to attain 
 to a satisfactory certainty as to whether he had been baptized or 
 not. Seeing, then, that it has pleased God to allow us to fall 
 into such circumstances with reference to ordination, we hail it 
 as one of His “tender mercies,” that He has given us reason to 
 hope that our baptism may be all that He graciously intended 
 it to be, whatever obscurity may hang over our pedigree of orders. 
 
 And now, though we honour the order as we have it, yet 
 
 1 Acts x, 48, 2 Acts x. 23, 45. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 269 
 under special circumstances we do well to recognise the validity 
 of Christian baptism where water has been used and the Holy 
 Trinity acknowledged, although the administrator may not have 
 been an ordained minister. 
 
 (3) Touching the water, neither quantity, nor temperature, 
 nor manner of application, are distinctly specified. 
 
 In our-Lord’s authoritative commandment to His disciples, as 
 recorded in the last chapter of St. Matthew, there is nothing of the 
 kind specified. The same may be said of the parallel passage in 
 St. Mark, and also of our Lord’s conversation with Nicodemus. 
 
 We come, then, to examine the language and practice of the 
 apostles, and still we find nothing of the kind specified. 
 
 On the day of Pentecost three thousand persons were baptized 
 in Jerusalem. It is clear, beyond controversy, that this took 
 place in the city, and that it was baptism by water; but there is 
 a marked silence in the narrative as to the mode or measure in 
 which the water was applied. It is unnatural, involving almost 
 a physical impossibility, to suppose that all the converts on that 
 memorable occasion were baptized at the same: place on the 
 same day. The obvious course of the proceeding was that, 
 being convinced by the gracious power of the Holy Ghost 
 working with St. Peter’s sermon, they then dispersed, and some 
 being baptized in one place, some in another, some in houses, 
 some in pools,some probably in the brook Cedron adjoining the 
 walls, the prodigious number of three thousand were baptized in 
 the course of the day. This appears to involve as an inevitable 
 consequence, that various modes were adopted in the application 
 of the water. No instructions were given for uniformity of 
 practice. The thing was not material. 
 
 The next account of baptisms is the history of the converts in 
 Samaria; and here again there is a total silence in the narrative, 
 as to any special mode of conducting the ordinance. “ When 
 they believed Philip preaching the things concerning the 
 kingdom of God, and the name of Jesus Christ, they were 
 baptized, both men and women.” ἢ ξ 
 
 Doubtless, all things were done “ decently and in order;” and 
 
 ) Acts viii. 12. | 
 
 
 
 
 
270 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 it is reasonable to suppose, nay, I think to conclude, that while 
 water was certainly used, yet it was not used in such manner 
 or quantity, as to impose upon the converts the_ necessity of 
 undressing, or of indecently wetting their apparel. All I am 
 here contending for is, that there is no specific form ~of adminis- 
 tration, no special mode or measure of applying the water, so 
 commanded as to be binding upon our consciences, as essential 
 to the ordinance. 
 
 The next instance is the one already elerred to of the 
 Ethiopian Eunuch. Here was a case of baptism to be adminis- 
 tered, not in a city to a multitude of converts, but in a remote 
 district of the country, and to a single individual. The place 
 was “the road from Jerusalem to Gaza, which is desert ;” and 
 where an actual physical hindrance might have arisen from 
 want of water. But as they travelled, “they came to a certain 
 water.” The sacred historian adds not a word descriptive of 
 this water. It is left to the imagination of the reader to 
 determine whether it was a shallow pool by the wayside, such 
 as might be found even in a desert after heavy rain, or a pool 
 of sufficient depth to cover a man’s body, or a running stream, 
 or a nameless river. All we learn to a certainty is, that there 
 was water. “And they went down both into the water, both 
 Philip and the Eunuch; and he baptized him.”’ How deep 
 they went into the water we are not informed; and here again 
 scope is given to the imagination of the reader. One may 
 fancy water of sufficient depth easily to cover over the entire 
 body of the Eunuch to be baptized, and of course of Philip also 
 the baptizer, and may deem the matter of their apparel, whether 
 laid aside for the occasion, or immersed with them, as utterly 
 unworthy any grave consideration. Another, calling to remem- 
 brance thé custom of wearing sandals, may picture to himself 
 the two men, without even a passing inconvenience to their 
 apparel, stepping into the water a few inches deep; as it is 
 equally probable the seh did who were baptized by J ohn 
 in Jordan. 
 
 The next instance ean is the baptism of Saul of Tarsus. 
 
 1 Acts vill. 38, | 
 
Churches Mititant on Earth. eae lyk 
 
 
 
 It is clear from the narrative that this took place in the house 
 where he was lodging. There is no description given of the 
 precise manner of it, but it is sufficiently obvious that it could 
 have had no outward conformity with the manner of the 
 Eunuch’s baptism. The same may be said of the baptism 
 of Cornelius and his household, and of Lydia and her house- 
 hold} and still more remarkably of the jailer, at Philippi. 
 {t is a matter of undeniable certainty that this baptism took 
 place in the jail, in the night, and without any previous 
 preparation or even intention. It was bond fide impromptu ; 
 ‘and no sufficient reason has ever been assigned for supposing it 
 probable that there was ready, in a heathen jail, a vessel of 
 water of such dimensions and convenience that the apostle and 
 jailer could walk into it, or to admit of the immersion of the 
 jailer and his family: In the absence of detailed description, 
 the probabilities are certainly on the side of a very different and 
 more sparing use of water. Whatever may have been the 
 precise mode adopted on this occasion, it must, I think, be 
 conceded, after a fair collation of all the instances referred to, 
 that no specific form of administration in these particulars is 
 indispensable to the ordinance. 
 
 Here again our practice in the Church of. England is in 
 happy harmony with sound scriptural deduction. We do not 
 confine ourselves to any one mode of applying the water, as 
 if it were essential. Total immersion under the water, copious 
 pouring out of the water, gentle sprinkling of the water, all are 
 included in our free practice. Feeling ourselves in this point 
 scripturally strong, we can easily bear the infirmities of the 
 weak; and if any of the brethren be so scrupulous as conscien- 
 tiously to consider any one specific method essential to the 
 ordinance, while we affectionately expostulate against the nar- 
 rowness, we can gracefully condescend to the weakness. 
 
 TV. We proceed to consider, in the fourth place, the proper 
 subjects for baptism; or, in other words, the persons to whom it 
 is scriptural to administer this ordinance. 
 
 1 Acts ix, 18; x, 47; xvi. 15, 33. 
 
oo ee te 
 a, a. 
 
 ar abe 
 = “y 
 3 
 
 272 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 Our Lord Himself describes them briefly, but comprehensively 
 —aLL NaTions. “Go ye and make disciples of all nations, 
 
 baptizing them.” Heretofore only the Jewish nation had been 
 
 disciples of the true God; but now, henceforth, discipleship 
 is not to be confined to Jews. Now, the long-concealed 
 purpose, the mystery which in other ages was not made known 
 unto the sons of men, is revealed; namely, that the Gentiles 
 should be fellow-heirs with the Jews, and of the same body, and 
 partakers of God’s promise in Christ by the gospel. Now, the 
 vessel of salvation, which had long been shut up in a Jewish 
 
 dock, is to be launched forth upon the wide sea, that her 
 precious cargo, even the unsearchable riches of Christ, may be . 
 
 carried to the ends of the earth. 
 
 “Go ye and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them.” 
 This is Christ’s command. The desire and aim οἵ. His obedient 
 followers can be nothing less than this. They could never with 
 any consistency be content with the discipleship and baptism of 
 some nations. So long as there remained upon earth any nation 
 undiscipled and unbaptized, the command of the Lord urged 
 them forward in the good work. Hence the apostle Paul’s 
 anxiety to break,new ground; to enlarge the sphere of his 
 labours; to make disciples in every place. “Yea,” he says, “so 
 
 have I strived to preach the gospel, not where Christ was 
 
 named, lest I should build upon another man’s foundation; but 
 as it is written, To whom He was not spoken of, they shall see; 
 and they that have not heard shall understand.”* And again, 
 he says, “ We are come as far as to you also in preaching the 
 gospel of Christ; . . . having hope, that we shall be enlarged 
 by you according to our rule abundantly, to preach the gospel 
 in the regions beyond you.”? Hence, also, the acknowledged 
 
 (though too sadly neglected) duty of missionary labours in all © 
 
 ages, up to this very hour; seeing there are still uiany and 
 
 populous nations undiscipled and unbaptized. The divine com- 
 
 mand is still unrepealed, still in full force, “Go ye and make 
 
 disciples of all nations.” That this command was given to the 
 
 first followers of the Lord Jesus, not as individuals who were 
 ! Rom. xv. 20, 21. _ 2 Cor. x, 14-16, 
 
 " 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 273 
 
 all to be in their graves a few years after, and who during those 
 few years could not possibly go in person to all nations; tad as 
 representatives of a class of men which should never cease till 
 the end of the world; appears strongly indicated, if not abso- 
 lutely proved, by the promise which accompanied the command, 
 “Lo! lam with you alway: go ye, make disciples, baptizing 
 and teaching, as [ have commanded you, and lo I am with you 
 alway,’ while you are so employed, “even unto the end of the 
 world.” 
 
 This in some measure anticipates and answers the objections 
 of those who admit that baptism, as an outward ordinance, was 
 practised by the apostles, but who deny, or at least hesitate to 
 
 _ admit, that the practice was to be continued after the apostolic 
 
 age. Such persons appear to think of baptism as they do of the 
 special and miraculous powers which were undeniably exercised 
 in the infancy of the Christian Church, but afterwards ceased. 
 It is difficult to reconcile this opinion with the fact, already 
 stated, that our Lord combines baptism with the teaching of all 
 nations, and promises His presence with those who baptise and 
 teach, even to the end of the world. In the parallel passage οὗ. 
 the gospel narrative as recorded by St. Mark, our Lord makes 
 baptism co-extensive with faith unto salvation. “Go ye into all 
 the world, and preach the gospel to every creature; he that 
 believeth AND is baptized shall be saved.” By this it would seem 
 that baptism is to be practised as enduringly and as universally 
 as faith is to be required. 
 
 It may indeed be urged, that in this very passage our Lord 
 adds, “ These signs shall follow them that believe: In my name 
 shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues,” 
 or in new languages—yAwocais xawais ;—“ they shall take up 
 serpents: and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt 
 them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.””? 
 And it may be argued, and undoubtedly with much apparent 
 force at first sight, that if these actual outward miracles have 
 ceased as no longer essential in the Christian Church, why may 
 we not conclude in like manner that baptism, as an outward 
 
 1 St. Mark xvi. 17, 18. 
 18 
 
274 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 visible ceremony, has ceased also, as no longer essential? This 
 is no light objection. It is one which I strongly suspect many 
 advocates of the perpetuity of baptism have not duly considered. 
 And therefore it should cause us all to entertain respect, un- 
 feigned respect, for the scruples of the Society of Friends, which 
 may, and I believe do, in a great measure, rest upon this very 
 point. Socinians urge the same. 
 
 I will now grdoavone to give what I conceive to be a fair 
 answer to it. The objection rests upon the supposition that out- 
 ward baptism and outward miracles held a similar position in 
 
 the Christian Church during the apostolic age; that they were 
 
 spoken of in similar language by our Lord; that they were both 
 practised for a time, and that when the one ceased to be practised 
 so should the other. 
 
 Upon further and closer examination, however, it will be 
 found that there was an essential difference between the place 
 occupied by baptism and that occupied by miracles, even among 
 the apostles themselves and their first converts. It will be 
 found, also, that there is an essential difference between the 
 mode in which our Lord speaks of baptism and that in which 
 He speaks of miracles; and the premises being thus removed, 
 the cogency of the objection which rested mainly upon them, 
 will be rendered, to say the least, less conclusive than it seemed 
 before. I devoutly trust, that in the calmness of unprejudiced 
 reflection, it may wholly give way, in many sincere minds. é 
 
 Even in the apostolic age, during the plenitude of superna- 
 tural power, outward miracles were performed by but a few, a 
 very few, of the members of the Church; whereas outward 
 baptism was administered to. every member without exception. 
 Many disciples were made without visible miracles; none with- 
 out baptism. When men professed to believe, there is not 
 one instance on record of any apostle commanding them to work 
 miracles; but it was the invariable practice of all the apostles to 
 command them to be baptized. This marks an essential differ- 
 ence between the two. Miracles were never considered co-ex- 
 tensive with faith; baptism always was. Where faith was in 
 any individual case, miracles might or might not be; but in 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 275 
 
 every case baptism must be. Such is the aspect clearly pre- 
 sented by the facts of the case in apostolic times; and it 
 establishes such a difference between miracles and baptism, as 
 invalidates all reasoning grounded upon a supposed similarity 
 between them. 
 
 To this agrees the difference in our Lord’s language concern- 
 ing them. He nowhere says, as of universal application in 
 every individual case, he that believeth and worketh miracles 
 shall be saved ; as He does say, in a form of speech obviously 
 intended to apply seriatim to each individual, “ He that believeth 
 _ and is baptized shall be saved.” 
 
 The form of speech in which miracles are promised is of a 
 totally different character. “ These signs shall follow them that 
 believe.” He does not say, he that believeth, or, what is the 
 same thing, each successive individual who believes, shall perform 
 these signs ; but only these signs shall follow the believing body, 
 the believers, them that believe. Neither does He say how 
 . frequently these signs shall appear, nor by how many they shall 
 be performed, nor for how long they shall continue. If outward 
 miracles had accompanied the Christian Church only for one 
 year, all that our Lord here promises would have been fulfilled. 
 But if baptism do not continue to accompany the Church, in the 
 case of every individual that believeth, all that our Pond here 
 enjoins is not complied with. 
 
 By this difference between miracles and baptism, and in our ὦ 
 Lord’s language concerning them respectively, we are prepared 
 for the facts which have followed. The signs promised are all 
 recorded to have taken place, with the exception of one; and it ° 
 is very remarkable that the sign in question, the only one of 
 which we read no instance in the history, is put hypothetically 
 (and is the only one so put) in the promise. “If they drink 
 any deadly thing, it ‘shall not hurt them.” We read no account 
 of miraculous preservation after drinking poison. But all the 
 other signs here mentioned are distinetly recorded as having 
 . Seed amongst the believers; and consequently at whatever 
 season they may have ceased to occur, the Lord’s promise was 
 fully kept. They did cease to occur. This is a fact. It is 
 
276 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 equally a fact that outward baptism never ceased. It was not 
 till within comparatively late years that, even in the smallest 
 fractional sect of professing Christians, outward baptism has 
 been dispensed with, or even questioned. The history of the 
 Church at large proclaims undeniably, what the language of 
 Scripture, carefully considered, prepares us to admit, nay, leads 
 us to anticipate; namely, the cessation of miracles, and the con- 
 tinuance of baptism. 
 
 On these grounds I conclude concerning the proper subjects 
 for baptism, first, that they are not to be confined to persons 
 who lived during the apostolic age of outward miracles, but in- 
 clude all Christian believers to the end of the world. 
 
 In this conclusion I am strengthened by the analogy with the 
 Lord’s Supper, which in its outward and visible administration 
 is distinctly declared by the apostle Paul to be for a remembrance 
 of the Lord Jesus and a showing forth of His death, “ until His 
 coming again.” 
 
 But further, secondly, the proper subjects for baptism are not 
 only all believers in all ages, but all who profess to be believers. 
 The profession may be sincere or otherwise; the answer of the 
 candidate, when questioned as to his faith in Christ, may be the 
 answer of a good conscience, or it may not; but in either case, 
 whatever may be the real state of heart of the individual, if the 
 profession itself, in all that is outward to the eye and ear, be 
 correct, baptism is to be administered. To this the apostle 
 Peter evidently refers when he distinguishes between the out- 
 ward ordinance in itself (the putting away of the jilth of the flesh), 
 and the inward real character of the recipient, (the answer of a 
 good ‘conscience toward God), and limits the saving efficacy of 
 baptism to the latter.” Doubtless the servants of the Lord, in 
 making disciples, should act with watchfulness and caution, and 
 use every Christian effort to guard against deception; but still, 
 as the miraculous power of discerning the thoughts and intents 
 of man’s heart is not lodged in the Church, we must form our 
 judgment from what we can discern, and we are bound by Holy 
 Scripture to administer baptism upon a fair outward profession. 
 
 11 Peter iii, 21. 2 See Appendix A. ; 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 274 
 
 This opens the door for false professors. Undoubtedly it does 
 so; and that such was our Lord’s intention is sufficiently plain 
 from His own descriptions of the work of His ministers. They 
 are sent to gather into one net both good fishes and bad; to 
 collect to one supper both welcome and unwelcome guests, who 
 remain mingled in one company, till the King himself arrives, 
 and then (but not Boer the hypocrites are Pddtosted and ex- 
 cluded. 
 
 In the case of the Ethiopian Eunuch as a candidate for 
 baptism, we have reason to believe that the answer he gave 
 . Philip was not only correct in words, but also a genuine index 
 of the state of his heart. In the case of Simon the sorcerer, 
 we know the reverse. However fair his profession might have 
 been, his heart was not right, he had no part or lot in the matter. 
 Among the discipled Corinthians there were not only true 
 believers, renewed in heart and life, but also. false professors, 
 immoral in conduct and heretical in doctrine; but all of them 
 were baptized upon their profession of the faith; and in no case 
 was either man or woman admitted to baptism but upon his or 
 her Christian profession. 
 
 In dealing with men and women upon this point, we have the 
 letter of the New Testament precedent to guide us; because the 
 history of the Acts of the Apostles is a history of Christian mis- 
 sions among men and women. Under similar circumstances a 
 similar course must ever be pursued. And such in point of fact 
 has ever been the case. The records of Christian missions exhibit 
 various measures of wisdom and discretion, of watchfulness and 
 caution, of prudence and discernment in the ministers of Christ, 
 with reference to their treatment of candidates for baptism; but 
 in one point they all agree, that neither man nor woman is ad- 
 mitted to the ordinance but upon such a profession of the Chris- 
 tian faith as appears at the time satisfactory to the minister ; and 
 _that upon such a profession all are admitted, both good and bad. 
 We have thus advanced another step in determining who are the 
 proper subjects for baptism. 
 
 Again, thirdly, the apostle Paul, in describing the extension 
 of the gospel among the nations, uses these remarkable words, 
 
278 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 “That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles 
 through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the 
 Spigit through faith.”* The blessing of Abraham! Observe, 
 this is written in the New Testament, but how is it to be under- 
 stood without referring to the Old? This is a question which we 
 would earnestly press upon those. who insist upon taking the 
 New Testament by itself, and refuse to. yield to anything but an 
 explicit text of the New Testament. Here is a text of the New 
 Testament, but in itself it explains nothing. It speaks of the 
 blessing of Abraham, without telling us what that blessing was; 
 and to those who will not be taught by the Old Testament, this 
 text is no better than a hieroglyphic. Thus we are sent back 
 (not by our own ingenuity to make out a case, as some affirm 
 that we do, but) by the holy apostle himself; we are sent back 
 to the history of Abraham, to ascertain what his blessing was, 
 that we may thereby Ἰ ον what it is that is come to us 
 Gentiles through Jesus Christ. 
 
 God had Pied Abraham, and that blessing, whatever it 
 was, had for centuries been confined to one nation. Now it 
 was to be conveyed among all the nations. Let this point be 
 duly considered. It was no -new blessing that was now to be 
 spread abroad among the nations; but the old blessing, the 
 blessing of Abraham. The Gentiles were not to be brought 
 into a relationship with God such as no people had ever been in 
 before; but into a relationship such as Abraham and his people 
 had been in for ages. Many of the outward circumstantials 
 connected with that relationship might vary. They had varied, 
 under Moses, from their original Abrahamic aspect; and they 
 were now to vary again after the death of Christ; but the 
 relationship itself, and the blessing under which it was enjoyed, 
 
 remained essentially the same. St. Paul does not use new 
 
 language, descriptive of a totally new religion, and containing 
 
 in his own words a full explanation of his meaning. On the 
 
 contrary, he uses old language, identifying the Christian blessing 
 
 with the blessing of Abraham, and compelling his readers either 
 
 to refer to the Book of has for an enlarged pe att gi of 
 Gal, iii. 14. 
 
‘Churches Militant on Earth. 279 
 
 
 
 his concise words, or to remain without any explanation at all. 
 “Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are 
 the children of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that 
 God would justify the Gentiles through faith, preached before 
 _the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be 
 
 blessed. So then they which be of faith are blessed with faith- 
 ful Abraham.”* Not by themselves, with some new and 
 peculiar blessing; but with Abraham, being made partakers of 
 the old blessing. ‘ That the Gentiles should be jfellow-heirs, 
 and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by 
 the gospel. 72“ Now 1 say that Jesus Christ was a minister of 
 the circumeision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises 
 made unto the fathers; and that [6 Gentiles might glorify 
 God for His mercy.” * “ And if some of the branches be broken 
 off, and, thou [Gentile], being a wild olive-tree, wert graft in 
 among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness 
 of the olive-tree.”’ 4 
 
 No unprejudiced inquirer, with such passages of the New 
 Testament before him, can consent to dislocate the Old Testa- 
 ment from the New; or to prosecute any scriptural inquiry 
 without free and full reference to any and every part of God’s 
 holy Word. 
 
 Thus we are most deeply concerned in the plese of Abraham ; 
 and thus a careful examination of the ereuiuih chapter of 
 Genesis, where that blessing is most emphatically recorded, be- 
 comes a matter of the liveliest interest to every sincere Christian. 
 
 The covenanted blessing of God to Abraham was twofold, 
 spiritual and temporal. Spirituai, ‘‘I will be a God to thee, 
 and to thy seed after thee;”’ and temporal, “I will give unto 
 thee,-and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art 
 a stranger, all the land of Canaan.”°® This latter part was 
 obviously and necessarily, from the very nature of the blessing 
 itself, to be confined to one nation. The land of Canaan 
 was not come upon the Gentiles through Jesus Christ. 
 Consequently the blessing of Abraham, which the apostle 
 
 1 Gal. iii. 7—9. 3 Rom. xy. 8, 9. 5 Gen. xvii. 7, 8. 
 2 Eph. iii. 6. * Rom. xi, 17. 
 
280 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 says was to come, and did come, on the Gentiles by the 
 gospel, was that blessing which assured him that God would be 
 in & peculiar manner a God to him and his seed after him. Thus 
 Abraham’s children were included in the blessing of Abraham. 
 
 The outward ordinance of circumcision was commanded of 
 God as the visible token of the covenant established with 
 Abraham; not of a part of the covenant only, but of the cove- 
 nant. This appears on the face of the context—‘ I will establish 
 my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee ... . 
 to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee; anp I will 
 give unto thee and to thy seed after thee, the land... . Thou 
 shalt keep my covenant therefore .... This is my covenant 
 which ye shall keep-. . . . every man-child among you shall 
 be circumcised . . .. and it shall be a token of the covenant 
 betwixt me and you.” 
 
 There is no ground therefore for the opinion entertained by 
 some, that circumcision was the token of the promise of the 
 land of Canaan only. It was the token of the covenant, which 
 covenant included also the spiritual blessing. And although 
 circumcision itself was, like the land, to be confined to one 
 nation, yet being connected in its institution with the spiritual 
 blessing also, which was to come on the Gentile nations, it 
 obviously originated the idea that the spiritual as well as the 
 temporal blessing should have a visible token. 
 ᾿ Circumcision was the token of both; and when the spiritual 
 blessing came on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, some of 
 the Jewish preachers of the gospel, not seeing the distinction 
 now before us, insisted on the Gentile converts being cir- 
 cumcised.t| This arose from the connexion between circum- 
 cision and the spiritual blessing: for we hear of no attempt to 
 put the Gentile converts into possession of the land of Canaan. 
 
 The infant children of circumcised parents could not have 
 personally. known, and felt, and believed what their fathers knew, 
 and felt, and believed ; yet the same token of the covenant was 
 given to them as to their fathers. God was their God as truly 
 as their fathers’ God. They were treated as part and parcel of 
 
 1 Acts xy, 1, 
 
Churches Afilitant on Earth. 281 
 
 their parents; and the root being holy, so were the branches. 
 The whole stock of the nation was separated from the world, and 
 consecrated to God’s peculiar service (a kingdom of priests), 
 and every bud that opened its little bosom on the tree, was holy 
 unto the Lord by ‘virtue of its connexion. 
 
 Such was the national custom in which the apostles of Jesus, 
 like all other Jews, had been brought up. Now, suppose Jesus 
 had said to them, “ All power is given unto me in heaven and in 
 earth ; go ye, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, cirewm- 
 cising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost,” is it not clear that the apostles would have 
 understood such a command as a command to circumcise, not» 
 only Gentile adults, but the children of circumcised adults? 
 Would they, as Jews, have required a specific mention of 
 infants? Or rather, would not a specific prohibition respecting 
 infants have been required to prevent the apostles from includ- 
 ing them? This would be irresistible if the outward ordinance 
 -had not been changed. ἀπά now let us ask, if it were the inten- 
 tion of Jesus to change the outward ordinance of discipleship 
 without changing the Jewish practice as to the admission of 
 infants,—what more simple course could have been adopted 
 than to command Jews to go forth and make disciples of all 
 nations, baptizing them? They knew how their own nation had 
 been made disciples, and in making disciples of other nations, 
 they would naturally follow their own national pattern, unless 
 they were forbidden, or supplied with some new pattern to fol- 
 low. With regard to the thing to be done, they had a new 
 pattern given them—baptism was that thing. With regard to 
 the persons to whom it was to be done, they had no new pattern, 
 while they had the comprehensive description, all nations. If 
 they followed the Jewish pattern, they would begin with adults 
 and their families, as God did with Abraham, and they, would 
 continue with the children also of adult disciples, as God did 
 with Abraham’s children. This would be to extend the blessing 
 of Abraham among the Gentile nations. 
 
 Had the Lord and His apostles left children out of the cove- 
 nant, the Jews, who took such care that their children should not 
 
282 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 be excluded from their own ordinance, would doubtless have 
 urged this as a great objection to the Christian religion. 
 
 But it is a fact, and an instructive fact, that among the many 
 objections urged by the unbelieving Jews, we never hear of an 
 objection on this account. 
 
 Was this principle of religious connexion between parent and 
 child to extend itself among the Gentiles? The opponents of 
 infant baptism answer, No. They say Christianity is a personal 
 affair throughout. No one can be holy by proxy. No infant is 
 capable of holiness. What saith the apostle Paul? ‘The un- 
 believing husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving 
 wife is sanctified by the husband; else were your children un- 
 clean; but now are they holy” (1 Cor. vii. 14). Thus the - 
 inspired apostle calls those children holy of whom even one parent 
 was a Christian. Had both the parents been heathens, the children 
 would have been unclean. The origin of the scriptural distine- 
 tion between clean and unclean, was the division of animals 
 into such as might be offered in sacrifice unto God, and such 
 as might not. ‘The former were called clean or holy, the latter 
 unclean. Hence the application to persons. The Jewish 
 nation was a clean or holy nation, being consecrated to God as 
 a living sacrifice. The heathen nations were wnclean, being not 
 so consecrated. The children of heathen parents were, like 
 themselves, unclean, unconsecrated. The children of Christian 
 parents, or even of one Christian parent, were holy or conse- 
 crated. , 
 
 To this let me add the evidence of a fact. In the year 257, 
 a council of sixty-six bishops of the Christian Church was con- 
 vened at Carthage, concerning which, Cyprian, the Bishop of 
 Carthage, says, that “having the question referred to them, 
 whether infants might be baptized before they were eight days 
 old, they decided unanimously, that no infant is to be pro- 
 hibited from the benefit of baptism.’’? 
 
 \ 
 
 ' Qualis illa de baptismo infantulorum controversia fuerit, ex epistola 
 Cypriani ad Fidum presbyterum hic subjecta, cognoscere licet. 
 
 * Cyprianus, et ceteri college qui in concilio ad fuerant, numero sexaginta sex, 
 Fido fratri salutem,” 
 
- 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 283 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 Observe, this is no opinion of a fallible uninspired man, nor of 
 a council. Whether the council determined right or wrong, is 
 nothing to the purpose. The historical record of such a question 
 having been examined, establishes this fact, that infant baptism 
 at or after eight days old, was then the custom of the Church. 
 
 The commencement of the letter is upon another subject. It then proceeds— 
 “quantum vero ad causam infantium pertinet quos dixisti intra secundum vel 
 tertium diem quo nati sunt, constitutos baptizari non oportere : et considerandam 
 esse legem circumcisionis antique, ut intra octavum diem eum qui natus est 
 baptizandum et sacrificandum non putares: longe aliud in concilio nostro 
 omnibus visum est. In hoc enim quod tu putabas esse faciendum nemo consen- 
 sit, sed universi potius judicavimus nulli hominum nato misericordiam Dei, et 
 eratiam denegandum.” 
 
 Then after some arguments in support of this, the unanimous decision of the 
 Council, he thus meets the special objection which Fidus had urged, from the 
 analogy with circumcision :— ; 
 
 “Nam quod in Judaica circumcisione carnali octavus dies observabatur ; 
 sacramentum est in umbra atque in imagine ante premissum; sed veniente 
 Christo veritate completum. Nam quia octavus dies, id est, post ,sabbatum 
 primus dies futurus erat, quo Dominus resurgeret, et nos vivificaret, et circum- 
 cisionem nobis spiritalem daret: hic dies octavus, id est, post sabbatum primus et 
 dominicus, preecessit in imagine, que imago cessavit superveniente post modum 
 veritate, et data nobis spiritali circumcisione. Propter quod neminem putamus 
 4 gratié consequenda impediendum esse ea lege que jam statuta est, nec spirita- 
 lem circumcisionem impediri carnali circumcisione debere, sed omnem omnino 
 hominem admittendum esse gratiam Christi; quando et Petrus in Actibus 
 Apostolorum loduatur et dicat: ‘Dominus mihi’ dixit neminem communem 
 dicendum et immundum.’ 
 
 “Ceterum si homines impedire aliquid ad consecutionem gratiz posset; 
 
 magis adultos, et provectos, et majores natu possent impedire peccata gayiora. 
 - Porro autem si etiam gravissimis delictoribus, et in Deum multum ante peccan- 
 tibus cwm postea crediderint, remissa peccatorum datur; et ἃ baptismo atque ὃ 
 eratia nemo prohibetur; quanto magis prohiberi non debet infans, qui recens 
 natus nihil peccavit, nisi quod secundum Adam carnaliter natus contagium 
 mortis antique prima nativitate contraxit? qui ad remissam peccatorum acci- 
 piendam hoc ipso facilius accedit, quod 1111 remittuntur non propria sed aliena 
 pececata. Et idcirco, frater carissime, hzec fuit in concilio nostra sententia, a 
 vaptismo atque ἃ gratia Dei, qui omnibus misericors et benignus et pius est, 
 neminem per nos debere prohiberi. Quod cum circa universos observandum 
 sit, atqueretinendum, tum magis circa infantes ipsos et recens natos observan- 
 dum putamus; qui hoc ipso de ope nostra, ac de divina misericordia plus 
 merentur, quod.in primo statim nativitatis suze ortu-plorantes ac flentes nihil 
 aliud quam deprecantur. Optamus te, frater carissime, semper bene valere.”— 
 Mansi, Sacr. Conci. Coll. Tom. i. p, 899. (Hdit. Florence 1759.) 
 
284 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 And this is a very important fact, because it turns the silence of 
 other primitive Christian writers upon the subject into proofs of 
 our position. The fact before us proves the practice ; and their 
 silence proves their acquiescence in, and approbation of, the 
 practice. It is just a case wherein silence proves consent. 
 
 Upon the supposition here advocated, of the Jewish pattern 
 having been followed, and the Jewish practice adopted, the 
 period of the first introduction of infant baptism into the Church 
 would not and could not be determined and specified ; because it 
 must have taken place gradually as children were born to 
 parents who had themselves been baptized as adults. In this 
 case we should not be likely to have any distinct record about 
 the matter until some occasion of discussion arose; and then the 
 terms of the discussion would take for granted the existence 
 of the practice, and not treat it as anything requiring apology 
 or defence. And such exactly is the state of the case, corroborat- 
 ing, in the most unsuspicious manner, the correctness of our 
 supposition and the conclusiveness of our argument. 
 
 St. Paul treats the subject of circumcision in immediate con- 
 nexion with the person of Christ; stating, first a fact, and then 
 two consequences resulting from that fact. He says that “ Jesus 
 Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God ;” 
 and then he adds the twofold end attained by this, “to confirm 
 the promises made unto the fathers; and that the Gentiles might 
 glorify God for His mercy.” } 
 
 The child Jesus was circumcised as a matter of course. This 
 followed from His birth in the Jewish Church, made of a Jewish 
 woman, made under the Jewish law.2. This ordinance of the law 
 was administered in what He Himself afterwards called the ful- 
 filment of all righteousness. He thus became “a minister of the 
 circumcision for the truth of God.” 
 
 This is the fact; and it speaks clearly, we may observe, the 
 high and fundamental truth of substitution. Circumcision was 
 a bloody ordinance, and full of very expressive meaning as ap- 
 plied to sinful man, who is born in corruption, and grows up a 
 slave to the lusts of his flesh. But where was the meaning of 
 
 ? Rom. xv. 8, 9, 2. St. Luke 11, 21; Gal, iv. 4, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. ii ΘῈ 
 
 
 
 applying it to a person who was altogether free from sin—holy, 
 harmless, undefiled? The answer is, He was from the first 
 “made sin for us.” The discipline, pain, chastisement, blood- 
 shedding, or by whatever other name or names it may be called, 
 which was most righteously deserved by our iniquities, was laid 
 on Him. Nothing of the kind was deserved by Him, yet every- 
 thing of the kind was inflicted upon Him. 
 
 The consequences of His circumcision, as here stated by the 
 apostle, were— 
 
 (1) To confirm the promises iad to the Jewish fathers. 
 
 The promises referred to are those, of course, which are 
 written in the Old Testament, and the place therein where we 
 first find them in connexion with circumcision, is the seventeenth 
 chapter of Genesis. In that chapter there are, as we have 
 already noticed, two distinct heads of promise; the one referring 
 to the multitude of Abraham’s offspring in Christ; the other, to 
 the possession of the land of Canaan. These are included in one 
 covenant, and the token of the covenant was circumcision. The 
 first of these was a repetition of what had been already promised 
 to him, and what he had already believed (chap. xv.) This is 
 proved to have been the gospel (Gal. ili. 8). The great blessing 
 of the gospel was bestowed upon Abraham while he was uncir- 
 cumcised. That blessing is gracious reconciliation to and fel- 
 lowship with God, through faith in God’s word, whether it be a 
 word of prophecy, or a word of history. The work of Jesus 
 Christ in our nature was, in the days of Abraham, a word of 
 prophecy: Abraham believed it, in the sense of relying upon it, 
 saw the day of Christ afar off, and was glad, having peace with 
 God. The work of Jesus Christ in our nature is now a word 
 of history, and all who believe it in like manner, that is, in the 
 sense of relying on it, enter into the same peace.* 
 
 The permanent, peaceful, and holy possession of the land of 
 Canaan by the Jewish nation was then a word of prophecy. 
 Abraham believed it, giving glory to God. Whatever partial 
 fulfilment it may have had, or, to speak more correctly, what- 
 ever earnest of its fulfilment may have been given, under David, 
 
 1 δύ, John viii. 56; Rom. iv. 20—25, 
 
286 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 or Solomon, or Hezekiah, it is, in its true import, a word of 
 prophecy still, and to believe it, without a question, is to give 
 glory te the divine veracity. 
 
 This explains the religion of ‘Abraham during several years 
 previous to the institution of circumcision. The promises of 
 God were made to him. He believed them, and, through con- 
 fidence of heart in God’s word, the blessing promised was reck- 
 oned to him as possessed. The seat of his religion was his heart; 
 and as yet there was no corresponding or significant symbol of 
 it in his flesh; no outward ratification of it to his sight. The 
 permanence of such a state of things is quite conceivable, and 
 spiritual minds may imagine its sufficiency also, for all the pur- 
 poses of true religion. But we have now to do, not with imagi- 
 
 nations, but with - facts. 
 
 Instead of leaving matters so, it pleased God, previous to the 
 death of Abraham, to establish an outward and visible ordinance 
 as a sign, and as a seal. Thus the apostle writes: Abraham 
 “received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness 
 of the faith aia he had, yet being uncircumcised.” * As cir- 
 cumcision was significant of the hist ge of character produced 
 in Abraham, it was a sign. It was a sign of the cutting off of 
 the sins of the flesh. He had the thing signified in its spiritual 
 influence before he had the sign of it, and the sign was added 
 for his instruction. It was not only a sign of his profession as 
 a Jew, distinguishing him, and to distinguish his seed, from the 
 uncircumcised nations of mankind—this was indeed a further 
 purpose intended by it—but it was a sign of the change in his 
 character which had been already effected by faith in God's 
 word. 
 
 So far, considered as a sign, the thing seems plain enough, 
 But how was it a seal? <A seal authiiedies an agreement 
 already made ; and in point of fact, the agreement must oie made 
 and mutually consented to by both parties, before it is in a con- 
 dition to be sealed. Circumcision, appointed by God for a sign, 
 and visibly authenticating His promise to all who had the thing 
 signified, became to them a seal—a seal of the righteousness of 
 
 ? Rom, iy. 11, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 587 
 EY IRE IE SESE dy TOPS EA SLO CEOS PEN ον 
 the faith which they had before they received the sign. Thus 
 circumcision was a sign of man’s changed character, and a seal 
 of God’s gracious promise. It did not change the character, 
 but was a sign of the change. It did ‘not entitle to the promise, 
 but to every one already cca and receiving the sign, it did 
 actually and visibly seal the promise. 
 
 This is simple in the case of Abraham, and of all who have 
 the thing signified, before they receive the sign.1 All such per- 
 sons believe the promises of God, and are personally interested; 
 i.e., the agreement is mutually consented to—before they receive 
 the seal. In such cases, the sign is received, a seal of the bless- 
 ing enjoyed, while as yet there was no sign. But this simplicity 
 seems to be destroyed, the natural and beautiful order reversed, 
 and the whole affair thrown into unintelligible confusion, by 
 giving this sign and seal to unconscious infants of a week old. 
 I am free to confess that with the history of Abraham alone 
 before me, and the commentary of St. Paul upon it, I would 
 not ἃ priort have anticipated the circumcision of infants. But 
 here again we are met by facts. The history of Abraham does 
 not stand alone. The fact that infants were circumcised, and by 
 especial divine commandment, cannot be disputed; though the 
 principle on which it was done may be mistaken. Perhaps that 
 principle is not fully and clearly revealed, since God. requires 
 of us confidence in His wisdom ; obedience of faith, as well as 
 wbedience of reason. I have already adverted to one ground of 
 reason for this appointment, viz., the connexion between parent 
 and child, so that the root—the believing parent—being holy, 
 the branch also is holy. It is not to be expected that this will 
 satisfy all minds. The fact, however, remains as God’s own 
 appointment; and that there is good and sufficient reason for it 
 . is to be believed, whether we can discern it to our own intelli- 
 gent satisfaction or not. 
 
 1 What then was circumcision to the men of Shechem, who received it, not in 
 consequence of any spiritual change of character, but entirely at the instance 
 of their young prince Hamor, himself induced by mere human affection? It 
 was a sign of a change of character which they did not possess ; and to them it 
 was a seal of nothing, because there was nothing to seal, no agreement between 
 them and the God of Israel. (See Gen, xxxiv.) 
 
288 ‘The Church and the Churches. 
 
 Our Lord Jesus Christ, by being circumcised as He was, gave 
 all the weight of His authority and divine mission to the bless- 
 ings and promises of the Old Testament; and also to the insti- 
 tated sign of the blessing, and seal of the promise; and further, 
 τ the application of ὮΝ sign and seal to an infant. Thus He 
 
 “confirmed the promises mane to the fathers ; ;” and as among 
 these were included the gospel promise to all nations, so among 
 the results from the circumgision of Christ is included— 
 
 (2) “That the Gentiles should glorify God for His mercy.” 
 It thus appears, and the conclusion is very important, that cir- 
 cumcision was connected with the covenant of grace in the 
 gospel, and not merely with the covenant of the land of Canaan. 
 ' On these grounds we justify the analogy above stated, between 
 the mode of discipling the Jewish nation, from Abraham till 
 Christ, and the mode of discipling all nations then specially 
 ἐσθ κα by Christ Himself. 
 
 Having thus considered the proper catia for the ordinance 
 of Baptism, we proceed to examine, 
 
 V. The nature of the efficacy which it is scriptural to ascribe 
 to this ordinance. 
 
 The language of the apostles upon this subject is mingled with 
 allusions to another subject, which, for the sake of clearness, 
 demands attention first, and distinctly. In speaking of the 
 spiritual changes which a sinner undergoes in becoming truly a 
 child of God, the apostles largely refer to the history of the 
 actual physical changes which the body of Christ underwent. 
 
 The body of Jesus was literally dead; and this is used as an 
 image of the spiritual “death unto sin” which is experienced 
 by the awakened soul. 3 
 
 The body of Jesus was literally buried; and this is used as an 
 image of the spiritual burial or separation from this present evil 
 Ww orld, which is experienced by the penitent soul. 
 
 The body of Jesus was literally raised from the dead, and 
 taken up to heaven; and this is used as an image of the οὐ πιῶ 
 resurrection and ascension to newness of life, ΤΟΝ is experienced 
 by the regenerated soul. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 289 
 
 
 
 All this is sometimes spoken of without any reference to bap- 
 tism. Thus, in St. Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians, the spiritual 
 qjuickening of souls previously dead in sin, and the resurrection 
 of Christ’s body, are ascribed to the same almighty energy... 
 ““the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, 
 according to the working of His mighty power, which He 
 wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. . . and 
 you who were dead in trespasses and sins . . . and hath raised 
 us up together.”! Also, in his Epistle to the Colossians, the 
 holiness of the Christian, in heart and life, is represented as the 
 consequence of his spiritual resurrection, in union with Christ, 
 whose resurrection was literal. “If ye then be risen with 
 Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth 
 at the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, 
 not on things on the earth. or ye are dead [to sin], and your 
 [new spiritual] life is hid with Christ in God... . . Mortify 
 therefore your members which are upon the earth.” ? 
 
 St. Peter also connects the renewal of the Christian to a 
 lively hope, with the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.* 
 
 In other passages, however, this language, derived from the 
 history of the body of Jesus, is mingled with mention of, and 
 allusions to, baptism; all expressive of the same spiritual mean- 
 ing. This will assist. us to understand aright that remarkable 
 passage in the sixth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, “ How 
 shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know 
 ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, 
 were baptized into His death? Therefore we are buried with 
 Him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up 
 from the dead by the glory (the glorious power) of the Father, 
 even so we also should walk in newness of life.” 
 
 We are dead to sin in our hearts, as Jesus was dead to this 
 world in His body. This is the reason we cannot continue to 
 live in sin. But how are we dead to sin? Know ye not, that 
 so many of us as have been converted to God, or—to express 
 the same thing, not literally, but in a figure derived from that 
 ordinance in which we have professed and proclaimed 
 
 1 Eph. i. 19; ii, 1—6. * Col. iii, 1—5, * Δ Peter’i. 5: 
 19 
 
290 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 our conversion — so many of us as have been baptized! 
 into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death, or—to ex- 
 press the same thing literally—were converted into a state of 
 deadness to sin? Therefore, also, as Christ’s body was literally 
 buried and separated from the visible things of this world, so 
 we are spiritually separated, or—to say the same thing in a 
 figure, derived from His body—we are buried with Him; or— 
 to say the same thing in a double figure, derived from His body 
 and our ordinance—we are buried by baptism into death, im 
 order that as Christ was literally raised from the dead, and 
 manifestly taken up to heaven by the glory of the Father, so 
 we should be spiritually raised to heavenly things and thoughts, 
 and manifest the same by walking in newness of life. 
 
 Similar to this is the meaning of the apostle’s language to the 
 converted Colossians. ‘ Ye are circumcised with the cireumci- 
 sion made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of 
 the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; buried with Him in 
 baptism, wherein also ye are risen with Him, through the faith 
 of the operation of God, who hath raised Him from the dead” 
 —the faith which is wrought in you by the power of God, the 
 same power by which Jesus Christ was raised from the dead. 
 “ And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of 
 your flesh, hath He quickened together with Him, having for- 
 given you all trespasses.”’ ἢ 
 
 The Colossians were never circumcised in the flesh. That 
 would have been circumcision made with hands. But they were: 
 quickened to God by the “ cireumcision of Christ,” or Christian, 
 circumcision, or circumcision made without hands. Here their 
 spiritual change is expressed in a figure derived from the Jewish 
 ordinance; and then the apostle proceeds to explain his owm 
 meaning—establishing, by the way, a tolerably strong analogy 
 between circumcision and baptism—“ Buried with him in bap- 
 tism,” 1.6., spiritually dead and separated from this world in 
 your baptism, as Christ was literally dead and buried; “ wherein 
 also ye are risen with Him,” spiritually risen to a new state of 
 life in your baptism, as Christ was literally raised from the 
 
 Col, ii, 11—138. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 291 
 a “through the faith of the operation of God.” In the 
 passage just eat from the Epistle to the Romans, the apostle 
 says that Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the 
 Father; and here he ascribes the spiritual resurrection of the 
 Colossian Christians to the faith of the operation of God. 
 In like manner he says to the converted Galatians, “ Ye are 
 ul the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus; for as many oi’ 
 you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” } 
 
 In all this the apostle speaks of baptism as a compound, in- 
 cluding two things, the outward visible ordinance, and the inward 
 spiritual faith. As such he identifies baptism with conversion, 
 so completely that the word conversion, in its full spiritual 
 meaning, might be substituted for the word baptism, without 
 altering the sense of the context. “ Buried with Him in con- 
 version, wherein also ye are risen with Him through the faith 
 which is of the operation of God. Know ye not that so many 
 of us as were converted to Jesus Christ, were converted to His 
 death—to a state of deadness to sin imaged by His literal death? 
 Therefore we are buried, separated from the world, with Him, 
 by conversion to His death —deadness to sin—that like as Christ 
 was raised from the dead, by the glorious power of the Father 
 operating in the sepulchre, even so we also, being converted 
 through the faith, which is of the same glorious an of God, 
 operating in our emits: should’ walk in newness of life.” 
 
 The faith was the inward and invisible principle produced by 
 the power of God; the water was the outward and visible ele- 
 ment used by the command of God. By the faith the spiritual 
 change was effected in the sight of God; by the water it was 
 authenticated and ratified—wherever it existed—in the sight of 
 men. And the apostle habitually uses the word baptism to 
 express—not merely and singly the outward ordinance in water, 
 but—unitedly the outward ordinance, and the inward and true 
 faith. Meaning this, all this, by baptism, he ascribes to it 
 saving efficacy, as we do to conversion. This is that “one 
 baptism ’’ which we acknowledge for the remission of sins.” 
 
 But what if, in-any instance, only a part of what the apostles 
 
 1 Gal. iii. 26, 27. ? Nicene Creed. © 
 
 
 
292 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 mean by baptism be given? What, for example, if only the 
 outward ordinance be given? Then, in that case, baptism is not 
 given; baptism, as the apostles understood it, is not “ rightly 
 received,” and there is no saving efficacy. ‘This distinction is 
 clearly marked by St. Peter, when, speaking of the saving 
 efficacy of baptism, he guards carefully against the possibility of 
 being mistaken to mean the outward ordinance only. 
 
 Comparing baptism to the ark of Noah, and the resurrection 
 of Jesus Christ to the water which sustained the ark, he says 
 that in the ark a few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water; 
 and then he adds, “ The like figure whereunto even baptism 
 doth also now save us,” but instead of simply concluding with 
 “by the resurrection of Jesus Christ,” he says, “ baptism doth 
 also now save us—not the putting away the filth of the flesh, 
 but the answer of a good conscience towards God—by the 
 resurrection of Jesus Christ.” ἢ 
 
 Baptism doth save: but what baptism? The answer is, bap- 
 tism “rightly received;” that is, not a part of it only, not the 
 application of water to the flesh, but the whole of it, including 
 also the state of heart which supplies an answer of a good con- 
 science, a true and faithful answer to the question, Dost thou 
 believe in Jesus Christ ? 
 
 If thou believest, thou mayest be baptized with water. 
 
 I believe. 
 
 Well, if this be the answer of a good conscience; if the faith 
 of the operation of God be indeed in you, effecting a spiritual 
 change, then the outward part of the ordinance, which is a sign 
 of that change, will be to you a seal of all its blessings. Such 
 baptism doth save. ; 
 
 It was possible then—why else should St. Peter introduce 
 such a clause ?—that the component parts of what the apostles 
 meant by saving baptism might in some instances be separated: 
 that the outward ordinance in water might be administered 
 without an answer of a good conscience, without any accom- | 
 panying inward faith, and consequently without any real 
 
 spiritual change. ᾿ 
 Δ Art, xxvii. 21 Peter iii. 20, 21. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. — 293 
 
 This was indeed indispensable towards the accomplishment of 
 the Lord’s revealed purpose, that His true Church should con- 
 tinue a hidden company, known certainly only to Himself; that 
 the tares and the wheat, the clothed and the unclothed guests, 
 the sheep and the goats, should be so mingled as to render it 
 “impossible for His most faithful servants infallibly to distinguish; 
 ~ because, to this end, every outward mark possessed by the chil- 
 dren of God must be possessed by them in common with others. 
 
 At the commencement, however, in the infancy of the Church, 
 during the personal ministry of the apostles, we may well believe 
 that the separation, the outward ordinance, without the answer 
 of a good conscience, was comparatively very rare. There had 
 as yet been no time for a generation of nominal Christians to 
 grow up. All who were called Christians, or nearly all, were 
 adult converts from Judaism or paganism, baptized in conse- 
 quence of their own profession of the Christian faith; and in those 
 days, when the Christian Church had no temporal honours, dis- 
 tinctions, or emoluments to confer on her members, but, on the 
 contrary, when’a profession of Christianity need men to 
 odium and obloquy and persecution, the temptations to a false 
 or hypocritical profession were comparatively few. It is true 
 that even then there were some hypocrites, but their number 
 must have been small. They were the exceptions, and there- 
 fore—although, when speaking prophetically the apostles make 
 the mixed character of the baptized body sufficiently distinct, 
 yet when speaking of the state of things actually existing in 
 their own days—it-was natural enough to address to professing 
 Christians generally, z.¢., to the then visible Church, language 
 which in strict literal accuracy was applicable only to real Chris- 
 tian believers. 
 
 Such language commonly used plainly involves the supposi- 
 tion that commonly baptism was complete, that it was a sign of 
 a change of character, of a spiritual cleansing already received : 
 and, to persons so changed, a seal of God’s promises to His 
 people. In the case of an adult convert, such as Saul of Tarsus, 
 or Lydia of Thyatira, whose heart was already changed by the 
 ‘Holy Spirit, this was simple and clear, harmonizing exactly 
 
294 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 t feo oS τ 
 
 a 
 
 
 
 
 
 with the case of Abraham. Such converts were already per- 
 sonally interested in God's promises. Baptism, appointed by 
 the Lord Jesus fora sign, and visibly authenticating His pro- 
 mises to all who had the thing signified, became to them a 
 seal, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which they had 
 before they were baptized. Baptism was the sign, not merely 
 of their profession of the Christian religion, but also of their 
 inward and spiritual change of character, and a seal of God’s 
 gracious promises to them. It did not change their characters; 
 they were not admissible to it till they had, or said they had, 
 faith, and faith changes the character, overcoming the world; 
 but it was a sign of the change. It did not. entitle to the 
 promises, but to every one already spiritually changed, and 
 thereby entitled, it did actually and visibly seal the promises. 
 And, therefore, although baptism was not precisely contem- 
 poraneous in God’s sight with the spiritual change, yet, follow- 
 ing soon after according to God’s commandment, and being the 
 first manifestation of it to man’s sight, the whole change came 
 naturally to be identified with, and expressed by, the outward 
 and visible sign and seal of it. Forgiveness of sins accompanied 
 the spiritual change, and therefore is sometimes spoken of as 
 accompanying the sign of the change.. 
 
 ashetone is edn more froquosttly spoken ube in direct con- 
 nexion with the faith of the heart, and without any reference 
 to the ordinance of Baptism. “ Hin (Christ) hath God exalted 
 with His right hand to be a prince and a Saviour, to give re- 
 pentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins.”* “ Be it known 
 unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is 
 preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him all that 
 believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be 
 justified by the law of Moses.”? “ To open their eyes, and to turn 
 them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto 
 God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance 
 among them which are sanctified by faith that isin Me.”* “In 
 whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgive- 
 ness of sins.” * 
 
  Acts.y. 31. ? Acts xiii. 38, 39. 5 Acts xxvi. 18. 4° Col. i 14, 
 
\ 
 
 Churches Afilitant on Earth. 295 
 
 
 
 In these and such passages the blessing of forgiveness of sins 
 is associated with that state of heart which is by the faith of the 
 operation of God, and of which only God Himself is immedi- 
 ately and directly cognizant. 
 
 There is one passage of a different character, where forgiveness 
 is associated with that outward ordinance of God’s appointment 
 
 ‘which is an avowal among men, that he who observes it is the 
 
 Lord’s servant. With the heart he has believed unto righteous- 
 ΟΠ ness; and now, using water according to the commandment, 
 and “ calling upon the name of the Lord,” he makes confession 
 with, his mouth unto salvation.'. The passage referred to, the 
 only one of the kind in the sacred volume, occurs in the address 
 of Ananias to Saul of Tarsus, as recorded in the 22nd chapter 
 of the Acts. ‘The God of our fathers hath chosen thee, that 
 thou shouldst know His will, and see that Just One, and shouldst 
 hear the voice of His mouth. For thou shalt be His witness 
 unto all men of what thou hast seen and heard. And now, why 
 tarriest thou? arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, 
 calling on the name of the Tord.” 
 
 Saul was already a believer in the Lord Jesus, whose glory 
 he had seen, and whose voice he had heard. Being a believer, 
 he had as such the blessing of forgiveness of sins; yet here the 
 washing away of his sins is connected with the outward ordi- 
 mance, which was the open profession of faith, and which there 
 appears to have been some disposition in him to delay; for 
 Ananias said, ‘‘ Why tarriest thou?” As if he had said, Show 
 yourself what you are, at once; the God of our fathers has 
 chosen you for His servant; avow yourself as such, to the 
 (neouragement of your fellow-servants, and to the confusion of 
 surrounding adversaries. Saul did so. He committed himself; 
 “and straightway he preached Christ in the synagogues, that He 
 is the Son of God. . . . All that heard him were amazed... . 
 But Saul increased the more in strength, and confounded the 
 Jews which dwelt at Damascus, proving that this is very Christ.’’? 
 
 In the case of Abraham, as we have seen, the institution of 
 ' Rom. x. 10. 5. Acts ix. 20—22. 
 
296 The Church and the | Churches. 
 
 
 
 an outward ordinance was delayed for many years after the 
 servant of God was in the possession and enjoyment of spiritual. 
 religion. In the case of Saul there was no delay; but the prin- 
 ciple was the same. Saul was a believer, as Abraham had been: 
 the seat of his religion was his heart, and he received a significant 
 symbol of it in his flesh, an outward ratification of it to his sight. 
 He received the sign of baptism, a seal of the righteousness of 
 the faith which he had, yet being unbaptized. It was a sign of 
 the washing away of his sins. It was not only a sign of his 
 profession as a Christian, distinguishing him from his unbaptized 
 fellow-countrymen, but it was a sign of the change in his state 
 and character which had been already effected by faith. 
 
 It is not, I think, to be wondered at that some men, captivated 
 with the beauty of thie arrangement, should endeavour to retain 
 it unimpaired by confining “baptism to adults, and as far as 
 possible to converted adults. It is right so to do in the com- 
 mencement of a’ mission to the heathen,—the only true parallel 
 to the history of the Acts of the Apostles; yet even here there 
 will occur cases to which the apostolical language concerning 
 baptism cannot be truly applied. It could not have been truly 
 applied in the case of Simon’ Magus, yet, it is instructive to 
 observe that, notwithstanding this and other such disastrous 
 instances as those of Ananias and Sapphira, Demas, Diotrephes, 
 Hymeneus, Philetus, the language habitually used by the 
 apostles concerning baptism ascribes to it the efficacy which in 
 genuine instances of real converts of truth belonged to it. 
 
 What, then, if a Christian community adopt this view; confine 
 the ordinance to adults, not only in the outset of a mission, but 
 always; endeayour to confine it to really and spiritually con- 
 verted adults, i.¢., true believers, who, when questioned, can give 
 an answer of a good conscience ; and notwithstanding occasional 
 or even frequent disappointments, continue to speak of it as what 
 it ought to be: are such persons to be unchristianized, or are 
 they to be denied the name of a Christian Church, because they 
 
 cannot enter into our analogy between baptism and circum- 
 cision, and thereupon feel constrained to deny that there exists 
 any divine authority for the baptism of infants? 1 trust not, 
 
 Ἀ 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 207 
 
 
 
 although I firmly believe that “the baptism of young children 
 is in any wise to be retained in the Church, as most agreeable 
 with the institution of Christ.” A diversity of judgment upon 
 this point, followed by a corresponding diversity of practice, 
 although it must of course involve error on one side, need not, 
 and I hope does not, involve such error as of necessity vitiates’ 
 the saving Christianity of either side. 
 
 It can be no matter of surprise that some men, admiring as 
 gordially as their opponerits in this question do, the beauty and 
 simplicity of the scriptural arrangement and language concern- 
 ing the baptism of believing ἀπ. ; but seeing that fis analogy 
 of “God? s dealings, and the practice of Christ’s Church, conspire 
 
 -in the conclusion that baptism was from the first given to infants, 
 should retain the practice; and that retaining it, they should not 
 on that account cease to speak of baptism as the Scripture 
 speaks, but endeavour to ascribe, to every instance of every 
 infant, the perfectness which belonged to a perfect instance of a 
 truly-converted adult, receiving the sign of baptism, a seal of 
 the righteousness of the faith which he had being yet unbaptized. 
 
 Are such persons to be condemned as superstitious formalists, 
 or denied the name and character of a true Christian Church, 
 because, allowing their affections to be engaged in this matter 
 as well as their understandings, and availing themselves of the 
 degree of obscurity which it has pleased God to leave around 
 the subject, they continue, in the face of many disappointments, 
 to speak of baptism as what it ought to be, conceiving that they 
 are thereby honouring God’s appointment as such, and as far as 
 lieth in them, inviting and encouraging among men that simple 
 confidence of heart which is the special element of saving 
 efficacy ? Mn γενοιτο. 
 
 This is the tender, affectionate, loving, and confiding position 
 taken by the English Church. Here, she exhorts her members 
 not to doubt, but earnestly to believe, that Almighty God 
 favourably alloweth her charitable work in bringing her infants 
 to His holy baptism; here, not in the language of dogmatic 
 theology, but of fervent devotion, she urges her petitions before 
 the throne of grace, pleading the promise made to prayer, by 
 
298 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 Him who said, er and ye shall Ἡρ κα ϑμς ἘΠ᾿ and ye shall 
 find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. Here, she 
 responds with earnestness and animation, “ Lord, give now to 
 us that ask, let us that seek find, open the door to us that 
 knock;” “Give Thy Holy Spirit to this infant, that he may 
 be born again and made an heir of everlasting salvation.” 
 And here, with humble. but hearty confidence in the divine 
 assurance that “whatsoever we ask in prayer, believing, we 
 shall receive,”’! she pours forth her thanksgivings to her heavenly 
 Father for His tender, mercy, because it hath pleased Him to 
 hear and answer her prayers; because it hath pleased Him to 
 regenerate her infants with His Holy Spirit, to receive them for 
 His own children by adoption, and to incorporate them /into His 
 holy Church.’ 
 
 If, however, any of her members, not content with this, 
 proceed to systematize,—if they advance the theory that every 
 baptized person is absolutely opere operato delivered from origi- 
 nal sin, then they place themselves in opposition to the English 
 Church; because, in her dogmatic theology, that Church δὴν 
 declares that original sin, “this infection of our nature, which 
 deserves God’s wrath and damnation, doth remain, yea, in them 
 that are regenerated.”*® So that even if it could be most rigidly 
 proved that every baptized person is regenerated,still, according 
 to the deliberate decision of the English Church, it’ would not 
 follow that any baptized person was delivered from original sin. 
 
 1 St. Matt. xxi. 22. 
 
 ? Baptismal office. 
 
 3 “ Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do 
 vainly talk), but it is the fault and corruption of the nature of every man, that 
 naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone 
 from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil, so that 
 the flesh lusteth always contrary to the spirit ; and therefore, in every person 
 born into this world, it deserveth God’s wrath and damnation. And this infec- 
 tion of nature doth remain, yea, in them that are regenerated; whereby the lust 
 of the flesh, called in the Greek phronema sarkes, which some do expound the 
 wisdom, some sensuality, some the affection, some the desire of the flesh, is not 
 subject to the law of God, And although there is no condemnation for them 
 that believe and are baptized, yet the apostle doth confess that concupiscence 
 and lust hath of itself the nature of sin.”—Art. ix, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 299 
 
 
 
 Deliverance from sin, both original and actual, is ascribed ex- 
 clusively to the “one oblation of Christ finishedupon the cross.””! 
 
 And if others, equally determined to systematize, assert that 
 the regeneration spoken of in the service, is not spiritual 
 regeneration, but only ecclesiastical; not a renewal of the 
 heart in the sight of God, but only a change of state as to 
 outward privilege and consequent responsibility; not an intro- 
 duction to pardoning mercy and saving grace, but only to 
 geographical Christianity; they also appear to forsake the well- 
 balanced teaching of the Church of England: because, first, in 
 this service she prays that the adult candidate for baptism, or 
 the infant charitably brought, may receive remission of his sins 
 by “ spiritual regeneration;” not ecclesiastical, but spiritual 
 regeneration! she prays also, that ‘‘ he may lead the rest of his 
 life according to this beginning;” which, on the supposition of 
 his receiving then, certainly and always, geographical Chris- 
 tianity, and certainly nothing more, would be a prayer that he 
 might continue a geographical Christian only, never becoming 
 a spiritual one, during the rest of his life. And because, 
 secondly, the Church of England in her dogmatic teaching, 
 expressly declares that they who receive baptism rightly are 
 thereby grafted into the Church; that the promises of forgive- 
 ness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of God by the 
 Holy Ghost are therein visibly signed and sealed; that faith 
 is confirmed, and grace increased by virtue of prayer to God.” 
 
 By virtue of prayer to God! These words indicate a part at 
 
 * “The offering of Christ once made, is that perfect redemption, propitiation, 
 and satisfaction, for all the sins of the whole world, both original and actual; 
 and there is none other satisfaction for sin, but that alone. Wherefore the 
 sacrifice of masses, in the which it was commonly said that the priest did offer 
 Christ for the quick and the dead, to have remission of pain or guilt, were 
 blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits.”-—Art. xxxi. 
 
 * “Baptism is not only a sign of profession and mark of difference whereby 
 Christian men are discerned from others that be not christened ; but it is also a 
 sign of regeneration, or new birth,’”’—not regeneration itself, but a sign of 
 regeneration,—“ whereby as by an instrument, they that receive baptism 
 rightly,”—not ali who receive it, but they who receive it *ightly,—* are grafted 
 into the Church; the promises of forgiveness of sin, and of our adoption to be 
 the sons. of God by the Holy Ghost, are visibly signed and sealed. | Faith is, 
 confirmed, and grace increased by virtue of prayer unto God. The baptism of 
 
 ¢ 
 
300 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 least, and a most important part, of what is intended by receiving 
 baptism rightly. -They ascribe the saving benefit to the virtue 
 of prayer, and thus supply a key to the right understanding of 
 the baptismal office. May every reader of these pages be mer- 
 cifully enabled to realize the full benefit of his baptism, by 
 virtue of prayer to God; looking back upon that sacred 
 ordinance, administered in compliance with the Lord’s com- 
 mandment, as a seal of God’s promises of mercy to his soul, 
 as manifestly applied as if a visible hand had been stretched 
 down from heaven for the purpose! And if any one ask 
 himself in some perplexity, “How can I look upon baptism as 
 a seal of God’s promises to me, seeing it is equally applied to 
 thousands, who entirely disregard those promises?’’ let him 
 answer.to himself another question, “ How is it that I receive 
 the Bible as God’s Word to me, seeing it is equally sent, and 
 freely distributed among thousands of unbelievers? What 
 makes the difference ? 
 
 Confidence of heart in it makes all the difference. So it does 
 in baptism. This is God's gift: “doubt ye not, but earnestly 
 believe ;” ask, seek, knock; God has promised to answer prayer. 
 ‘Wherefore we, being thus persuaded, and nothing doubting, 
 let us faithfully and devoutly give thanks,” ete. 
 
 Viewed thus, as a service of warm-hearted devotion, our 
 baptismal office is full of elevating confidence in God, and 
 animating encouragement to Christian parents; and the only 
 embarrassment we feel in the use of it, is one common to all 
 Christian forms of devotion composed in faith and hope and 
 love; namely, that our hearts are rarely so full of faith and 
 hope and love, as cordially to keep pace with our words of 
 prayer and praise, especially praise. From this embarrassment 
 we can have no relief, but in one of two ways; either by lower- 
 ing the form to the unchristian state of our own hearts, or by 
 raising our hearts to the Christian character of the form. It is 
 a Christian thing to pray in faith and hope and love, asking 
 the Holy Ghost for our children. It is a Christian thing to 
 
 young children is in any wise to be retained in the Church, as most agreeable 
 with the institution of Christ.”’—Art. xxvii. 
 
———$—$—$—— ———— απ —— t - 
 
 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 301 
 give thanks in faith and hope and love, though for the present 
 we seem not to receive what we ask for. It is an unchristian 
 thing to cease to pray for the blessing. It is an unchristian 
 thing to pray without faith. It is an unchristian thing to pray 
 with faith, and not to give thanks for having our prayer heard. 
 Sursum corda. “ The virtue of prayer” is the holy oil which 
 makes our baptismal service run sweetly, without either dogma- 
 tizing in falsehood on the physical efficacy of the ordinance in 
 itself, or recoiling in unbelief from the Christian fervour of the 
 language employed in it. 
 
 But if our baptismal service, instead of being thus treated as 
 a form of devotional earnestness, be looked upon as expressing 
 a decision in dogmatic theology; and, as such, be compared 
 with Holy Scripture, the statements in the 25th and 27th 
 Articles, and the facts of the case; it must continue what it 
 has long been, a fruitful source of debate and division. The 
 controversy can never be closed. 
 _. Wise and practical men, in the exercise of high and respon- 
 sible authority, should look to this. If it be in their power to 
 remove, or even in some good measure to abate, existing divi- 
 sions, it is no light matter to keep such a candle under a 
 bushel. If they be hindered from any united movement. by 
 divisions among themselves, those are the divisions which they 
 should seriously lay to heart; and they should bear in mind, that — 
 while the commandments to seek the good of others unto edifi- 
 cation, to bear with the infirmities of the weak, and to remove 
 stumbling-blocks out of the way, are given by inspiration of 
 God, the ipsissima verba of our Church-service, however excel- 
 lent, are not given by inspiration of God. . 
 
 By a slight alteration, very slight, more verbal’ than real, the 
 cause of truth would lose nothing, and the cause of the Church 
 of England would gain much, by enabling her attached ministers 
 and members to show, with more simplicity, and with less need 
 for laborious explanations—which wear to many the appearance 
 of evasion—the harmony οἵ her various official documents 
 among themselves, and with the undeniable facts of the case by 
 which she is surrounded. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE CHURCHES OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH—THE 
 LORD’S SUPPER. 
 
 Figurative Language—Force of Words—Exposition of St. John vi.—Christ’s 
 | Disciples prepared for such Language as “ Take, Hat, this is my Body ”"— 
 Institution of the Lord’s Supper—An Abiding Ordinance “ Till the Lord 
 Come ’’—What is Essential to its Scriptural Celebration—The True Essen- 
 tial Nature of it—A Commemoration of an Absent Friend—A Confession 
 of Faith—A Vow of Devoted Service, Sacramentum—A Feeding upon the , 
 Truth—The Body and Blood of Christ Expressive of all Revealed Truth— 
 This may be Eaten without the Supper, and the Supper without this— 
 Proportion of Apostolical Teaching on these Points—Our Absent Lord is 
 coming. 
 
 “Gop, who at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in 
 time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last 
 days spoken unto us by His Son.” God, who in all His former 
 communications treated man in a way suited to his complex 
 nature, consisting of soul and body, has in this, His last 
 communication, treated us in like manner ; addressing truth, 
 spiritual truth, to the conceptions and feelings of the soul, 
 and exhibiting that truth in the elements of the outward and 
 visible world, to the senses of the body. We have seen the 
 application of this, as it regards Baptism; and we are now to 
 consider it in the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper. 
 
 (1) During the personal ministry of Jesus on the earth, He 
 expressed many of the sublime truths of His spiritual religion 
 in figurative language. All Scripture, indeed, abounds with 
 figures of speech ; and for the right understanding of Scripture, 
 it is absolutely indispensable that’ careful attention be paid to 
 the nature of such language, and the source from ‘whence it is 
 

 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 303 
 
 
 
 _ derived. The nature of it is simply this: the expression of an 
 inward invisible truth by an outward and visible object; the - 
 force of which expression is derived from the harmony which, 
 as a matter of fact, is found to exist between outward objects 
 and inward truths, and the consequent suitability of the one 
 to represent the other. For example, I wish to express this 
 precious truth, that the invisible God is aware of all my 
 necessities and infirmities, and in kind watchful care and 
 tender love is constantly supplying: all my wants. To say 
 this briefly, comprehensively, expressively, I say, “God is my 
 - shepherd.’ Here is an outward and visible object made use 
 _of to express my meaning. This is a figure. The office of a 
 shepherd towards his sheep, his knowledge of their habits, 
 and his watchful care of them, going out and. coming in, 
 supplying them with pasture convenient for them; these 
 constitute the suitability which renders the figure expressive. 
 In the letter of it, the letter is a falsehood. “The letter 
 Killeth.” As a figure it is a life-giving truth. 
 
 The sources from whence such figures are derived are 
 various. The most fertile are the natural creation, and the 
 instituted types of the Jewish ceremonial law. When St. 
 John says, “ God as light,’ he takes a figure from the natural 
 creation. When St. Paul calls “Christ our Passover,”? he 
 takes a figure from the law of Moses. Concerning the cere- 
 monial law of the Jews, we read that it was arranged for the 
 express purpose of setting forth the everlasting truths of the 
 gospel, for “look,” said God, “that thou make them after their 
 pattern, which was shown thee in the Mount.”’* The great 
 original of that pattern was the everlasting gospel, which 
 Jehovah purposed in Jesus to His own glory. 
 
 The suitability, therefore, of the figures derived from the 
 Mosaic types to express the spiritual things of Christ is not 
 accidental, but designed of God. The same is true concerning 
 the objects of external nature. Creation as well as Judaism 
 was designed to bear witness to the truth—the eternal truth, 
 which God purposed in His dear Son to His own glory. 
 
 11] Johni.5. . EW ΠΟΤ γον ᾿ς 3. Exod. xxy, 40. 
 
304 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 Hence everything is what it is. Hence the properties of 
 every external object. Everything was “made by Christ, and 
 for Christ.”' Hence the analogies between external nature 
 and revealed religion, which Bishop Butler and others have 
 pointed out with so much sagacity and power, to prove that 
 the Author of nature is also the Author of Scripture. Hence, 
 also, the important fact in the interpretation of Seripture, 
 that the external world in all its varieties; matter with all its 
 properties and combinations of properties,—supply a vocabu- 
 lary of figurative language, to express the truth of God as 
 ™ is in Jesus Christ, and in the Church of Christ. The 
 figurative language so used is popular, not scientific; and 
 therefore the properties of matter referred to in it are such 
 as are generally and practically known, not such as require 
 the application of chemistry to elicit. The new creation of 
 the Church of God out of the darkness of sin, is thus expressed 
 in language derived from the creation of order, and light, and 
 beauty, out of the darkness of chaos. “For God, who com- 
 manded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our 
 hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God 
 in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. iv. 6). 
 
 (2) Words are useful. This is a truism; but let it be con- 
 sidered how and why words are useful. They are not so in 
 themselves as mere sounds. Were I to utter Greek or Hebrew 
 words in a pulpit in this country, surrounded by an attentive 
 congregation, the sounds might be in themselves most distinct 
 and clear, and audible by all, and yet in nowise useful ; because 
 they would be mere sounds ; words are useful, then, not merely 
 as sounds, but as conveyers of a meaning. I stand in a pulpit 
 and look round upon a congregation. I have a thought in my 
 mind which I wish to convey into their minds. How shall I 
 do it? Iam acquainted with certain sounds which will express 
 my meaning, and I know the fact that the people also are 
 acquainted with the same sounds. They are English words. 
 I speak them, and in an instant, as if by electric wires, I 
 convey into all their minds the thought that was in my own 
 
 1 Col.ja. 16, 
 
Churches Alilitant on Earth. 305 
 
 
 
 mind. If, however, I used those words, or any of them, in a 
 sense different from that in which the auditors understood 
 them, then, instead of conveying the thought of my mind 
 into their minds, I would convey some other thought which 
 might be of a totally different character. Thus, in order to 
 be useful, words must not only be in the same language which 
 the auditors of them understand, but they must be used in the 
 ‘same sense which those auditors habitually ascribe to them. 
 If the language be not known, words are absolutely useless. 
 If the language be known, but the sense in which the speaker 
 uses it be not known, words are deceitful and mischievous; so 
 that, finally, it is only when both the language and the sense 
 in which the speaker uses it, are known, that words are useful. 
 I shall now apply these remarks to one of the most striking 
 and instructive dissertations recorded in the New Testament. 
 Jesus said to His disciples and a surrounding multitude of 
 Jews, “As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the 
 Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me” (St. John 
 vi. 57). Here our attention is directed to the nature of true 
 religion as enjoyed by a living member of Christ’s Church in 
 this world. The expression “eating” is the peculiar one in 
 this passage. It was introduced into the conversation by the 
 Jews in their cavils against Jesus (vers. 30, 31). They had 
 followed Him because of the miracle of the loaves. Here they 
 insinuate that if He grounded His claims to be received as the 
 Messiah upon miracles, they ought to be of a more extensive 
 kind. His having fed about five thousand men with a few 
 loaves, was nothing, when compared with what Moses did, 
 who, they said, fed the whole congregation of Israel without 
 any loaves, with manna brought down from heaven. Jesus, 
 as His manner was,! avails Himself of the incident before 
 Him to proclaim essential eternal truth: He takes, as it were, 
 2 Compare His discourse with the woman of Samaria at Jacob’s well (St. John 
 iv. ), where water was the present visible figure, suggestive of spiritual truth. 
 The resemblance between that discourse and the one now under consideration 
 is remarkable. In truth the one is little less than a repetition of the other, by 
 
 simply substituting the words “ water”’ and “thirst,” for the words “ bread” 
 and “ hunger.” 
 
 20 
 
306 Lhe Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 His text from their allusion to the manna in the wilderness, 
 and preaches the gospel in language borrowed from the wants 
 and the supplies of the body. “Then said Jesus unto them, 
 Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread 
 from heaven, but my Father giveth you the true bread from 
 heaven. For the bread of God is He which cometh down from 
 heayen and giveth life unto the world” (vers. 32, 33). Not 
 perceiving the spiritual turn He was giving the subject, they ἡ 
 asked Him for a continual supply. “Then said they unto 
 Him, Lord, evermore give us this bread” (ver. 34). He 
 answered them more plainly, “I am the bread of life: he that 
 cometh to me shall never hungef; and he that believeth on 
 me shall never thirst” (ver. 35). Here we learn to identify ’ 
 three modes of expression: eating Him, coming to Him, and 
 believing on Him. That which naturally puts an end to 
 hunger is eating; but Jesus says, He that cometh to me shall 
 never hunger, therefore coming and eating mean the same 
 thing. That which naturally puts an end to thirst is dirwnk- 
 ing; but Jesus says, He that believeth on me shall never 
 thirst, therefore believing and drinking mean the same thing. 
 Whichever of these expressions He afterwards uses through- 
 out the discourse, still one and the same thing is intended— 
 inward, living, spiritual, satisfying, strengthening communion 
 with Him. See what light this throws upon the whole strain 
 of what follows—Ye also'have seen me and believe not. 
 Ye do not come to me, ye do not eat me. All that the Father 
 giveth me, shall conve to me, shall believe in me, shall eat 
 me, and him that cometh, that believeth, that eateth, J will 
 in nowise cast out. 
 
 This explains the remarkable parallel in the words already 
 quoted. As the living Father hath sent me, and J live by the 
 Father, in a spiritual, satisfying, strengthening communion 
 with the Father, finding it my meat and drink to do the will 
 of my Father; so he that eateth me as the bread, cometh to 
 me as the way, believeth on me as the truth, even he shall live 
 by me. What, then, is this eating of Christ, and living by 
 Christ, which is the privilege of every believer? We answer 
 
 \ 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 307 
 
 
 
 by asking another question, What was the living by the Father 
 which was the happy privilege of Jesus? Was it the actual 
 literal eating of flesh with the mouth of His body? The sup- 
 position is manifestly absurd ; for the Father never took flesh, 
 and the Son could not have so lived by the Father. It is false, 
 therefore, to suppose that the Christian so lives by the Son. 
 This is the bread which came down from heaven ; this is that 
 way opened unto heaven, this is that faith revealed from 
 heaven—he that eateth of this bread—he that cometh by this 
 way—he that believeth this truth—shall live for ever! Many 
 of His disciples, still understanding Him carnally, fixing their 
 attention upon the word eating, and blind to its identity with 
 coming and believing, said, This is a hard saying; who can 
 hear it? 
 
 Supposing the meaning of it to have been what they thought 
 it was (and what many still seem to think it was), it would 
 truly have been a hard saying, a contradictory saying ; for He 
 had just called Himself both flesh and bread: “Whoso eateth 
 my flesh ;” “He that eateth of this bread.” Now flesh is not 
 bread, and bread is not flesh; so that taking His words in the 
 
 letter, His saying was contradictory. Their murmurs led to 
 His explanation. “When Jesus knew in Himself that His 
 disciples murmured at it, He said unto them, Doth this offend 
 you? What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up 
 where He was before ?” (vers. 61, 62). Now, while I am with 
 you, it is within the bounds of physical possibility that you 
 should literally eat my flesh and drink my blood ; yet such an 
 interpretation offends you, and very justly. When I ascend 
 up where I was before, and take my flesh with me, there will 
 be an absolute physical impossibility that you should eat my 
 flesh in the way you mean; yet still it will be indispensable 
 to your salvation that you eat my flesh in the way I mean. 
 The next verse explains the mystery, and confirms the inter- 
 pretation [ have here given: “It is the spirit that quickeneth ; 
 the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, 
 they are spirit and they are life” (ver. 63).1. Mark, also, the 
 
 ' A similar argument is supplied by another passage in this discourse. Jesus 
 \ 
 
308 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 corroborating connexion in the two following verses. “ But 
 
 there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus. knew from. 
 
 the beginning who they were that believed not, and who 
 should betray Him. And He said, Therefore said I unto you, 
 that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto 
 
 said (vers. 49, 50), “ Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. 
 This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof 
 and not die.” In these words, the bread which Moses gave to the Jewish fathers 
 is contrasted with the bread which Jesus gives to His true disciples in this 
 remarkable particular; that the persons who ate the one died, but the persons 
 who eat the other never die, It is the distinguishing characteristic of the true 
 bread which came down from heayen, that they who eat it have eternal life: 
 they never die. In what sense, then, is it, that Christians who eat Christ have 
 eternal life, and never die? Where be the tens of thousands, who with un- 
 questionable sincerity have believed the dogma of transubstantiation, and eaten 
 what they considered to be Christ’s flesh? Dead, all dead. But it will readily 
 be answered, the life which Christians have, and have for ever, is spiritual life. 
 Doubtless it is so; and therefore the bread that supports it is spiritual bread, 
 
 Further, every one who eats the flesh of Christ, and drinks His blood, has 
 eternal life, and shall never perish, shall never die spiritually. This is Christ's 
 own assurance. If then the dogma of transubstantiation be true, it follows, that 
 every one who at any time eats, or has eaten. a consecrated wafer, has eternal 
 life, and shall never perish. This includes all who have ever so eaten, though 
 they should afterwards relapse into unclean living, and continue so till death: 
 or relapse into what many would deem more fatal still, viz., heresy and schism : 
 protesting against what they would then have the hardihood to call the false 
 doctrines of the Roman Church, and so becoming what we presume to call 
 
 Reformers. It would include Luther himself; for thus the matter would stand 
 in close controversy with a Romanist :— 
 
 Did Luther ever eat the flesh of Christ and drink His blood? If you say no. 
 you deny transubstantiation, because Luther frequently received the Eucharist 
 in the Church of Rome. 
 
 But I say, yes, he did. 
 
 Well, then, I ask, has Luther eternal life, and did he never perish? If you 
 say, yes, he has eternal life, then you relinquish the exclusive claims of your 
 Church, you admit the eternal salvation of a heretic, a schismatic, a man who 
 spent all the latter years of his life in avowed hostility to both the doctrines 
 and discipline of the Roman Church; and died in his sins, without confession. 
 without absolution, but glorying in his apostasy ! 
 
 No! no! Luther must have perished everlastingly, and so indeed all our 
 most approved doctors since the time of Luther have held. 
 
 You believe, then, that Luther has not eternal life? 
 
 No, he has not. 
 
 Then you make Christ a liar; because He said, “ He that eateth my flesh and 
 drinketh my blood, hath eternal life.” 
 
 a, =" 
 CE εασναις σὰν 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 309 
 
 
 
 him of my Father” (vers. 64, 65). In explanation of your 
 mistake about eating, I tell you that some of you do not 
 helieve, and this is the reason why I said to you, No man can 
 come, except it were given him of the Father. 
 
 This doctrine was too spiritual for many who had enrolled 
 themselves amongst His followers. “From that time many 
 of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him. 
 Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? 
 Then Simon Peter answered Him, Lord, to whom shall we 
 go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe 
 and are sure that Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living 
 God.” : 
 
 Peter put the right interpretation upon His words through- 
 out the whole discourse. To believe that He, standing in 
 true and proper human flesh among them, was the Christ, 
 the Son of the living God, the Way, the Truth, and the Life ; 
 to believe that His words were the words of eternal life, 
 words revealing Him, “in knowledge of whom standeth our 
 eternal life;” this was to come to Him, this was to eat His 
 flesh and drink His blood, this was to live by Him. Jesus 
 acknowledged the correctness of this interpretation, and 
 answered, “ Have not I chosen you twelve?” If I had not, 
 you would have gone away with the rest; but I have chosen 
 you, and therefore it is given unto you to perceive my 
 spiritual meaning, and therefore you do not go away. 
 Nevertheless, do not suppose that I am deceived in any of 
 you. I know whom I have chosen unto salvation; and I 
 know’ whom I have chosen, but that the Scripture might be 
 fulfilled. Ihave chosen eleven of you for one purpose, and 
 one of you for another. “Have not I chosen you twelve? and 
 one of you is a devil.” 
 
 We see here the nature of genuine spiritual religion. It is 
 not a participation in national privileges, however excellent 
 
 No, but I deny that Luther ever did eat the flesh of Christ and drink His 
 blood. 
 
 Then you abjure transubstantiation, because Luther frequently received the 
 Holy Eucharist in the Church of Rome. 
 
310 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 in themselves, and however highly esteemed as blessings from 
 God. It is not a round of outward observances, nor the 
 regular performance of moral duties, however acceptable 
 those: observances and duties may be, as things commanded 
 of God. These things are all upon the surface. When the 
 inward man is right, these things occupy an important place 
 in the witness which that man bears for God in the world, 
 and in the witness which God will bear for that man in the 
 day of judgment., But still these things do not lie at the 
 root. National privileges may be enjoyed, and outward 
 duties may be regularly and strictly observed by many who 
 have never come to the way of God, never believed on the 
 truth of God, never eaten of the flesh of the Son of God. 
 Real religion lies within. It is communion with Christ, and 
 with the Father through Christ, such as Christ Himself held 
 with the Father. Hear the apostle John: “ That which was 
 from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have. 
 seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our 
 hands have handled, of the Word of life (for the life was 
 manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show 
 unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and 
 was manifested unto us); that which we have seen and 
 heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship 
 with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with. 
 His Son Jesus Christ. And these things we write unto you, 
 that your joy may be full (1 John 1. 1—4). 
 
 This fellowship is by faith in Jesus as the truth: it is by 
 coming to Jesus as the Way; it is by being grafted into 
 Jesus as the Vine; itis by realizing the guardian care and 
 watchful supplies of Jesus as the Shepherd; it is by having 
 sympathy, and counsel, and comfort from Jesus as a Friend; 
 it is by enjoying the love of Jesus as a marin it is By . 
 eating Jesus as the bread of life. 
 
 We see by all this what description of interpretation the 
 apostles had learned to put upon such language from their 
 Lord. They had been carefully instructed in what He meant 
 by such words as eating His flesh and drinking His blood. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 11. 
 
 
 
 They had received the lesson; and knew that they should 
 -identify such eating and drinking with coming unto Him, 
 and believing on Him, and being grafted into Him. 
 
 Now then let us follow them to that night in which their 
 Master was betrayed ; let us enter with them into that upper 
 chamber where they had made ready the passover ; and let us 
 attend to what took place there while they sat at supper. 
 
 This will lead to a more direct consideration of the ordinance 
 
 of the Lord’s Supper. 
 I. In its original institution. 
 II. In its continuance in the Churches. 
 ΠῚ. In what is essential to its celebration. 
 IV. In the true spiritual nature of it. 
 
 I. The divine institution of the Lord’s Supper is contained 
 in the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. As they were eating, 
 “ He took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto 
 them, saying, This is my body, which is given for you: this 
 doin remembrance of me. And He took the cup, and gave 
 thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for 
 _ this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many 
 for the remission of sins” (St. Luke xxii. 19; St. Matt. XXXVI. 
 27, 28). 
 
 This is express and complete, so far as the disciples to 
 whom Jesus addressed Himself were concerned. It became 
 obviously and undeniably their duty to observe this ordinance, 
 as commanded by their Lord and Master. But this, of itself, 
 would not prove that the ordinance was to be continued in 
 the Church after those first disciples had fallen asleep. Some 
 of the things which the Lord commanded them were not to 
 be continued. For example, when sending the twelve forth 
 to preach, He commanded them, saying, “Provide neither 
 gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your 
 journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for 
 the workman is worthy of his meat” (St. Matt. x. 9, 10). 
 From these words it became their plain duty to go forth 
 without any of the ordinary means of support; but it does. 
 
2138 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 not follow that all who have succeeded them in the ministry 
 of the word should go forth in like manner. And, doubt- 
 less, had the Scriptures contained nothing more upon the sub- 
 ject of the Lord’s Supper than the commandment of Jesus to 
 the twelve disciples, a similar line of argument might fairly 
 be applied to invalidate the continuance of that ordinance 
 in the Churches. ; 
 II. But it has pleased God to place this matter beyond the 
 reach of reasonable doubt, and to give us as express an 
 authority for the continuance as for the original institution of 
 the Lord’s Supper. St. Paul was not one of the disciples to 
 whom Jesus gave the commandment. At that time he was 
 not a disciple at all, but an opposer and persecutor. After- 
 wards, when he was called to be an apostle, and sent forth to 
 preach to the Gentiles, to guard, it would seem, against any 
 mistake upon this point, the Lord gave him special instruc- 
 tions, similar to His original commandment addressed to the 
 twelve. Of this he thus informs us: “I received of the Lord 
 that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus, 
 the same night in which He was betrayed, took bread; and 
 when He had given thanks, He brake it, and said, Take, eat : 
 this is my body, which is given for you: this do in remem- 
 brance of me. After the same manner also He took the cup, 
 when He had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament 
 in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance 
 of me” (1 Cor. xi. 23—25). And to prevent any subsequent 
 mistake as to the continuance of the ordinance, the apostle 
 was instructed to declare that it was of uninterrupted divine ἡ 
 obligation, until the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 “For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do 
 show the Lord’s death till He come” (ver. 26). The former 
 part of this passage extends the institution to us Gentiles ; 
 and the latter part binds it upon us and our children, ti// the 
 Lord comes. 
 
 III. The right celebration of the Lord’s Supper includes 
 an actual and literal use of bread and wine. This would seem 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 312 
 
 
 
 
 
 ᾽}7 
 
 to follow from the language of the institution itself, “ eat, 
 “drink.” But this alone would not be conclusive ; because 
 such language is, as we have seen, frequently used figuratively, 
 to signify spiritual communion; but here again we are sup- 
 plied, by the facts of the case, with most conclusive proof, 
 that in the celebration of this ordinante, under apostolical 
 authority, there was the actual use of bread and wine. The 
 members of the primitive Corinthian Church were guilty 
 of a carnal abuse of this sacred ordinance. St. Paul reproves 
 them for it, charging them with such reckless and selfish eat- 
 ing and drinking, that while some of the brethren were left 
 without anything, others were surfeited even to drunkenness. 
 His words are, “One is hungry, and another is drunken.” 
 It is. obvious, therefore, that they had actual eating and 
 drinking. (I may add, in passing, that it is equally obvious 
 that what they drank was actually intoxicating wine.) 
 And the apostle, while directly correcting their abuse 
 of the practice, indirectly stamps the practice itself with 
 his inspired authority. Here was an opportunity afforded 
 of putting a stop to the practice of using literal wine, 
 had such practice been an error. But instead of putting 
 a stop to it, the apostle plainly sanctions it, provided it 
 were done decently and in order. It follows from this, that 
 whatever views of spiritual truth may be entertained, and 
 whatever spiritual feelings may be experienced, no person, 
 or society of persons, refusing to use, in this ordinance, literal 
 bread and wine, can be living in obedience to our Lord’s 
 commandment. And it follows, also, that the lay members of 
 the Church partook of wine, as well as bread, otherwise no 
 opportunity could have arisen for such an abuse, or the use 
 of such Janguage. 
 
 Again, the right celebration of this ordinance involves an 
 acknowledgment of the doctrine of atonement, i.c., pardon 
 of sin, through the meritorious substitution of an appointed 
 sacrifice. This was plainly declared by our Lord in the 
 institution of it: “This is my blood, which is shed for many, 
 for the remission of sins.” This direct connexion between 
 
314 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the shedding of Christ’s blood arid the forgiveness of our sins, 
 is the fundamental truth; without which, it is worse than a 
 perversion of language to admit that there is, or can be, any 
 Christianity at all. None who reject this truth can be living 
 in obedience to the Lord’s commandment in this ordinance. 
 
 But the right celebration of this ordinance does not include 
 any specific and uniform mode of administration, whether 
 as to the words we use, or the postures we adopt, or the 
 frequency of our observance, or the quantity we eat and 
 drink. The words with which Christ Himself blessed the 
 bread, or gave thanks, are not recorded, neither are the words 
 of the apostles. 5 
 
 All such details are left to the discretion of the members of 
 the Church in different ages and countries; and may be ar- 
 
 ranged and altered at discretion, provided always that nothing , 
 
 be enjoined contrary to God’s Word written, and nothing 
 practised indecent or disorderly, frivolous or absurd.’ ἢ 
 
 ΔΑΒ a specimen of the frivolous absurdity, if indeed it do not deserve to be 
 more gravely stigmatised, with which men of high station and influence 
 delighted to invest the celebration of this ordinance, I cite the following 
 passage from Cyril, Archbishop of Jerusalem, It occurs in his fifth Mystagogic 
 Catechesis. 
 
 “ Aeceden&, autem ad communionem, non expansis manuum volis accede, 
 neque cum disjunctis digitis, sed sinistram veluti sedem quandam subjicias 
 dextra, que tantum Regem susceptura est: et concava manu suscipe corpus 
 Christi, dicens: Amen, Sanctificatis ergo diligenter oculis, tam sancti corporis 
 contactu, communica. Cave autem nequid inde excidat tibi: quod enim 
 amittas, hoc tanquam ex proprio membro amiscris. 
 
 “Tum vero post communionem corporis Christi accede, et ad calicem 
 sanguinis illius, non extendens manus, sed pronus adorationis in modum et 
 yenerationis, dicens: Amen. Sanctificeris eo sanguine Christi, quem assu- 
 mis ; et cum adhuc est humiditas in labiis tuis, manibus attingens, et oculos, 
 et frontem, et reliqua sensuum organa consecra.” ἢ 
 
 When you approach, come not with the palms of your hands opened, nor 
 with the fingers separated, but put the left below the right, as a sort of throne 
 for it while it is to receive so great a King, and in the hollow of the hand 
 
 receive the body of Christ, saying, Amen. Having then carefully hallowed Ὁ 
 
 thine eyés by the touch of so holy a body, partake. Beware, however, lest 
 any portion should fall; for whatsoever you lose, you lose as from a member 
 of yourself. 
 
 ' Mysta. Catec. V. 88 18, 19. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth, 315 
 
 It is of much consequence thus to distinguish between what 
 is essential to the ordinance as of divine institution, and 
 what is adventitious as of human arrangement. If there be 
 no bread used, or no wine, or if there be no confession of the 
 great doctrine of atonement, the ordinance is vitiated. The 
 Lord’s Supper, as the Lord appointed it, is not observed. But 
 it may be observed where there is no Liturgy, no prescribed 
 form of consecration, no rubrical directions’ concerning the 
 postures of the minister, the position or description of the 
 table, or the time and manner of placing the bread and wine 
 upon it. 
 
 On all such matters it is lawful for any national or particular 
 Church to adopt any such: arrangements as shall be deemed 
 expedient for decency and order; and when they are adopted, 
 it is not lawful for any private member of such Church to 
 violate them. But it is lawful for any other national or 
 particular Church to adopt other different arrangements (pro-, 
 vided always that nothing be enjoined contrary to God’s Word 
 written); and it is schismatical tyranny in any one Church 
 to impose her own arrangements (as necessary to salvation) 
 upon another ; or to deny the true and saving. Christianity of 
 other Churches, because they prefer their own arrangements, 
 and refuse to adopt hers. 
 
 We are confirmed in this judgment by the difference between 
 the instructions given by inspiration of God in the Jewish 
 ordinances and in the Christian. 
 
 In Judaism, uniformity in detail was necessary for the com- 
 pleteness ‘and integrity of the type; therefore every garment 
 and every movement of the sacrificing priest was specified in 
 the divine institution; but now the great Antitype is come, 
 the one sacrifice once, and once for all, offered, and the true 
 ever-living Priest entered into heaven itself; now, the con- 
 
 Then, after partaking of the body of Christ, approach to the cup of His 
 blood, not stretching forth thy hands, but looking to the ground, after the 
 manner of adoration and worship, saying, Amen. Be thou, then, sanctified 
 with the blood of Christ which thou takest: and while yet the moisture is on 
 
 thy lips, touch with thy hands and hallow with it thine eyes, and forehead, and 
 other organs of sense. 
 
316 The Churcn and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 formity required is reduced to the simplest elements, and no 
 details of administration, whether of dress or posture, whether 
 of minister or people, are specified. We now consider,— 
 
 IV. The true spiritual nature of the Lord’s Supper. 
 
 This may, I think, be perfectly and clearly considered under 
 five heads. 
 
 (1) It is a commemoration of an absent friend. The Friend 
 is Jesus Christ. Where is He now? Ido not ask this with 
 reference to His Godhead; in this respect He is everywhere 
 essentially omnipresent, “equal to the Father as touching His 
 Godhead :” but to His manhood, and especially the visible 
 part of it, His body, which was born of the Virgin Mary, 
 which hungered, thirsted, suffered, died, was buried, and rose 
 again the third day ; His body, concerning which, after it was 
 risen, He said, ‘‘ Handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh 
 and bones, as ye see me have” (St. Luke xxiv. 39). So con- 
 sidered, where is He? The answer is, “In heaven.” He went 
 away into heaven, and will come again in like manner as He 
 went (Acts i. 11). Before He departed, He appointed this 
 
 memorial of Himself to be observed by His friends during ~ 
 
 His absence. “He took bread, and gave thanks, and brake 
 
 it, and gave to them, saying, This is my body, which is given 
 
 for you: this do in remembrance of me. Likewise also the 
 cup, after supper,” etc. Thus this was to be done in remem- 
 brance of Him, until He should return again, when of course 
 this memorial, intended for His absence, would cease. 
 
 This seems fairly to conclude against His bodily presence 
 in the ordinance. Remembrance refers to a transaction past, 
 or an individual absent, and not to anything present. Of 
 course He was present when He first desired them to do it, 
 and showed them what to do; but He did not so desire them, 
 till He was on the point of leaving them; and His command- 
 ment to continue the practice, had obvious and natural 
 reference to His approaching absence. If He intended this 
 eating and drinking to be done by His Church in His presence, 
 He used a word calculated to mislead when He said, Do this 
 
 ot See << 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 2 
 
 in remembrance of το. If at the words of consecration, He 
 comes, then the time is arrived for discontinuing this ordinance, 
 for it is instituted only till He comes. 
 
 (2) It is a confession of faith. 
 
 As often, however frequently or rarely it may be, as we 
 obey this commandment of the Lord, eating this bread and 
 drinking this cup, we do “show the Lord’s death, until He 
 comes.” By an outward and visible action, which may be 
 seen and known of all around us, we point to the death of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ as the foundation of our hope in the day 
 of judgment, when He shall come in His glory. We confess 
 Him, not only in our own hearts in secret before His all- 
 searching eye, but openly also “before men.” Such an open 
 ‘acknowledgment of Him now during His absence, and while 
 the world is rejecting Him, He expressly requires from His 
 Church, and connects it with a corresponding acknowledgment 
 of her upon His return. “ Whosoever shall confess me before 
 men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels 
 of God” (St. Luke xii. 8). To receive the Lord’s Supper is to 
 show our faith in the Lord’s death ; it is a public declaration 
 that we renounce every other way, or supposed way, of 
 salvation, and cleave only unto Him. 
 
 (3) It is a vow of devoted service. 
 
 It is from this that it derived the name of sacrament. 
 Sacramentum signifies an oath. It was commonly used to 
 express the obligation unto which Roman soldiers bound 
 themselves unto death, when they entered the army. And 
 because the members of Christ’s Church did in Baptism make, 
 and at the Lord’s Supper repeat, a solemn oath or vow to be 
 Christ’s faithful soldiers and servants until their lives’ end, 
 those ordinances came to be called, in the Latin Churches, 
 sacramenta, or sacraments. This is the simple and intelligible 
 
 1 « And to the end that we should alway 7emember the exceeding great love 
 of our Master and only Saviour, Jesus Christ, thus dying for us, and the in- 
 numerable benefits which by His precious blood-shedding He hath obtained to 
 us; He hath instituted and ordained holy mysteries, as pledges of His love, 
 and for a continual semembrance of His death, te our great and endless com- 
 fort.’ — Communion Service, Church of England. 
 
318 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 origin of this much abused word, which has been made, in the 
 imagination of theologians, to signify what it never signified 
 in any language. The meanings ascribed to it are so entirely 
 arbitrary, and so utterly wide of the literal signification of the 
 word itself, that in the disputations which have arisen about 
 them, there is no common standard to refer to, and of course 
 controversy is interminable. 
 
 In our Church Catechism we ask, “What meanest thou by 
 this word sacrament?” And instead of giving in answer, the 
 English of the word, which is its real and true meaning, and 
 concerning which, therefore, there could have been no pro- 
 tracted controversy, we answer, “I mean an outward and 
 visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace, given unto us, 
 
 ᾿ ordained by Christ Himself, as a means whereby we receive * 
 
 the same, and a pledge to assure us thereof.” 
 
 It is not pretended that this is the meaning of the word, 
 but only what we choose to mean by it. We may teach our 
 children to mean all this by it, but we cannot force the word 
 to mean this, or anything like this. And if we thus arbitrarily 
 apply a meaning to the word, which it will not bear, we have 
 
 no reason to complain of others, who apply another and a 
 different meaning to it, though it be as arbitrary and as foreign - 
 
 from the right and true use of the word as ours. 
 
 I do not ‘deny, or dispute, the right of any living society to 
 adopt a word from a dead language, and μώπεῖνο, to it any 
 meaning they please; provided that in all their documents 
 and works of official authority, they adhere consistently to 
 that meaning. But another society may, on the same principle, 
 claim the same right, and adopt the same word, ascribing to 
 it a very different meaning; and in such a case, it is obvious 
 that the use of this word, in controversy between the two 
 societies, is more likely to mystify and , perplex, than to 
 elucidate and explain. 
 
 If the word occutred in the Scriptures, the case would be 
 wholly different ; for then, every Christian society would be 
 equally bound to investigate, and if possible to ascertain the 
 sense in which the sacred writer used it, and to receive that 
 
 ’ 1 
 4 wt 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 319 
 
 
 
 sense as a common standard: but the word now under con- 
 sideration, though in such incessant use among ecclesiastical 
 controversialists, never once occurs in the inspired volume. 
 It is for this reason, that in my endeavours to avoid ambiguity 
 I have refrained as far as possible from the use of this shib- 
 boleth, and adopted (with reference to the ordinance now 
 under consideration) the expression which is sanctioned by 
 - apostolical usage, The Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. xi. 20). 
 
 The open celebration of this ordinance might well be con- 
 sidered a solemn vow, pledge, or oath of allegiance to the 
 Lord Jesus, accompanied as it was by exposure to imminent 
 danger. The stream of authority ran against the infant 
 Church, even to violent persecution. Great was the tempta- 
 tion, therefore, by which converts were exercised, to conceal 
 their convictions within their own bosoms, or at furthest 
 within the circle of their faithful and already converted 
 friends, if by so doing they might have the saving benefits "Ὁ 
 of the Christian religion, without incurring the present perils | 
 of the Christian Church. Participation in the Lord’s Supper 
 was incompatible with such concealment ; because it was an 
 overt act, open to the inspection of any spy, and easy of proof 
 before the magistrates. 
 
 It was, therefore, not only a profession of faith, but a pro- 
 fession' under such circumstances as invested it with the 
 character of a solemn enlistment by men who had counted 
 the cost, and come to the determination not to esteem their 
 lives dear to themselves in comparison with the high duty 
 and everlasting blessedness of serving the Lord Christ. 
 
 (4) It is a spiritual feeding upon the truth. 
 
 Truth is to a man’s soul what food is to his body. If the 
 body be healthful, food is enjoyed, and ministers growth : it 
 gives pleasure in the taking, and strength when taken. If 
 the soul be healthful, truth is in like manner attended with 
 gratification and production of strength and growth. Jesus 
 Christ is “the truth.” Jesus Christ is “God manifest in the 
 flesh.” The flesh of Christ, ie. His body and blood, express 
 conprehensively all revealed truth. To feed on truth, is to 
 
320 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 eat and drink Christ: to eat His body, and drink His blood. 
 If any man feed not on the truth, if he enjoy it not, tasting 
 that the Lord is good (Psalm xxxiv. 8) ; if he eat not the body 
 of Christ, and drink not His blood, he has no true spiritual 
 life in him (St. John vi. 53). 
 
 The Lord’s Supper expresses this, not by words only, but 
 also by material things. Our sense of taste is appealed to, as 
 well as our mental or spiritual perceptions. Religion is not a 
 science, but a life: truth is not a lesson to be learned in the 
 - intellect, but an incorporation including the whole man, the 
 sentient, the animal parts, as well as the intellectual. It is 
 union with Christ. He dwells in our hearts by faith (Eph. 
 iii. 17), “and we are members of His body, of His flesh, and 
 of His bones” (chap. v. 30). 
 
 Of this the Lord’s Supper is the outward and _ visible 
 expression: valuable, highly so, as all means are which the 
 Lord has appointed, but valuable only as means for the attain- 
 ment of the higher end in view. This accounts, and I think 
 very satisfactorily, for the fact, that the Lord’s Supper is so - 
 rarely mentioned in the history or writings of the apostles. 
 They were so engrossed in thinking, and feeling, and speaking, 
 and writing about the great end, that they seldom dwell upon 
 the details of the means. If we except the passing mention 
 made of “breaking of bread,” in the second chapter of the 
 Acts of the Apostles (and the application of that to the Lord’s 
 Supper is doubtful), the subject of the Lord’s Supper is not so 
 much as alluded to in the entire narrative. In St. Paul’s 
 Epistle to the Romans, there is no mention of or allusion to it. 
 In his Second Epistle to the Corinthians, there is no allusion 
 to it. In his Epistles to the Churches of Galatia, Ephesus. 
 Philippi, Colosse, and Thessalonica, we do not meet with the 
 slightest allusion to it. In his Epistles to Timothy and Titus, 
 where some instruction upon the subject might have been 
 expected, there is no allusion to it. The same is true of his 
 Epistle to Philemon, and I think also of the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews. The only clause in this epistle that can be mistaken 
 for an allusion (and that a remote and obscure one) to the 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 331 
 
 
 
 Lord’s Supper, is chap. xiii. 10O—*“ We have an altar whereof 
 they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle.” This 
 appears to me to be a general contrast between Christianity 
 and Judaism, expressing the impossibility of practically com- 
 bining them, but without any special reference to the Lord’s 
 Supper. In this opinion I am not singular. 
 
 In the Epistle general of St. James, there is no allusion to 
 it. In the two Epistles of St. Peter, no allusion to it. In the 
 three Epistles of St. John, no allusion to it. In the Epistle of 
 St. Jude, no allusion to it. 
 
 The reader will notice that this is not a matter of opinion, 
 liable to error and open to correction, but a plain matter of 
 fact: and certainly, if it be a primary duty (as without doubt © 
 it is) to give diligent heed to the truth as it is revealed in the 
 Scriptures, and not only so, but also to the scriptural pro- 
 portions in which it is pressed upon the Church,’ there is 
 
 1 “ Under the law it was appointed, that they which served in the tabernacle 
 should eat-of those sacrifices which were offered upon the altar; but now it is 
 otherwise: we have a spiritual and a living altar and sacrifice, eyen Christ 
 Jesus Himself; of whom they cannot obtain any right to partake, that are 
 addicted to the ceremonies of the abrogated law.— Bishop Hall, apud Mant and 
 D’Oyley, in loco. 
 
 “De hoc altari edimus, dum salutem ex cruce Christi percipimus. Qui autem 
 legalia custodient, non habent partem in efficacia passionis Christi." —Lstius 
 in P. $. 
 
 * “ Tf it can be shown by any incontrovertible proofs that every doetrine and 
 precept of the Scriptures, so far as they practically concern us, are prominent in 
 proportion to their importance, whether the subject be a doctrine to be believed 
 or a duty to be performed ; a grace to be cultivated; a sin to be avoided; or 
 a corruption to be subdued : if it can be proved that just in proportion as the 
 subject is connected with our salvation, so is it made plain and frequently 
 recurred to: while matters more remotely connected with that primary object 
 are more obscure and less frequently brought forward ; if this feattire of reve- 
 lation can be established as existing, it is certain that it would not only tend to 
 assist the Bible student in his inquiries, but supply us with a standard by which 
 deviations from truth might be detected.” —Bunbury. 
 
 “Take heed unto the doctrine not only that every part be according to the 
 rule, but, all parts, in their several relations, so held and exhibited as to be 
 according to the proportion of faith. 
 
 “There is a proportion of faith, because there is a body of faith ;—a system 
 of faith, with a beauty of symmetry in the whole, as well as in the parts; a 
 harmony of relation, without a discernment of which the full value of no one 
 
 21 
 
322 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 / 
 
 
 
 much and important instruction in the fact here stated. In 
 all the apostolical writings subsequent to the institution of the 
 Lord’s Supper, that ordinance is plainly mentioned only in one 
 epistle; and in that epistle, only twice—once as a passing 
 illustration of another subject, and once for the correction of 
 certain practical abuses which had crept into the mode of its 
 observance. 
 
 This fact does not in any way disparage the ordinance 
 
 member can be understood. In one sense, it is right to say that all parts of the 
 system of revealed truth are essential—essential to. the complete integrity of 
 the system they certainly are. In another sense it is right to say that all parts 
 are not essential—essential to the vitality of religion they are not. There are 
 truths, without the confession of which the soul can live unto God, though it 
 may suffer loss; and there are others, without which it cannot; just as there 
 are members of our bodies without which we can survive, and others without 
 which life must be extinct—all essential to integrity, not all to vitality, The 
 pattern of the tabernacle which was shown to Moses in the mount had its 
 various parts, from the network of the outer court to the most fine gold of the 
 inner sanctuary ; and every cord of that network was as essential to the perfect 
 integrity of the pattern as the crowning gold about the mercy-seat. But who 
 can say that the ark of the covenant and the mercy-seat within the veil were 
 not more vitally important than the whole framework around them? So in the 
 doctrine of the gospel there is a proportion of importance ; some parts more 
 prominent, more necessary, while none can say to any, ‘I have no need of thee; ’ 
 all ‘compacted together by that which every joint supplieth ;’ all nourished by 
 the same central fountain, animated by one pulse, depending on one head, even 
 Jesus Christ, ‘from whom all the body, by joints and bands, having nourishment 
 administered and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. To preach 
 the truth in this, its right shape and proportion, is a great duty, All we say 
 may be scriptural ; we may keep back no single feature of the whole body of 
 revealed truth; and yet our representations ‘may be so confused, disjointed, 
 and shaken; the greater joints so hid in the undue prominence of the less, 
 means so confounded with ends, the stream of life with its channels, the 
 symptoms of health with its properties, outward motion with inward life, the 
 mode of possessing, with the mode of obtaining grace; no separate statement - 
 untrue, but each in its relative bearing so confused, as to leave an impression 
 scarcely better than that of positive error.’”— Charge of the Bishop of Ohio. 
 
 1 The passage here referred to, is 1 Cor. x. 16—21 : ‘ The cup of blessing which 
 we bless, is it not the communion (κοινωνία, fellowship) of the blood of Christ ?” 
 etc. I have called it a passing illustration of another subject ; and such it will, 
 I think, appear to be, upon afair and comprehensive examination of the context 
 in which it occurs, Such an éxamination is beyond the compass of a note, and 
 as I feel its importance, I have appended to this chapter an extract from a 
 sermon upon the passage, 
 
Churches Mihitant on Earth. εὐ ον Ὁ 
 
 
 
 itself. The apostles would not of course have adopted any 
 line of procedure justly liable to such a reproach. One plain 
 commandment from their Lord was abundantly sufficient to 
 insure their dutiful obedience. I speak here of proportions in 
 the teaching of the apostles, whether they were preaching to 
 the heathen or writing to the saints. They used all appointed 
 means, but they did not treat means as if they were ends; 
 or as if they could of themselves, or by any inherent virtue 
 lodged in them and inseparable from them, secure the ends 
 desired. If the apostles believed, as the truth of God, what 
 many claiming to be their successors have advanced upon 
 this subject, they have certainly manifested a remarkable 
 unanimity in concealing their real sentiments. Supposing 
 Peter and John to have held the Roman—or Tractarian—view 
 of “The Holy Eucharist :” their catholic epistles may be cited 
 as the most complete specimens of reserve which have ever 
 been published. In those epistles the sacred writers enlarge, 
 with eager animation, on evangelical doctrine, but make no 
 mention whatever, directly or indirectly, of the Lord’s Supper, 
 considered as an outward ordinance. | 
 
 The inward and spiritual end in view in it, and in all other 
 means, is their constant topic. On communion with, and con- 
 - formity to, God, they expatiate with delight and reiteration. 
 Their heart’s desire and prayer—like that of their “ beloved 
 brother Paul ”—was, that God would mercifully grant to His 
 people, “according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened 
 with might by His Spirit in the inner man: that Christ might 
 dwell in their hearts by faith: that they, being rooted and 
 grounded in love, might be able to comprehend with all saints, 
 what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to 
 know the love of Christ oh passeth knowledge. that bes 
 might be filled with all the fulness of God.” Ὁ 
 
 This expresses the true feeding upon the true bread which 
 came down from heaven that a man might eat and not die. 
 This is in truth to eat the flesh of Christ, which is meat indeed, 
 
 and to drink His blood, which is drink indeed. This may be 
 : 1 Eph, iii. 16--19, : 
 
324 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 had without the ordinance of bread and wine; and the ordi- 
 nance in all its outward requirements may be had without this. 
 Here, on both sides, the English Church is as express and clear 
 as any lover of scriptural truth can desire. 
 
 “The wicked, and such as be void of a lively faith, although 
 they do carnally and visibly press with their teeth, as St. 
 Augustine saith, the sacrament of the body. and blood of 
 Christ, yet in nowise are they partakers of Christ : but rather, 
 to their condemnation, do eat and drink the sign or sacrament 
 of so great a thing.” ? 
 
 s But if.a man, hie by reason of extremity of sickness, or 
 for want of warning in due time to the curate, or for lack of 
 company to receive with him, or by any other just impediment, 
 do not receive the sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, the 
 curate shall instruct him, that if he do truly repent him of. his 
 sins, and steadfastly believe that Jesus Christ hath suffered 
 death upon the cross for him and shed’ His blood for his 
 redemption, earnestly remembering the benefits he hath thereby, 
 and giving Him hearty thanks therefor, he doth eat and drink 
 the bods y ΤΥ, blood of our Saviour Christ profitably to his 
 soul’s health, although he do not receive the sacrament with 
 his mouth,” ?” 
 
 The man who is destitute of a lively faith, though he receive 
 the consecrated bread and wine, yet is in nowise* a partaker 
 of Christ. And the man who possesses a lively faith, though 
 he does not receive the consecrated bread and wine, yet he 
 doth eat and drink the body and blood of our Saviour Christ. 
 
 Language can go no farther than this, in unequivocal 
 explicitness; but language, the medium of reasonable com- 
 munication between man and man, is powerless against im- 
 pressions which are unreasonable; and therefore the most 
 conclusive arguments frequently fail of any practical and 
 permanent effects. The intellect may be posed, unable to 
 answer; nay, convinced that there is no real answer to give ; 
 
 1 Art, xxix. 2 Rubric Com. Sick. 
 ’ He profanes a sacred ordinance to his own hurt, but he is in nowise a par- 
 taker of Christ, because Christ is in nowise in the bread and wine. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 325 
 
 yet still the man, in what is really practical within him, is 
 not satisfied, and perseveres—he can assign no reason why— 
 in compliance with existing impressions. 
 
 Those who have lived long enough ‘in this world, and with 
 sufficient observation on what passes around: them, to be 
 themselves impressed with this truth, will not be very 
 sanguine as. to the practical results to be expected from con- 
 troversy, however unanswerable their arguments may be. 
 Neither is the evasion of such arguments always, or generally, 
 insincere; but the state of the affections interferes with the 
 pure operations of the intellect. The consecutive chain of 
 logical deduction is insensibly snapped asunder by the intrusion 
 of some feeling or association, and .the intellectual sorites 
 crumbles into inextricable confusion before the magic wand of 
 a pre-occupied heart. 
 
 If this pre-occupation have reached the conscience as well 
 as the affections, and the existing impression be, or be supposed 
 to be, a matter of faith ; then, to resist and reject with disdain 
 the plainest and most conclusive argumentation is invested 
 with all the imaginary heroism of a martyr’s fidelity unto 
 death. And thus the problem is solved: revelation is clear 
 and explicit; reason is close, conclusive, and unanswerable ; 
 yet transubstantiation survives in the unreasonably impressed 
 affections and consciences of sincere but deluded millions, Is 
 such sincerity an excuse? or can it be fairly pleaded in arrest 
 of judgment against the idolatry inseparable from this dogma 
 as received and used in the Church of Rome? If so, there is 
 no such thing as idolatry; because the millions of Asia pros- 
 trate before Vislinoo or Siiva are quite as sincere as the 
 millions of Europe prostrate before the consecrated wafer. 
 
 On the other hand, if it be just to charge with idolatry the 
 men who “bowed the knee to the image of Baal ”—notwith- 
 standing their profound sincerity—and to deny this is to reject 
 Holy Scripture at once—on what principle of right reason or 
 fair argument can it be unjust to charge with idolatry the 
 most sincere among the multitudes who bow the knee to the 
 image of Jesus, Mary, or Joseph? They do not consider it 
 
326 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 “idolatry !”? Be it so: neither did “the worshippers of, 
 Baal,” neither did the craftsmen at Ephesus, who shouted 
 “Great is Diana of the Ephesians,’ consider themselves 
 idolaters. 
 
 But here again reason is powerless against impressions ; 
 and men called liberal, and impressed with indifference—I 
 might without exaggeration say infidelity—reject arguments 
 they cannot answer, and, in defiance of both reason and 
 Scripture, continue to idolize sincerity as the touchstone and 
 turning-point of saving truth. 
 
 To-return, and to conclude. The expectation of the coming 
 again of our Lord Jesus Christ is involved in a scriptural 
 observance of the Lord’s Supper; which is expressly limited 
 to the period of His absence. This is an animating expecta- 
 tion; and with a few animating words upon it I will close 
 this chapter. 
 
 There is a secret and very cordial pleasure even in the 
 painstaking and fatigue of getting ready, and keeping ready, 
 for the arrival of a friend. Jesus is our Friend—our best, and 
 kindest, and most faithful Friend,—and “ He is coming.” It is 
 not, then, under the lash of a commandment grievous to be 
 borne, that we would stand in readiness, waiting for our Lord ; 
 but in the exercise of a watchful and prayerful diligence, 
 which, whatever self-denial it may require, “is full of sweet, 
 pleasant, and unspeakable comfort.” Wherever the love of 
 the Lord is, there the holy commandment ceases to be grievous, 
 because the heart’s desire is holiness. Wherever the love of 
 
 ! Lord Byron’s apology for the idolatries of Rome, vain as it is, is better 
 than this :— 
 
 “ The kindled marble’s bust may wear 
 More poesy upon its speaking brow 
 Than aught less than the Homeric page may bear ; 
 One noble stroke with a whole life may glow, 
 Or deify the canvas till it shine 
 With beauty so surpassing all below, 
 That they who kneel to idols so divine 
 Break no commandment, for high Heaven is there 
 Transfused, transfigurated.”’ 
 
 —Prophecy of Dante. Canto iv, 
 
Chasihes Militant on Earth. 327 
 
 the Lord is not, the commandment cannot but be grievous, 
 and will be either carelessly disregarded, or disingenuously 
 evaded, or wilfully disobeyed. 
 
 And yet Jesus,is the sinner’s Friend! He is indeed the 
 sinner’s Friend “ till He comes:” but—let the reader mark it 
 well—not when He comes. He came, and lived, and died the 
 Friend of publicans and sinners: of sinners of ‘all descriptions 
 without exception—thieves, drunkards, adulterers, blasphemers, 
 murderers, and even Pharisees :! their best Friend, opening the 
 veins of His body and the anguish of His soul, to pour forth a 
 rich flood of pardoning mercy to every one that believeth. In 
 this character He still presents Himself in the ministry of 
 reconciliation: in this character it is the privilege of His faith- 
 ful ambassadors again and again to proclaim Him amongst the 
 vilest transgressors—yes, and amongst the proudest and most 
 incorrigible moralists; imploring them in His name to be 
 reconciled to God, and urging upon them with tender and 
 affectionate earnestness, that “now is the accepted time, now 
 the day of salvation.” Believe in Jesus, feed on Him in thy 
 heart, and taste His pardoning blood. Believe in Jesus, feed 
 on Him in thy heart, and realize His holy unctiom. Believe 
 in Jesus, feed on Him in thy heart, eat, and live for ever. 
 Hear His own comfortable words unto all who truly turn to 
 Him: “Come unto me, all that travail and are heavy laden, 
 and I will refresh you.” Hear also what St. Paul saith: “This 
 is a true saying, and worthy of all men to be received, that 
 Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” Hear also 
 what St. John saith: “If any man sin, we have an advocate 
 with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He is the 
 propitiation for our sins.” 
 
 Now, to-day, while it is called to-day, matters stand thus, 
 and the gracious invitations are repeated. How long this 
 state of things may last, no man knoweth. While Jesus 
 remains absent, this is the state of things: but He is coming, 
 and when He comes, faith is at an end, and patience is at an 
 end; glory is come, and hell is come. — Believers are now wait- 
 
 1 St. Matt. xxi, 28—32, . 
 
328 The Church and the Churches. — 
 
 ing upon God by faith, and God is waiting upon unbelievers 
 in patience. But when Jesus comes there is no more waiting : 
 the barn for the wheat—glory, glory, glory; the whirlwind 
 and fire for the chaff—ruin, eternal ruin. 
 Believers, be ready. In the midst of all your sorrows, lift 
 up your heads and your hearts with joy, for your redemption 
 draweth nigh. In the midst of all your perplexities and 
 temptations, hold fast your confidence; for He in whom you 
 have placed it, and who will never disappoint you, draweth 
 nigh. In the midst of all your fears, maintain your bold 
 confession of Jesus; for He cometh, and whosoever shall be 
 found confessing Him before men, shall be confessed and 
 welcomed by Him gloriously before the angels of God. 
 Unbelievers, be ready. Behold, He is coming! Can you 
 
 resist His arm of power? Can you hush His thunder into 
 silence, or arrest His lightning in its flight? Can you break 
 the sword that is girded upon the thigh of Him whose name 
 is King of kings and Lord of lords? or extract the arrows of 
 His bow, which shall be found ‘sharp, in the hearts of the 
 King’s enemies? Can you dwell with everlasting burnings ? 
 Helpless rebel, submit! resistance is madness. Believe, and 
 be reconciled. 
 
 Believe, and show the reason of a man. 
 
 Believe, and taste the pleasure of a saint. 
 
 Believe, and wait with patience for the Lord. 
 
 Believe, and look with triumph on the tomb. 
 
 The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of 
 Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of 
 Christ? For we being many are one bread and one body, for we are all par- 
 takers of that one bread. Behold Israel after the flesh: are not they which 
 eat of the sacrifices partakers of the altar? (1 Cor, x. 16—18). 
 
 In these words of the apostle, the Christians at Corinth, and 
 all Christians, were referred to the history of the Jewish 
 people, “Israel after the flesh,’ for instruction on a very 
 important subject. That subject was idolatry. Its impor- 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 329 
 
 
 
 tance to the Corinthians at the time this was written was a 
 matter of actual practice from day to day. Its importance to 
 us now is chiefly the light and explanation thrown upon other 
 subjects by the apostle’s mode of discussing it. From the | 
 14th verse we learn that his object was to withdraw the 
 brethren from all idolatvous practices: “ Wherefore, my dearly 
 beloved, flee from idolatry.” 
 
 This is introduced with a wherefore (A.omep) as a conse- 
 quence from what has preceded; and in order to catch the 
 drift of the argument, and perceive the position which the 
 passage before us occupies in it, we must refer back to the 
 beginning of the 8th chapter, where the subject is intro- 
 duced : 
 
 “ Now, as touching things offered unto idols, we know that 
 we all have knowledge; knowledge puffeth up, but charity 
 edifieth ” (viii. 1). 
 
 We all know that there are no such beings as those whom 
 the Gentiles fancy they are worshipping. We know that 
 Jupiter and Juno and Diana were mere imaginations; that 
 no such beings have any real existence, or ever,had. This is 
 indeed sufficient for ourselves, and our duty in this matter 
 would be simple and easy if we had only ourselves to con- 
 sider; but it is our Christian duty to consider our brethren 
 also, for their edification. He who acts with reference to 
 himself alone, regardless of his brethren, is puffed up in his 
 selfish knowledge—“ Knowledge puffeth wp;” but he who 
 acts with reference to the brethren also, for their edification, 
 manifests brotherly love and charity—“Charity edifieth.” 
 Now, love is better than knowledge, “and if any man think 
 that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet as he 
 ought to know” (ver. 2). . 
 
 Knowledge that is selfish is thereby proved not to be of the 
 right kind; it may exist where there is no love of God, and 
 consequently no salvation. “But if any man love God, the 
 same is known of Him” (ver. 8). The apostle then proceeds 
 to apply- these general principles to his subject: “As concern- 
 ing therefore the eating of those things that are offered in 
 
 \ 
 
330 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 sacrifice unto idols we know that an idol is nothing in the 
 world, and that there is none other God but one. 
 
 “For though there be that are called gods, whether in 
 heaven or in earth (as there be gods many, and lords many), 
 
 “But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are 
 all things, and we in Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by 
 whom are all things, and we by Him” (vers. 4—6). 
 
 These verses describe the knowledge which was sufficient for 
 those who had it, considering themselves only as individuals ; 
 but they were bound to consider others also, who might be sin- 
 cere at heart, though not so enlightened in their understandings. 
 
 “ Howbeit, there is not in every man that knowledge; for 
 some with conscience of the idol, unto this hour, eat it as a 
 thing offered unto an idol; and their conscience being weak is 
 defiled” (ver. 7). 
 
 In itself indeed it is not vital in the sight of God. ‘ 
 
 “Meat commendeth us not to God; For neither if we eat 
 are we the better; neither if we eat not, are we the worse” 
 (ver. 8). But it is highly important as regards the brethren, 
 who with comparatively weak understandings may mistake 
 your outward action to mean what in you indeed it does not 
 mean, but what it would, and does mean in them: and thus 
 your selfish indulgence of what in you is Christian liberty, 
 based on Christian knowledge, may embolden them to do, 
 what in their state of mind is to them idolatry. “But take 
 heed lest by any means this liberty of yours become a 
 stumbling-block to them that are weak” (ver. 9). “For if 
 any man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the 
 idol’s temple, shall not the conscience of him which is weak 
 be emboldened to eat those things which are offered to idols ; 
 and through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for 
 whom Christ died? But when ye sin so against the brethren, 
 and wound their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ” 
 (vers. 10—12). Then follows the apostle’s personal determi- 
 nation in the matter. “ Wherefore, if meat make my brother 
 to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I 
 make my brother to offend” (ver. 13). 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 331 
 
 And having introduced himself by way of example, he 
 enlarges through the whole of the 9th chapter on his mission, 
 his duty, his practice; he then, at the opening of this 10th 
 chapter, introduces a reference to Jewish history for further 
 instruction in this matter. The ancient Jews, in the days οἵ. 
 Moses, whom he calls “our fathers,” were privileged with 
 religious ordinances, as we are. They-had their baptism, as 
 we have ours; they had their communion, as we have ours; 
 they did all eat the same spiritual meat that we eat; it was 
 not literally the same, for theirs was manna, and ours is 
 bread ; but its spiritual meaning was the same: their manna 
 represented Christ, so also does our bread. They did all drink 
 the same spiritual drink that we drink ; it was not literally 
 the same, for theirs was water, and ours is wine; theirs was 
 shed from a rock, ours is blessed in a cup; but its spiritual 
 meaning was the same:.“ that rock was Christ ;” not of course 
 literally—it was stone, and remained stone, and what came out 
 of it was water; but spiritually they drank of that spiritual 
 drink ; and our cup is the New Testament in Christ’s blood, 
 not of course literally—it is silver, and remains silver, and 
 what comes out of it is wine; but, spiritually, we drink the 
 same spiritual drink. . 
 
 Those ordinances did not, however, in their case, and do not 
 in our case, insure salvation. 
 
 “With many of them God was not well pleased, for they 
 were overthrown in the wilderness” (x. 5). This is written 
 for our warning, to guard us against the evils by which they. 
 fell. After enumerating some of those evils, the apostle adds, 
 “Now all those things happened unto them for ensamples, 
 and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends 
 of the world are come.” “ Wherefore, let him that thinketh 
 he standeth, take heed lest he fall” (vers. 11, 12). 
 
 Then, for the consolation and encouragement of the brethren, 
 lest such an awful example should dishearten them, he says, 
 “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common 
 to man; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be 
 tempted above that ye are able, but will with the temptation 
 
332 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it” 
 (ver. 13). 
 
 And so he returns to his main exhortation, which is, that 
 they should flee idolatry. In this matter there was no 
 hidden mystery of divine depth, such as he recognises in 
 other branches of the subject, and declares to be beyond 
 man’s understanding; on the contrary, he here invites an 
 exercise of their wisdom and judgment: “I speak as to wise 
 men, judge ye what I say ” (ver. 15). 
 
 He then illustrates his subject by a twofold reference—first, 
 to the Lord’s Supper among Christians; and, second, to those 
 sacrifices, a part of which was eaten among the Jews; and so 
 returns to the matter of the idols’ temples, in which he shows 
 no Christian ought to worship ; and the feasts in such temples, 
 in which he shows no Christians ought to eat: because, although 
 what the Gentile worshippers called an idol was a nonentity, 
 as he had before stated, yet, in point of fact, the beings really 
 served in those temples and at those feasts were the fallen 
 angels; and it was impossible for any man to combine the 
 service of devils with the service of God. 
 
 To eat of things consecrated to worship in any temple, is 
 to have fellowship with him, whoever or whatever he may be, 
 who is worshipped in that temple. This is a general prinéiple 
 to all: behold the Jews who did eat of the sacrifices had 
 fellowship (κοινωνοὶ εἰστ) with the altar; that is, with God 
 as He was there revealed, the object of worship among the 
 Jews. 
 
 Behold the Christian Church, the Christians who eat the 
 bread which we break, and drink the cup which we bless, 
 have fellowship (xowwvia) with the body and blood of Christ ; 
 that is, with God as He is now revealed, the object of worship 
 among Christians. Behold the Gentiles; shall I say that the 
 Gentiles who eat in their temples, and all who eat with them, 
 have fellowship in like manner with their idols? No; for 
 the idol is nothing at all; but. this I say, that whatever 
 imaginary beings the Gentiles may fancy to themselves as 
 the object of their worship, they are in fact and reality 
 
Churches Mihtant on Earth. 334 
 
 worshipping devils, and I would not that ye should have 
 fellowship (xowwvovs ἰνεσθαι) with devils. It is in compatible 
 with the worship of God. 
 
 “Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of 
 devils; ye cannot be partakers of the Lord’s table, and of 
 the table of devils” (ver. 21). 
 
 Such was the apostle’s solemn decision in this question of 
 the idols’ temples ; and when we remember that the worship 
 so characterised and condemned, and from which all Christians 
 were so peremptorily commanded to absent themselves, was 
 the worship of the empire, established, and endowed, and 
 protected by the civil power, in all its gorgeous ceremonies ; 
 the worship of men of letters and of arts, who lavished, in its 
 honour and embellishment, their richest stores of poetry and 
 painting and sculpture and music; the worship of the people 
 living in their prejudices and habits, and connected with the 
 secular interests of so many thousands of craftsmen; we shall 
 learn to appreciate the bold and holy fidelity of the man of 
 God, who thus pronounced sentence of condemnation upon it. 
 Through the power of God graciously working with, and con- 
 firming the words of, His servants, this decision of the apostle, 
 followed by its legitimate results among the brethren, exor- 
 cised the Pantheon, silenced the oracles, and closed the temples 
 of Paganism, and in the sequel led all classes of the great 
 community, from the emperor to the common soldier and’ 
 day-labourer, to eat of the bread which we break, and to 
 drink of the cup which we bless. “ 
 
 And now, returning on this, let us briefly derive instruction 
 to ourselves from the apostle’s illustrations of his subject. 
 One of them was taken from the Lord’s Supper; the truth 
 concerning it was clear to the Corinthian Christians, while 
 concerning the heathen worship they were still in darkness 
 and doubt, and difference amongst themselves. We may now 
 use the passage conversely, because the truth in the matter 
 of heathenism is now clear to us, but we are still involved 
 in difficulty and differences about the Lord’s Supper. 
 
 I ask, then, 
 
. 3324 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 When the’ Gentiles were eating the sacrifices in their 
 temples, and holding jellowship with devils, as we here 
 learn they did, were they eating the devils? Surely not; 
 they were holding fellowship with them spiritually, but not. - 
 eating them. 
 
 When the Jews were eating the sacrifices in the tabernacle, 
 and holding fellowship with the altar, as we here learn they 
 did, were they eating the altar? Surely not: they were 
 holding fellowship with it spiritually, but not eating it. 
 When Christians are eating the bread which we break, and 
 drinking the cup which we bless, and holding fellowship with _ 
 the body and blood of Christ, as we here learn they did; are. 
 they eating the body and blood of Christ? By the force of 
 the apostle’s illustrations and parallel, surely not; they are 
 holding fellowship with the body and blood of Christ 
 spiritually, but not eating it. 
 
 What, then, though some persons, or many persons, call this 
 spiritual fellowship by the name of eating and drinking, is it 
 really eating and drinking? It is indeed to the spiritual and 
 immortal part of a Christian, what eating and drinking are 
 to his natural body; and therefore it may well and truly be 
 called eating and drinking ; because the spirit of man may 
 well and truly, and very intelligibly, be said to hunger and 
 thirst, to eat and drink, as well as his body ; and therefore 
 the act which satisfies his spirit may be called eating and 
 drinking, as well as the act, or acts, which satisfy his 
 body. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE CHURCHES "OF CHRIST MILITANT HERE ON EARTH—THEIR 
 MINISTRY AND CONNEXION WITH THE CIVIL RULER. 
 
 A Religion with its Doctrines Revealed: A Society with its Officers Founded— 
 The Christian Ministry—Clearly Distinguished from the Lay Members 
 of the Churches—Their Duty—Difference between Christ’s Language to 
 His inspired Apostles, and St. Paul’s Language to his uninspired Successor 
 —Their Authority— Derived from the Word of God—Limited by the same 
 —In Matters of Faith, no Addition to, or Subtraction from: In Matters 
 of Ceremony, no Opposition to the Written Word—Members of the Church 
 Subjects of the State—Inevitable Connexion—The Civil Ruler—Absolute— 
 Mixed—Who are Rulers in England ?—Duty of Rulers. 
 
 It has pleased God not only to reveal a religion, but also to 
 found a society among men. The religion has its peculiar 
 doctrines and ordinances, and the society has its peculiar 
 officers and government. The doctrines must be preached 
 and the ordinances administered ; and the persons intrusted 
 with these important functions must be under adequate 
 superintendence for the securing of efficiency and order, and 
 the correction of abuse and irregularity, should any arise. 
 In addition to the rules which God has given for the govern- 
 ment of His society upon earth, and which are general, other 
 and more particular rules have been added by men. These 
 have not been altogether and everywhere the same ; and they 
 may in many things be different, “according to diversities of 
 countries, times, and men’s manners,’* so that all be done 
 - with due deference to what God Himself has ordained, and 
 nothing in opposition to it. When the rules introduced by 
 
 } Art, xxxiy., Church of England. 
 
336 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 men are in opposition to the Word of God, the society adopt- ΄ 
 ing them ceases to be a Church, and ceases to deserve the 
 name of.a Church. But short of this, the diversities which 
 may be introduced without any direct opposition to the Word 
 of God, have led to the formation among men of many 
 societies; differing from one another in many particulars, to 
 which the members of each are so wedded, that all attempts at 
 amalgamation must of necessity be fruitless ; and yet, in the 
 sight of God, and for all the essential purposes of salvation, 
 there may still be but one society. : 
 
 We are now to consider the officers of that society: the 
 Christian ministry—its appointments—its duty-—its authority, 
 and the limit of its authority, in connexion with the duty of 
 the lay members of the Churches, and especially of the civil 
 “ powers that be.” ° | 
 
 I. On the appointment of the Christian ministry, I need 
 not say much in this place, having already printed and pub- 
 lished to an eighth edition, a full statement of my views and 
 convictions on the subject.’ 
 
 1 Lectures on the Church. See Lecture Second, on ordination, succession, 
 the power of the keys, etc. On the power of the keys, I may here add the 
 confirming testimony of Bishop Jewell, who, though classed among “ irreverent 
 dissenters,” by Romanising deserters from the English Church, will ever be 
 considered a faithful and wise witness for the truth, both scriptural and eecle- 
 siastical, by all sound,and consistent Churchmen. The work of his from 
 which I now quote, comes to us with more than the weight of his individual 
 opinion, as it received the sanction of Convocation :— 
 
 “ We say that Christ has given to His ministers the power of binding and 
 loosing, of opening and shutting. And we say that the power of loosing con- 
 sists in this, that the minister, by the preaching of the gospel, offers to dejected 
 minds and true penitents, through the merits of Christ, absolution; and doth 
 assure them a certain remission of their sins, and the hopes-of eternal salvation ; 
 or secondly. reconciles, restores, and receives into the congregation and unity 
 of the faithful, those penitents, who by any grievous scandal or known and 
 public offence, have offended the minds of their brethren, and, in a sort, alienated 
 and separated themselves from the common society of the Church and body of 
 Christ. And we say the minister doth exercise the power of binding or shutting, 
 when he shutteth the gate of the kingdom of heaven against unbelievers and 
 obstinate persons, and denounceth to them the vengeance of God and eternal 
 punishment; or excludeth out of the bosom of the Church, those that are 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 337 
 
 
 
 I see no reason to withdraw or modify that statement, 
 either with regard ‘to the nature of the apostolical commission, 
 or to the essential difference between the Lord’s appointment 
 
 publicly excommunicated; and that God Himself doth so far approve whatever 
 sentence His ministers shall so give, that whatsoever is either loosed or bound 
 by their ministry here on earth, He will in like manner bind or loose, and con- 
 firm in heaven. The key with which these ministers do shut or open the 
 kingdom of heaven, we say with St. Chrysostom, is the knowledge of the Scrip- 
 ture ; with Tertullian, is the interpretation of the law; and with Eusebius, is 
 the Word of God. We say the disciples of Christ received this power (from 
 Him), not that they might hear the private confessions of the people, and 
 catch their whispering murmurs, as the Popish priests everywhere now do, and 
 that in such a manner as if all the force and use of the keys consisted only in 
 this; but that they might go and preach and publish the gospel, that so they 
 might be a savour of life unto life to them that did believe; and that they 
 might be also a savour of death unto death to those that did not believe: that 
 the minds of the pious, who were affrighted with the sense of their former ill 
 lives and errors, after they beheld the light of the gospel, and believed in Christ, 
 might be opened by the Word of God, as doors are with a key; and that the 
 wicked and stubborn, who would not believe and return into the way, might 
 be left, shut up, and locked, and, as St. Paul expresseth it (2 Tim. iii. 13), 
 might waa worse and worse. This we take to be the meaning of the keys, and 
 that in this manner the consciences of men are either bound or loosed. We 
 say that the priest is a judge; but then we say with St. Ambrose, that he hath 
 not the right of any dominion, and therefore Christ reprehended the Scribes 
 and Pharisees with these words, that He: might reprove their negligence in 
 teaching (Matt. xxiii. 13: Luke xi. 52). Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, 
 for ye have taken away the key of knowledge, and shut up the kingdom of 
 heaven against men. Seeing then the key, by which a passage is opened for 
 us into the kingdom of heaven, is the word of the gospel, and the interpretation 
 of the law and the Scriptures, where there is no such word there is no key. 
 And seeing the same word was given to all, and the key which pertains to all 
 is but one, we say that the power of all ministers, as to binding and loosing, 
 is one and the same ; and we say, that'even the Pope himself, notwithstanding 
 his flatterers do so sweetly sooth him up with these words (Matt. xvi. 19), “I 
 will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven,’ as if they belonged to 
 him, and to no other mortal under heaven,—except he makes it his business to 
 tend and subdue the consciences of men to the Word of God ;—we deny that 
 even he (as I said) can either open or shut, or hath at all the keys; and 
 although he doth teach and instruct the people (which I wish he would | 
 ‘sometimes do truly, and at last be persuaded to believe it is at least some part 
 of his duty and office), but yet, if he did so, his key would be neither better 
 nor greater than that of others: for who made the difference? Who taught 
 him to open more learnedly, or absolye more powerfully, than his brethren ?” 
 —Jewell’s Apology, chap. ii. § 8. 
 22 
 
338 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 of the apostles, and their appointment of their successors. It 
 is enough for my present purpose to revert to the facts, that 
 there was such an appointment, and that there ‘has continued, 
 and does still continue, such a succession ; not necessarily, or 
 as I think, possibly traceable link after link, in any one par- 
 ticular bishopric, whether of Crete after Titus, or of Ephesus 
 after Timothy; but generally an Episcopal succession as un- 
 deniable on the face of history, as that there has been a 
 succession of monarchs on the thrones of Europe, or generals 
 in command of the armies of the nations. 
 
 The distinction between the MINISTRY of the Churches, and 
 the great body of the members, is made as plain in Holy 
 Scripture as words can make anything. I might with truth 
 say, plainer: because it does not rest on words alone, however 
 explicit, but is exhibited in symbols also. The Divine Head of 
 the Church, when giving instructive visions, as well as instrue- 
 tive messages, to ne beloved disciple in Patmos, showed him 
 seven ἐν αι to represent the seven Churches of Asia; but 
 instead of allowing him to imagine that the ministers of pies 
 Churches were included in this representation, He presented 
 to his view seven stars also, and informed him that these 
 represented the seven angels, or messengers, or chief ministers 
 of the Churches (Apoce. i. 20). Compare 2 Cor. viil. 23, where 
 ministers are called “the messengers of the Churches, and the 
 glory of Christ.” 
 
 This is conclusive for a continued ministr y after the apostles, 
 because not one of the apostles themselves was then presiding 
 over any of these seven Churches. It might with probable 
 truth be said that St. John was the only one of the apostles 
 alive at the time. There was, therefore, by divine institution, 
 not only a temporary appointment in the persons of the 
 apostles at the commencement of the Christian Churches, but 
 also a standing ministry in those Churches. 
 
 St. Paul makes this distinction very clear, illustrating it by 
 the difference between workmen and the materials upon which | 
 ‘they work—labourers' and their husbandry—builders and the 
 building upon which they are engaged. “ We are labourers 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 339 
 
 together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s 
 building.” 1 
 
 This divine appointment of the Christian ministry invests it 
 with a grandeur and solemnity well calculated to quicken into 
 vigorous exercise the best energies, mental and bodily ; while 
 it awakens the most penetrating moral responsibilities of every. 
 man who holds the high commission. It is a blessing to the 
 world every way. Faithful ministers are directly a blessing, 
 as disturbers of the carnal security of fallen men; as living | 
 specimens as well as clear expositors of divine truth ; and as 
 channels of consolation, through the medium of their own 
 personal experience and prayerful sympathy.? And unfaithful 
 ministers! Alas, unhappymen! It is painful to contemplate 
 either their own miseries, or the wide-spread and disastrous 
 offences of which they are the occasion; yet even they, in the 
 wonder-working hand of God, whose prerogative it is to bring 
 good out of evil, are made in some respects a blessing. They 
 teach with a power and a plainness which mere words cannot 
 convey, that Christian character is not inseparable from 
 Christian privilege, however eminent; that baptism, the Lord’s 
 Supper, and laying on of hands, may all be in strict accordance 
 with the Lord’s commandment, where yet the lively image of 
 the Lord’s character is not. They loudly warn us therefore 
 not to depend, for our personal Christianity, upon our ecclesi- 
 astical privileges ; but to seek it in our closets and upon our 
 knees, in the exercise of personal piety. They warn the people 
 also to look, in every case, higher than the instrument em- 
 ployed ; that their faith may stand, not in the wisdom of man 
 but in the power of God. “For who is Paul?” inquires the 
 apostle, “and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, 
 even as the Lord gave to everyman? I have planted, Apollos 
 watered ; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that 
 planteth anything, neither he that watereth, but God that giveth 
 the increase. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are 
 one; and every man shall receive his own reward according to 
 his own labour.”? One, not one only man—Paul and Apollos 
 
 11 Cor. iii. 9. 22 Cor, i, 3—6. 391 Cor: 111, 5—8. 
 
340 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 were two—but one only ministry, one only ordinance of God, 
 comprising a variety of instrumentality in the great field of 
 labour ; and every man engaged in any branch or branches of 
 that labour, shall receive his own reward according to his own 
 labour. He who has faithfully laboured as a planter, shall 
 receive a planter’s reward ; and he who has faithfully laboured 
 as a waterer, shall receive a waterer’s reward ; he who labours as 
 a breaker-up of fallow ground, shall receive a breaker’s reward ; 
 and he who bears the lambs of the flock in his bosom, and 
 gently leads the weary and infirm, shall receive a shepherd’s 
 reward. No labour in the Lord shall be labour in vain. The © 
 reward is sure, not because the labourer deserves it, but because 
 the Lord has promised it; not the servant’s merit, but the 
 Master's veracity, is the groundwork of the glorious recom- 
 pense of the reward. 
 
 II. This leads to a consideration of the duty of the ministry. 
 Their first and highest duty is to “ preach the word,” all of it, 
 not easy and popular selections only, but “all the revealed will 
 of God.” 1 
 
 Upon one special and very important subject I invite atten- 
 tion—to the difficulty and duty of this impartiality. The in- 
 struction given to us in the Bible is not confined to those things 
 which are generally considered, and commonly called religious ; 
 it extends to those things also which are commonly called politi- 
 cal. In other words, it addresses itself to the duties of a man, 
 not only asan immortal individual with regard to God and the 
 world to come; but also as a member of civil society, with 
 regard to the government under which he lives, or of which 
 he may form a part, whether supreme or subordinate. Upon 
 this point, however, there exists a deep-rooted prejudice in the 
 minds of many who profess in all sincerity to receive the Bible 
 as a revelation from God. The faithful Christian pastor is 
 compelled to experience the action of this prejudice. Should 
 the gospel of the day contain the well-known words of our 
 Lord, “ Render unto Cesar the things that are Cvesar’s, and 
 
 1 Acts xx, 26, 27. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 345 
 
 unto God the things that are God’s,” the minister may read the 
 whole passage at the communion-table without exciting any 
 comment ; he may ascend his pulpit and preach from the latter 
 clause, enlarging upon the things that are God’s and upon 
 men’s duty with regard to them; he may repeat this Sunday 
 .after Sunday throughout the year, entering into details and 
 specifying particulars. No special notice is taken of this, He 
 is giving what is received, as a matter of course, as religious 
 instruction. But if, upon any one Sunday of the year, he 
 should, in the honesty and impartiality of his heart, select the 
 former clause for a text; and, treating it as he did the other, 
 enlarge upon the things that are Cesar’s and upon man’s duty 
 with regard to them, entering upon details and specifying 
 particulars, immediately the prejudice referred to is called 
 into action, he is “ political ;” all his religious instruction for 
 months is forgotten ; in this one trespass he is condemned, as 
 if his subject had no place in the revelation of which he is 
 an authorised interpreter. Yet his subject, and possibly his 
 manner of treating it, is as truly scriptural in the second case 
 as in the first. What, then, isthe duty of a minister of Christ’s 
 Church, solemnly commissioned to preach the word? | Is he to 
 yield to the force of existing prejudice, and wilfully to sup- 
 press, from month to month, and year to year,a portion of 
 that divine revelation? Is he for the sake of present peace to 
 become instrumental, however unintentionally, in forwarding 
 the designs of the disaffected, by leaving the institutions of 
 his country and the authority of her rulers dissociated from 
 the high sanction of the Word of God and the constraining” 
 - influence of Christian motives? Is he to deprive political 
 duties of all the sacredness and power of religious obligation ἢ 
 
 “Tt is required in stewards that a man be found faithful.” Ὁ 
 Suppose the case of a steward employed by a nobleman and 
 sent to the management of his estate. Upon making himself 
 acquainted with particulars, he perceives that certain fields 
 upon his lord’s property have been allowed to lie fallow and ~ 
 useless for years; and upon inquiry, he finds a strong prejudice 
 
 "1 Cor. iv. 2. 
 
342 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 among the tenantry against any attempt to cultivate those 
 fields). What becomes his duty? Is he to yield to the pre- 
 judice of the tenantry, and leave the fields uncultivated to the 
 detriment of his master’s interest; or is he to resist the pre- 
 judice, and advance, with caution and skill indeed, but with 
 unwavering determination, to reclaim the wastes, that they also 
 —not instead of the others, or to the neglect of any other, but 
 also, in addition to all the others—may yield a return to his 
 lord? | 
 
 The answer, in this case, is ready; and the epphoaa is 
 plain and convincing to “the stewards of the myst of 
 God. 
 
 It would be difficult to estimate the amount of damage 
 sustained by our own country, or the imminence of the present 
 danger to our national institutions, from the lack of this com- 
 prehensive impartiality in their treatment of the Word of 
 God by the ministers of our Church. 
 
 The writer of these pages heard a noble lord, who had been 
 a member of the House of Commons for above a quarter of a 
 century, declare in a very solemn way, that during all that 
 time he had been regular in his attendance at divine service in 
 some church in London, or in his parish church in the country ; 
 and that he had never once heard a word of Christian instrue- 
 tion addressed to legislators or magistrates with reference to 
 their official responsibilities, or the discharge of their official’ 
 duties. The natural consequence was—as Ἢ confessed in his 
 own case, and as far as he knew the same applied to his 
 brother members and justices—that religion was looked upon 
 as a matter of individual concern in private life, and wholly 
 detached from their public functions. This is the gangrene 
 which is consuming our true national strength; so that while 
 the grace of God is triumphing in the hearts of multitudes οἵ. 
 our fellow- -countrymen considered as private individuals, the 
 nation, as such, is proclaiming its infidelity, its incapacity to 
 know what is religious truth, as completely as if the Bible 
 had never been written, or as if it consisted of hieroglyphics 
 which had never been deciphered; or if not this, then worse 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 343 
 than this—its utter disregard of what it knows to be God’s 
 truth ; degrading it, for man’s present convenience and hollow 
 peace, to a level with divers falsehoods. 
 
 But while it is the duty of the ministers of the Churches of 
 Christ to treat the Word of God in their ministrations without 
 partiality, as well as without hypocrisy, it is equally their duty 
 to bear in practical remembrance that their commission extends 
 to nothing more than a ministry of the Word, the written 
 Word of God. It includes no general undefined authority, 
 either to do or to teach at their discretion. 
 
 This is the point. selected for especial enforcement in the 
 parting charge of the aged apostle. Writing to one of his 
 immediate successors in the ministry, who was then the bishop 
 of the Church of Ephesus, and having referred him to the Holy 
 Scriptures, whose sufficiency for wisdom unto salvation by faith, 
 and for thoroughly furnishing the man of God unto all good 
 works, he pointedly reiterates ; he then in all solemnity adds, “I 
 charge thee therefore, before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, 
 who shall judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and 
 His kingdom, preach the word ; be instant in season, out of 
 season,’ ! ete, 
 
 I cite this passage not merely for the sake of these plain 
 and solemn words considered directly in themselves, but still 
 more for the sake of a very instructive contrast between our 
 Lord Jesus Christ’s charge to His inspired apostles, and St. 
 Paul’s charge to his uninspired successor. Our Lord’s charge 
 is recorded in the twentieth chapter of St. John: “Then said 
 Jesus unto them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath 
 sent me, even so send I you. And when He had said this, He 
 breathed on them, and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy 
 Ghost ; whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto 
 them ; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.” ” 
 
 Here asimilitude is declared between the Father’s mission οἵ. 
 Christ, and Christ’s mission of the apostles, “As my Father sent 
 me, even so send I you ;” and an interesting question arises as 
 
 2 2 Tim: iv. 1,2. 2 86, John xx. 21—23, 
 
344 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 to how far, and in what respects, this similitude applies, and 
 was intended to apply. That it cannot be applied absolutely 
 in every respect, is obvious; because the Father sent the Lord 
 Jesus to be a sacrifice for sin, a propitiation through faith in His 
 blood, a substitute, suffering the just for the unjust: but the 
 Lord Jesus did not send the apostles even so ; they required a 
 sacrifice for their own sins, and could in nowise be a sacrifice 
 for the sins of others. Again, the Father sent the Son to he 
 the “ first-fruits” of the resurrection of the body ; to die indeed 
 in human flesh, but to see no corruption: the Son did not send 
 the apostles even 80, Peter and James and John and the rest 
 are dead and buried ; their bodies saw corruption, and are under 
 the power of it to this day. In these respects there is no 
 similitude, and, therefore, an absolute unqualified similitude 
 cannot be contended for. 
 
 It has been argued, from these words, that as the Father 
 sent Christ into the world to forgive sins, not independently 
 indeed and of Himself, but as the accredited messenger of, and 
 in conjunction with, the Father, even so Christ sent the 
 apostles into the world to forgive sins; not independently and 
 of themselves, but as the accredited messengers of, and in con- 
 junction with, Christ. 
 
 But, as far as the words before us are concerned, it might 
 with equal cogency be argued, that as the Father sent Chitiet 
 into the world “free from all spot of sin, original or actual,” 
 even so Christ sent the apostles into the world “free from all 
 spot of sin, original or actual.” 
 
 This is not pretended, notwithstanding the similitude 
 expressed in our Lord’s language. That similitude, therefore, 
 is not absolute, but must be moditied; our, adversaries in this 
 controversy themselves being the judges. 
 
 The question recurs, wherein consists the true force of our 
 Lord’s expression, even so? And it is scripturally answered 
 by referring to other parts of our Lord’s farewell addresses to 
 the eleven. He said, “ When the Comforter is come, whom I 
 will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth 
 which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of me: and 
 
Cheivthes Militant on Earth. 345 
 
 ye also shall bear witness, because ye have, been with me from 
 the beginning.”! Here their witness or testimony is combined 
 with the testimony of the Holy Ghost. And describing what 
 that is, the Lord said, “ When He, the Spirit of truth is come, 
 He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Him- 
 self; .... He shall glorify me; for He shall receive of mine, 
 and shall show it unto you. All things that the Father hath 
 are mine; therefore said I, that He shall take care of mine and 
 shall show it unto you.’”” 
 
 The testimony of the Spirit is not concerning Himself, but 
 concerning Jesus—“ He shall glorify me.’—“ He shall take of 
 mine and show it unto you.” The testimony of the Spirit is 
 to THE TRUTH, to “ God manifest in the flesh,” to the things of 
 the Father revealed in Jesus Christ. “He shall testify of me,” 
 said the Lord to the apostles, “and ye also shall bear witness ” 
 to the same truth. So far the similitude announced in the 
 expression “even so send I you,” does indeed apply. 
 
 ‘Jesus came into the world to bear witness to the truth. 
 So He says of Himself expressly. “ΤῸ this end was I born, 
 and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear 
 witness to the truth.”* Not that this was the sole object of 
 His mission; for elsewhere, as we have seen, other and won- 
 derful objects are assigned; but this was one, and an important 
 one. To this He was “sent by the Father,’ as He Himself 
 plainly announced in the synagogue at Nazareth, when He 
 read, and applied to His own mission, the language of the 
 prophet, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He hath 
 anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; He hath sent me 
 to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the cap- 
 tives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty 
 them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the 
 Lord.” * The Father sent the Son to bear witness to the truth. 
 The object of the mission of the Holy Ghost was, that He 
 should bear witness to the truth. With this the mission of 
 the apostles is combined, “ Ye also shall bear witness.” Here 
 
 1 St. John xv. 26, 27. 3 δύ, John xviii. 37. 
 2 δύ, John xvi. 13—15. * St. Luke iv. 17—19. 
 
346 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 we perceive the .true and only point of the application of our 
 Lord’s words even so. As the Father sent me to bear witness 
 to, the truth, and as I send the Holy Ghost in you to bear 
 witness to the truth, even so send I you into the world, and 
 ye also shall bear witness to the truth.’ 
 
 They did so. They proclaimed the truth of the invisible 
 God, as revealed in the incarnate Son. It was not themselves 
 as fallible men who spake, but the Holy Ghost spake in them 
 and by them, without any possibility of mistake. They bound 
 on earth what is bound in heaven, they loosed, they retained 
 and remitted, even as Jesus Himself did; so that it might be 
 truly said of their word as of His, “The word that I speak 
 unto you, the same shall judge you at the last day.”? : 
 
 Further. They not only spoke the truth, they wrote it 
 also, partly in the overruling providence of God throwing 
 some of them into situations where they could not continue, 
 without interruption, to speak it, as when St. Paul was 
 made a prisoner; and partly by the express commandment of 
 the Lord, as to St. John in Patmos, “ Write it in a book, and 
 
 1 ἐς When our Lord says that He sends the apostles, ‘as the Father had sent 
 Him,’ He must be understood to mean, that He sends them with the same design 
 with which He Himself came,—that of doing the work, and seeking the honour, 
 of Him that sent Him; that of propagating and establishing the kingdom of 
 the Messiah, by faith in His blessed gospel; also, that He sends them with the 
 same authority, so far as was necessary for compassing that design.”—Dean 
 Stanhope, apud Mant and D’Oyly, in loc. 
 
 “Our Lord here invests the apostles with as ample powers of preaching the 
 gospel themselves, and commissioning others so to do, as He Himself had been 
 intrusted with by God the Father.”—Dr. Nicholl, apud Mant and D’Oyly, in 
 loc. 
 
 “ Sicut tu me misisti,” etc. St. John xvii. 18. 
 
 “ Causa redditur, vel. i. cur hi supra alios auxilio Divino egeant, quia ΔΉ 
 munus suscepturi sint legationis pro Christo, 2 Cor, y. 20 ; Eph. vi. 80 ; vel. 2, 
 quare nolit adhuce eos auferi ὁ mundo, quia mittendi sunt ut per totum mundum 
 predicent ; et ut rite hoc officio fungantur, petit eos sanctificari. Illud καθὼς 
 aliquam, non omnimodam, congruentiam significat, in ipso scil, dogmate quod 
 erat predicandum, vel in eodem fine, nempe ut totam salutis doctrinam homi- 
 nibus tradant ; non auctoritate. Christus ἃ Patre se missum passim in hoe Libro 
 praedicat, nec raré in illo sensu docendi, Vide Esa. ᾿χὶ, 1.’—Luecas Brugensia, 
 Toletus, Beza, et Grotius, in P. 8. 
 
 2 St. John xii, 48, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 347 
 
 =e 
 
 
 
 send it unto the seven churches.”! And accordingly, the aged 
 Evangelist informs us concerning the things that are written ; 
 not indeed that they are all the things which were said and done 
 by Jesus, but that they were sufficient. “These are written, 
 that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; 
 and that believing, ye might have life through His name.” ” 
 
 Having caused such writings to be produced, the Lord 
 Himself caused them to be preserved. And thus, without 
 a perpetuity of plenary inspiration unto infallibility in any 
 man, the Churches of Christ militant here on earth are 
 supplied with infallible truth in perpetuity. The written 
 Word was completed, and in anticipation of this, when an 
 inspired apostle, about to finish his earthly course, addressed a 
 parting charge to one of his immediate successors in the 
 ministry of the Churches, he did not make use of any such 
 language as the Lord Jesus had used to the chosen vessels of 
 ‘inspiration. St. Paul did not say to Timothy or Titus, “ As the 
 Lord sent me, even so I send you;” he did not presume to 
 prolong that sound, but he said, “I charge you before the 
 Lord, preach the word !” 
 
 It was no part of Timothy’s commission to testify for him- 
 self, as if the Spirit of truth had been promised to him, as it 
 was to the apostles: his commission was to preach the Word, 
 and therefore his duty was to give attention to reading and 
 meditation, that he might profit in the knowledge of what 
 he was sent to teach. When Jesus commissioned the apostles, 
 He told them “to take no thought beforehand what they 
 should speak, neither to premeditate, but,” He added, “ what- 
 soever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it 
 is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost.”® When St. Paul 
 commissioned Timothy, his strain was wholly different. He 
 said, “ Till I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, 
 to doctrine: . . .,. meditate upon these things; give thyself, 
 wholly to them, that thy profiting may appear to all.” 4 
 
 Here, then, at this stage—if Holy Scripture be indeed taken 
 
 TOW Lol. 8 St. Mark xiii. 11. 
 2 St. John xx. 30, 31. 41 Tim. tv. 13, 15. 
 
348 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 as our guide—the “even so send I you” must be cut off for 
 ever. With the perfection of the inspired canon, and the 
 death of the last of the apostles, the “even so send I you” 
 was completely superseded by the “preach the word.” The 
 transition was not a gradual one, shading off among the 
 primitive fathers and ministers of the early Churches: it was 
 instantaneous and complete. Between plenary inspiration, 
 ‘and the want of it; between infallibility to compose “the 
 word,” and the duty of preaching the word as composed, 
 “there is a great gulf fixed.” To a ministry such as the 
 apostles exercised in person, no man can, I think, scripturally 
 lay claim; but a ministry such as the apostles delegated is, 
 with all its duties, dignities, and responsibilities, intrusted to 
 every man who is lawfully called thereto by prayer and the 
 laying on of hands. It would, therefore, be more strictly 
 correct to call the ministers of the Churches successors of 
 Timothy and Titus, than successors of the apostles. The com- 
 mission which Jesus gave to the apostles, they have ποῦ: the ¢ 
 commission which Paul gave to Timothy, they have. 
 
 1 “Tf Timothy and Titus declared the truth of God as correctly as Pan] and 
 Peter, then it might be said with equal truth to Timothy and Titus as to Paul 
 and Peter, Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and 
 whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained; whatsoever ye bind on earth, is 
 bound in heaven; and whatsoever ye loose on earth, is loosed in heaven. They 
 declared and pronounced to God’s people—God’s believing people, being 
 penitent—the forgiveness of sins unto salvation; and they declared and 
 pronounced, that he that believeth not shall be damned. 7 
 
 “ΤῊ this sense alone, it appears to me, and under this limitation, could this 
 branch of the apostolical commission be transmitted. And in this sense alone 
 does the Church seem to be justified in the use of her Lord’s awful words 
 in her services for ordination. Such use, so understood, is in character with all 
 her services. They are constructed for true Christian believers, and the 
 prayers offered in them are treated as prayers of faith, that is, prayers 
 answered :—According to that saying of the Lord, ‘ Whatsoever ye shall ask in 
 prayer, believing, ye shall receive.’ Prayer for the Holy Ghost upon the 
 candidate for the priesthood to replenish him with the truth of God's doctrine, ~ 
 being offered in faith and answered; he is addressed as under that divine 
 guidance and teaching which will cause his word of doctrine to be conformable 
 to the mind of God as stated by the apostles, and therefore binding and loosing 
 upon earth as it is bound and loosed in heaven. 
 
 “That it is in this sense, and understood according to this declaratory 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 340 
 
 Ill. The authority of the ministry. This is discussed in 
 inseparable connexion with the duty of the lay-members of 
 the Church towards their ministers. The duty of obedience 
 to the ordinances of God is not disputed among the members 
 of the Churches of Christ. Concerning the nature of those 
 ordinances, the best mode of their administration, and the 
 gracious benefits or dangerous responsibilities, or both, to be 
 derived from them, great differences of opinion exist, and 
 might have been reasonably anticipated; but upon the 
 question of obedience itself, wherever it can be shown that 
 God has commanded, there is no difference. All, or nearly all, 
 agree that the Lord Jesus Christ instituted baptism and the 
 Lord’s Supper, and that consequently it became the duty of 
 His disciples to observe those ordinances. 
 
 But another question arises when we approach the ordi- 
 nances of man , because here the sources of authority enjoining 
 the observance being fallible, and therefore in any one parti- 
 cular instance possibly in error, the duty of obedience seems 
 in every instance suspended upon the result of a preliminary” 
 inquiry as to whether the thing enjoined be right or wrong. 
 And this seems to imply that all parties have one common 
 standard of reference, in the light of whose permanent 
 authority that inquiry is to be conducted. 
 
 Upon the general duty of obedience to the lawfully-con- 
 stituted ministry of the. Christian Churches, St. Paul's 
 language is plain : “Obey them that have the rule over you, 
 and submit yourselves; for they watch for your souls, as they 
 that must give account.”! And the spirit in which this 
 obedience is to be rendered is beautifully described by the 
 same apostle in his first epistle to the Church of the Thessa- 
 lonians: “ We beseech you, brethren, to know them which 
 labour among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish 
 
 interpretation, the words are used by our own Church, a candid comparison of 
 her offices does, I think, make abundantly clear. It should, however, be borne 
 in mind that the words were not introduced into the ordinal of the Church 
 until the twelfth century.”—TZhe Author's Lectures on the Church, pp. 91, 92. 
 Kighth edition. 
 
 1 Heb. xiii. 17. 
 
350 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 you; and to esteem them very highly in love, for their work’s 
 sake.” } 
 
 Nothing can be more obvious than that these instructions 
 were given to the Christian laity, concerning the first pastors 
 or angels of the Churches. Obey your Church rulers, and 
 submit yourselves, for they are over you in the Lord. Their 
 official authority, in virtue of which they require your obedi- 
 ence, is not arrogated by man, but ordained of God, and 
 therefore submission is inculcated as a matter of conscience 
 towards God. : 
 
 As a general principle this is felt, and cannot but be felt, by 
 all who will yield consistent deference to the Holy Scriptures. 
 By many, however, it is felt to be inconvenient; and the 
 favourite mode of evading it as a divine ordinance, and 
 reducing it to a human compact, is to say, first, that the 
 pastors here spoken of by the apostle were all men of personal 
 piety, and preachers of scriptural truth; and then, secondly, 
 that obedience to them is enjoined in virtue of their character 
 altogether, and not at all in virtue of their office. Thus, 
 restraining the precept to such pastors as they are pleased to 
 consider faithful men, and to them only as long as they con- 
 tinue to give satisfaction to their judges, whose competence to 
 form a sound judgment is quietly taken for granted ; they get 
 _ wholly rid of the constraint of the divine injunction; which, 
 by this interpretation and this limitation, they render as 
 nugatory as any of their own maxims; and thereupon find 
 their conscience perfectly at ease while they make free, in 
 word and deed, with bishops, and Churches, and ordinances. 
 
 ~ 
 
 It is highly probable that most, if not all, of the first 
 
 pastors of the Churches were men of personal godliness, and 
 preachers of sound doctrines ; but it does by no means follow 
 that their, character was their entire qualification as pastors. 
 Nay, the very existence of pastors, as distinct from their 
 flocks, proves the contrary; or else it proves that in each 
 church there was but one godly man possessing the gift of 
 speech. For if all, or most of, the members of a church were 
 1 1 Thess. vy. 12, 13. 
 
 τς 
 
of that character, and if character, without ordination, quali- 
 _ fied for the ministry, then all, or most, were ministers, and 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 351 
 
 the distinction disappears. But we have already seen that the 
 distinction is scriptural, and therefore this interpretation of the 
 separatists must disappear. I earnestly disclaim any design 
 or desire to depreciate character, or to justify the wicked ; 
 far otherwise; but personal character is not my present 
 subject: I am proving the reality-and the authority of the 
 pastoral office. I deny not that this office has been too often 
 intrusted to unfit hands, and abused to the worst of purposes. 
 It has been in such sort abused as to be made the instrument 
 of lust and ambition, of avarice, and injustice, and sloth. 
 But still the office exists, and in those deplorable cases weighs 
 down the wretched renegade who holds it, under its increased 
 responsibilities and aggravated judgments. It will be said that 
 this is to ascribe an opus operatum to a mere manual cere- 
 mony. But let us not be deterred by hard words. If the 
 opus referred to be an increased responsibility, then truly 
 there is an opus operatum in the reception of every Christian 
 privilege, and of this among the rest. The privilege of in- 
 struction in our Lord’s will incurs the penalty of many stripes 
 if that will be not obeyed. The privilege of Christian ordi- 
 nances transfers a community from the more tolerable condition 
 of Tyre and Sidon, into the more intolerable responsibility of 
 Chorazin and Bethsaida. And the privilege of the Christian 
 ministry exposes the unworthy intruder to a deadlier condem- 
 nation. This is not merely gathered by general inference, but 
 seems to be the direct and obvious meaning of St. James, 
 where he says in his catholic epistle to the twelve tribes, 
 My brethren, be not many masters, she that we shall 
 receive the greater condemnation. 
 
 But to return to the authority of the ministry of the 
 Churches: although, as regards MATTERS of FAITH, we are 
 bound to look upon ourselves as the immediate successors of 
 the apostolical Churches, and utterly to reject any addition to 
 the Scriptures, or any pretended development which amounts 
 to an addition ; yet as regards rites, and ceremonies, and forms 
 
352 The Church and the Churches, 
 
 
 
 of worship, we are not, I conceive, at liberty to look upon our- 
 selves as immediate successors of those first Churches, as 
 though no ordinance of man had intervened. 
 
 This distinction between matters of faith to be believed for 
 salvation, and rites and ceremonies instituted for the preserva- 
 tion of decency and order, is neither fanciful nor arbitrary. It 
 is not a quibble of carnal men, conveniently invented for the 
 propping up of a Babylonish fabric, as it has been rashly 
 represented. It is strictly scriptural. The Bible proclaims its 
 own sufficiency as regards matters of faith. Paul informs 
 Timothy that the Holy Scriptures are able to make him wise 
 unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus; and 
 adds that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is 
 profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for istruc- 
 tion in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, 
 thoroughly furnished unto all good works (2 Tim. 11]. 15—17). 
 But as regards institutions and ceremonies of order, the Bible » 
 proclaims its own insufficiency. The apostle enjoins upon the 
 brethren to submit themselves to the rulers, which would be 
 worse than useless if the rulers had no authority to command ἢ 
 anything beyond the letter of the Scripture. To the Corin- 
 thian Church the apostle says, Let all things be done decently 
 and in order ; and again he says, The rest will I set vm order 
 when I come ; and to Titus he says, For this cause left I thee in 
 Crete, that thow shouldest SET IN ORDER THE THINGS THAT ARE 
 WANTING, and ordain elders in every city as I had appointed 
 thee. The Scriptures contain no detailed description of how 
 Paul set things in order at Corinth, or Titus in Crete; and the 
 omission was designed that other Churches in different cir- 
 cumstances, and ages, and climates, might enjoy Christian 
 liberty, while with wisdom and discretion they set things in 
 order for themselves. The reason and the mercy of this are 
 obvious, in a religion which was designed to extend to the 
 north and to the south, to the east and to the west,—a religion 
 which was to gather its converts from the most cultivated 
 and the most barbarous of human tribes, and assemble its 
 congregations in every varying latitude, from the burning 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 353 
 
 sands of Guyana and Peru to the icebergs on the coast cf 
 Norway. 
 
 It follows, then, that the Bible was never designed to be 
 a sufficient guide in all the details of management in the 
 Churches of Christ. It is all-sufficient in principle. It invests 
 the Church rulers with true authority to enter into details; 
 and it binds the members of the Church to yield submission — 
 to the details so prescribed, though they be not written in the 
 Bible. In no case upon earth is it possible for the ultimate 
 end of legislative authority to be the immediate director in 
 every detail of the executive. Therefore general orders are 
 indispensable as the groundwork of delegated authority. To 
 THIS INFIRMITY OF HUMAN MANAGEMENT THE LORD HAS CON- 
 DESCENDED IN THE HISTORY OF His CaurcH. He has em- 
 ployed the instrumentality of human rulers. The rulers are 
 those who in the providence of God have the rule, whatever 
 may be the form of Church government. General orders are 
 given in the Bible; delegated authority is intrusted to the 
 rulers of the Christian Churches ; and every regulation, every 
 ceremony decreed by those rulers, (and not contradicted by 
 Scripture,) comes to the mind, and commands the obedience, of 
 a Christian Churchman upon the ultimate authority of Scrip- 
 ture itself. 
 
 To deny this power would be to supersede the use of the 
 ministry as a standing institution for the preservation of 
 decency and order; since those things which are in the Scrip- 
 tures left at large, such as the mode, for instance, of celebrating 
 the Lord’s Supper, the times and places of joint religious wor- 
 ship, etc.—if these, I say, unspecified points which must be 
 determined by some one,-are not to be determined by the 
 ministry of the Churches, in each country respectively, one of 
 the purposes for which Jesus Christ instituted this society is 
 defeated; since if she has any authority at all (which 
 He expressly gave her), and has none in matters deter- 
 mined in Scripture, she must have it in things wndetermined 
 in Scripture..... “In matters of discipline, the positive 
 institutions of the Church make things right.and wrong which 
 
 23 
 
354 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 were left undetermined in Scripture—such as the observance 
 of religious festivals, forms of public worship, administration 
 of the sacraments, and things of that nature. And to disre- 
 gard the authority of the Church in matters of this deserip- _ 
 tion, (I mean, of course, in such cases where there is nothing 
 ordained that is against Seripture,) to consider things which 
 were originally indifferent, as indifferent after the Church has 
 enacted regulations respecting them, is an offence against 
 ’ Christ Himself, the Head of that body ; not so great an offence, 
 I allow, as direct rebellion against His own immediate com- 
 mands, but as truly an offence. For Christians should remem- 
 ber that they cannot obey, in many instances, even the express 
 commands of Scripture, unless they comply either with some 
 kind of ecclesiastical discipline, or with some unauthorized 
 devices of their own instead. Our Saviour expressly com- 
 mands the celebration of the holy communion, and St. Paul 
 the assembling of Christians, for the purpose of prayer and 
 religious exhortation. Now these things must be done in some 
 time, place, and form, if the commands are to be obeyed at 
 all; and if each follows his own fancy in these points, there 
 will be divisions among Christians; they will come together 
 not for the better, but for the worse, like the disorderly Corin- 
 thians, of whom everyone had a psalm, had an exhortation, 
 had an interpretation, etc., which led to confusion and discord, 
 all which are expressly forbidden in Scripture itself.”? 
 
 What would be said to the colonel of a regiment who, on 
 receiving certain detailed orders from the general of brigade, 
 replied, I will not obey them; I have here the articles of war, 
 which I received from the commander-in-chief, and they con- 
 tain no mention of these orders? No. But do they not 
 contain a general order of obedience to your superiors in com- 
 mand, and does not that endorse all these? Equally unrea- 
 sonable and unscriptural is it in any man to say, I will not 
 conform to such or such a ceremony of the Church, because 
 there is no mention made of it in the Scripture. He has the 
 Bible in his hand commanding him to obey the rulers of the 
 
 1 Letters on the Church, by an Episcopalian, pp. 68—665, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 359 
 Church. The rulers say, Do this; and he replies, No, I will 
 not do it, because it is not specified in the Bible! The soldiers 
 and servants of the Gentile centurion shall rise up in the 
 judgment with such a man, and shall condemn him. For that 
 centurion was exercising a delegated authority under general 
 orders, and when he gave particular orders to those under him 
 they obeyed him. He said to one, Go, and he went; and to 
 another, Come, and he came ;. and to his servant, Do this, and 
 he did it. And verily, in the application of this, we may 
 truly say, “A greater than the centurion is here.” 
 
 Imagine the case of a nobleman’s or gentleman’s family, 
 wherein there is a large retinue of servants. Two of these 
 servants are, or fancy themselves, converted characters, while 
 all the rest of the family are worldly-minded to an excess. 
 These two are persecuted as spies by their fellow-servants, and 
 despised as canting methodists by their master. If they pray, 
 they must pray by stealth ; if they read, they must hide their 
 book the moment any one approaches; if they attend a church 
 where the gospel is preached, they must endure reproach and 
 scorn and scoffing for it; if they go out to enjoy communion 
 with a Christian neighbour, they must do it at the risk of 
 losing their places. Well, this they think is.quite delightful ; 
 —the people of God, say they, have been always sufferers. It is 
 refreshing to the spirit to have the high privilege of enduring 
 patiently for righteousness’ sake; but woe to the persecuting 
 tyrants who oppress God’s dear little ones:! 
 
 After some time their master becomes a religious character, 
 and establishes family worship in his house. 
 
 He commands all his servants to assemble at nine o’clock, 
 morning and evening, for reading the Scriptures. and prayer. 
 Then those two servants say, No! no human authority has a 
 right to dictate to us when we shall pray. Our religion is 
 between ourselves and God; such orders from man are a 
 tyrannical control over the conscience. This is a bigoted, 
 Popish family. What! fix nine o'clock every day for prayer, 
 like an ancient Pharisee! No, truly, real prayer is spiritual. 
 The kingdom of Christ is not of this world. Our vital godli- 
 
356 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 ness will be compromised by a Babylonish alliance with this 
 family. We will not go to family prayer! 
 
 Is not this a counterpart of the objections of many to the 
 ecclesiastical discipline of the Church of England?* And is 
 
 1 I have said ecclesiastical discipline, originating as it did, and superin- 
 tended, as it is, by the lawfully-appointed officers of the ecclesiastical society. 
 ‘Were it not for the pertinacity with which unproved, and disproved, accusa- 
 tions are unblushingly reiterated, it would be needless to refer to the charge 
 urged by dissenters against the Church of England, that her order and rule, 
 her faith and ordinances, are all laid down by the civil powers ; that her 
 officers, high and low, are all appointed, and paid, and governed by the State, 
 like the police. ; 
 
 Tt is almost incredible that the men who continue to advance this charge 
 can continue to think it justly applicable. It is, indeed, true that lay members 
 of the society, whether the sovereign or others, have power to select from 
 among the ordained’ ministers of the Church those whom they may prefer, to 
 fill certain stations of temporal emolument, combined with opportunities to 
 dispense spiritual instruction. But it is wholly untrue that the civil power, in 
 any or all of its branches, can appoint, or compel to the appointment of, any 
 single minister of the Church. 
 
 It is true that the State may, and ought to, judge of the doctrines which any 
 Christian society has announced its determination to teach; and may give, or 
 withhold, countenance and support to that society, according to the judgment 
 so formed. The English Church, as a Christian society, has plainly announced , 
 these doctrines which it is her determination to teach. The State may give, 
 or withhold, countenance and support to her while so teaching. But, it is 
 grossly untrue to say that the State dictates, or has power to dictate, a single 
 article of her faith. It is true that the civil power governs, and ought to 
 govern, the ministers of the Church, in common with all the other subjects of 
 the realm, in things concerning which God has issued no commandment; but 
 it is altogether untrue that the State governs, or has power to govern, any 
 “minister of the Church of England, to act in opposition to the Word of God. 
 
 Adverting historically to its: commencement, I have already thus described 
 the connexion between the Church and State; the Christian Church, con-— 
 sidered as a society, including many subjects of. the realm, and the State, con- 
 sidered as the civil ruler over the whole realm :— 
 
 “ The Christian society, constituted as we have seen, supplied an instrumen- _ 
 tality for the conversion to the faith of the gospel, or at least to a profession of 
 that faith, not of subjects only, but of sovereigns also. God is no respecter of, 
 persons or ranks, on either side. True it is, indeed, that. from reasons con- 
 nected with the pride of human intellect, with the possessions, honours, and 
 consequent entanglements of this world, not many wise men of the flesh, not 
 many rich, not many noble, received the testimony of the gospel to the saving ~ 
 of their souls: still there were some,—some at the very outset, in Czesar’s house- 
 hold; and the instrumentality which reached and subdued them, was power-— 
 
 
 
Churches Militant on res 357 
 
 it not the secret pride of independence, the instinctive insubor- 
 dination of the natural heart, which lies at the root of such. 
 boasted love of spirituality ? If you leave me alone to please - 
 myself, I will do many things. It is a secret gratification to 
 me to be the originating source of my own actions; it flatters 
 my self-importance; but if any human authority command. 
 me to do it, so that in doing it I must practise submission, 
 
 and acknowledge my own comparative littleness, then 1 won’t 
 
 do it. When man orders it, it ceases to be religion, for there 
 is no respect of persons with God ! 
 
 If there be ridicule in this illustration, it is not-used in a 
 spirit of mockery; but as a lawful, because a scriptural 
 weapon, when used in seriousness of reproof. 
 
 It may be profitable here to advert briefly to the difference, 
 in point of sanction, between the authority of the ministry of 
 
 ful, in God’s good time, to reach and subdue their imperial master. No 
 sovereign, so reached and brought personally under Christian influence, could 
 be blind to the efficiency of such an instrumentality, or insensible to the weight 
 of responsibility devolving upon himself, with regard to the use he should 
 make, or at the least endeavour to make of it, on behalf of his people. Becom- 
 ing personally a member of Christ’s Church, he became responsible not only 
 for the performance of his guondam duties as a sovereign, from new principles, 
 but also for the performance of new duties as a Christian sovereign, providen- 
 tially placed in a condition to avail himself of a new Christian instrumentality. _ 
 
 * Accordingly, where the Christian society extended itself so as to reach the 
 throne as well as the cottage, kings and princes availed themselves of the 
 officers and ordinances of the Church; they did not attempt to create other 
 officers, or impose other ordinances, but, using what they found already in 
 operation, they made God's instruments for eternal salvation to be at the same 
 time, and by the same means, their instruments for national civilisation, sub- 
 ordination, and peace. The rulers of this world require such instrumentality ; 
 because their subjects are men, intelligent, responsible, immortal creatures, 
 who cannot be properly managed in time—possessing and not abusing liberty 
 —unless they are under instruction for eternity. And the ministers of the 
 Christian Church rejoice in being so employed, because they are thereby 
 enabled to enlarge the sphere of their gracious labours, carrying the name and 
 truth οὗ their heavenly Master into every nook and corner of their earthly 
 Master’s dominions. 
 
 “Tt is as means towards the attainment of that end, as scaffolding towards 
 the erection of that building, and not for their own sakes, that we supremely 
 value our own nationally established Dg ares ’—Lectures on the Church, 
 pp. 120, 121. : 
 
358 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 the Church, and the authority of the civil magistrate. They 
 are both “powers that be,” they are both therefore binding 
 upon the consciences of Christian men. But in the case of 
 the one there is a judge, and a jail, and a scaffold: in the case 
 of the other, there is (and ought to be) nothing of this kind. 
 The Church, with all her discipline, even if maintained unto 
 excommunication, may be despised with present impunity. 
 The magistrate may not be so despised. If the fear of God 
 were upon men, they would respect the authority of the rulers 
 of the Church as much as those of the State, for both are 
 ordained of God, and obedience. to both is commanded in the 
 Word of God. But the weapons of the Church’s warfare are 
 not carnal. Like her divine Head, she is in the world, “ not 
 to destroy men’s lives, ‘but to save them” (St. Luke ix. 
 54—56). So far.as she imbrbes His spirit, toleration is her 
 preference; and so far as she follows His example, toleration 
 is her practice. The Church of Rome did indeed discard 
 toleration both in theory and practice. And in every age, 
 fanaticism, verifying the adage that extremes meet, has dis- 
 carded it in theory; her practice being restrained apparently 
 only by her impotence, or by some lingering though reluctant 
 deference to public opinion, which she is not able wholly to 
 shake off, except occasionally during violent paroxysms of her 
 excitement, when she forgets her policy in the sincerity of her 
 madness. But the Lord is long-suffering, and “ because sen- 
 tence against an evil-work is not executed speedily, therefore 
 the heart. of the sons: of men 15 fully set in them to do evil.” ἢ 
 All that we can do as Christian churchmen, is to teach and 
 persuade and warn.them, that now is the appointed time, now 
 the day-of salvation: that “the day of the Lord will come as 
 a thief in the night: that when they shall say ‘peace and 
 safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail 
 upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape; when 
 the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty 
 angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know 
 not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus 
 
 1 Eccles, viii. 11. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 359 
 
 Christ ;” one precept of which is, “ Obey them that have the 
 rule over you, and submit yourselves.” 
 
 Here, as a matter of course, I anticipate a recoil in the mind 
 of the reader, and more particularly of that class of readers 
 for whose instruction this is specially designed. What! it 
 will be asked—as if the question itself contained a triumphant 
 refutation of the doctrine here advocated—what! is absolute 
 submission to human authority the scriptural duty of every 
 Christian man? And is there no limit? Why, this is the 
 exploded bigotry of the dark ages, divine right and passive 
 obedience! According to this, the Reformation was an un- 
 justifiable schism, and our Revolution was a rebellion against 
 God ! 
 
 Many persons think so. I do not think so, and I proceed. 
 now to assign my reasons. 
 
 IV. What is the scriptural limit set to the authority of the 
 ruler, whether civil or ecclesiastical, in imposing ordinances 
 upon Christian men ? 
 
 There is a limit, and that limit is the Bible itself The 
 Christian authority of the ruler is derived from parts of the 
 Bible ; when, therefore, the ruler enacts any law, or decrees 
 any ceremony which is contrary to other parts of the Bible, 
 he arraigns his own charter. He can no longer claim the 
 authority of Scripture as the basis of his own authority, and 
 of course it ceases to be a scriptural duty to obey him. But 
 so long as the laws and ceremonies introduced by the ruler 
 are confined to matters which the Bible has left undetermined, 
 or wholly unnoticed, they are to be obeyed for conscience’ 
 sake, by all Christian men. 
 
 Suppose a father to intrust his sons to the care of a tutor, 
 giving at the same time, to both them and the tutor, a written 
 list of directions for the regulation of their lives; suppose the 
 list to consist of one feed items, one of which ce Obey your 
 tutor ; and suppose also the letter to contain an address from 
 
 ‘the father to the tutor, saying, Teach these children in my 
 11 Thess, v.; 2 Thess, i. 
 
360 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 name, and in accordance with my written instructions given 
 to you and tothem. The children, thus supplied with a letter 
 of infallible directions, and a living fallible guide invested with 
 authority to give them additional directions, would be in a 
 condition resembling that of the Christian: laity. When the 
 tutor issued a command, those children, if wise and dutiful, 
 would first examine whether their tutor’s command contra- 
 dicted any of the remaining ninety-and-nine instructions of 
 their father. If it did not, they would say, We are bound for 
 conscience’ sake to our father, to obey this. ‘His letter fully 
 warrants our tutor to require such obedience. But if their 
 tutor’s command did contradict any of the instructions in their 
 father’s letter, then they would say, Our tutor has forgotten 
 his proper place; he has no authority over us except what he 
 derives from this letter; now he is going against the letter, 
 and therefore, for conscience’ sake to our father, we must refuse 
 to obey him. 
 
 “A great difference is here to be made between those rules 
 that both Church and State ought to set to themselves in their 
 enacting of such matters, and the measures of the obedience of 
 subjects. The only question, in the point of obedience, must 
 be, LAWFUL or UNLAWFUL. ‘For expedient or inexpedient 
 ought never to be brought into question as to the point of 
 obedience ;, since no expediency whatsoever can balance the 
 breaking of order and the dissolving the constitution and 
 society. : 
 
 “ But those.in, whose hands the making of those rules is put, 
 ought to carry their thought much farther: they ought to 
 consider well the genius of the Christian religion. 
 
 “Yet in this matter no certain nor mathematical rules can 
 be given. Every person concerned in the management of this 
 authority, must act as he will answer it to God and to the 
 Church ; for he must be at liberty in applying general rules 
 to particular times: and cases.” And a temper must be 
 observed : we must avoid a sullen adhering to things because 
 they were once settled; as if points of honour were to be 
 maintained here. 
 
‘ 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 361 
 
 
 
 “Now, since there is not any one thing that Christ has 
 enjoined more solemnly and more frequently than love and 
 charity, union and agreement amongst His disciples; since 
 we are also required to assemble ourselves together, to con- 
 stitute ourselves in a body, both for worshipping God jointly, 
 and for maintaining order and love among the society of 
 Christians, we ought to acquiesce in such rules as have been 
 agreed upon by common consent, and which are recommended 
 to us by long practice, and that are established by those who 
 have the lawful authority over us. Nor can we assign any 
 other bounds to our submission‘ in this case than those that 
 the gospel has limited. We must obey God rather than man, 
 and we must in the first place render to God the things that 
 are God’s, and then give to Cesar the things that are Ceesar’s. 
 So that if either Church or State have power to make rules 
 and laws in such matters, they must have this extent given 
 them, that till they break in upon the laws of God, and the 
 gospel, we must be bound to obey them. A mean cannot be 
 put here: either they have no power at all, or they have a 
 power that must go to everything that is not forbidden by the 
 law of God. This is the only measure that can be given in 
 this matter.” ? 
 
 1 Burnet on the Articles. Art. xx. 
 
 To the smaller matters which have led to recent dissensions and divisions 
 among ourselves, these principles apply in full force. ; 
 
 The difference between what our Episcopal reformers, the rulers of our 
 Church for the time then being, composed, and what they compiled, is plain 
 enough, and natural enough. They composed the Articles, and the Articles 
 are consistent as a whole; distinct also, and emphatic; requiring not evasion 
 only, but avowedly a “non-natural” treatment, to reconcile them to Roman 
 doctrine. ἐνῷ 
 
 But they compiled the rubrics, mutilating some, and enlarging some: their 
 successors made changes in their work, and their successors made further 
 changes and restorations; till upon the whole the voice of rubrical authority 
 among us is a doubtful voice ; and there does not appear to exist any living 
 
 authority to divest’ it of that doubtfulness, so as to make jit say, clearly and 
 
 decidedly, the same thing to us all. 
 
 This was seen and known for years, and yet peace and harmony reigned 
 practically among us. Usage, sanctioned by authority, became authority itself ; 
 and now innovation seeks in vain to justify itself by pleading that the letter of 
 
362 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 The authority intrusted to the ministers of the Church, 
 whether contemporaneous with, or in succession to, the 
 apostles, was not at any time to entrench upon the faith 
 which the apostles taught, either in the way of adding to, 
 
 some rubrics is on its side. Is not this a fair statement of the case? For 
 where lay, or in what consisted, our ecclesiastical authority in such matters for 
 the last century and half? Not surely in one or two rubrics, detached from 
 the rest; still less in inferences drawn from rubrics. But in what did it con- 
 sist? Did not the continued sanction of the bishops, to a practice of almost all 
 the clergy, and that through a series of so many years, amount to an authority ? 
 And who are justly chargeable with the first disturbing exercise of private 
 judgment, but they who, without authority, and as individuals, broke in upon 
 the catholic practice of the Church? This was the more mischievous, because 
 the persons who were guilty of it were fully aware from the first that it would 
 inevitably lead to division; and that when the divisions came, there existed 
 no competent authority to Bone between the disputants and reduce all to 
 unanimity again. 
 
 An observation of Archbishop Secker concerning the prayer before the 
 sermon, might with advantage be applied to many other things. He says, 
 “The original manner of performing this part of the preacher’s office was by 
 ‘bidding,’ that is, inviting and exhorting the people to pray for the several 
 particulars mentioned by him, which they were understood to do, either 
 silently in their minds as they went along with him, or by comprehending 
 them all in the Lord’s prayer at last. But in process of time some imagined 
 it better to put the whole into the shape of a direct address: others followed 
 their example, as thinking it a matter of indifference: but most have kept to 
 the old way. And the intention being the same, neither custom should give 
 offence.” —Abp. Secker, apud ‘‘ Mant on the Prayer-Book.’ Art. Com, 
 
 The same may be said of a valuable observation of Bishop Mant on the 
 , subject of the Homilies. In his Commentary on the Een of Common Prayer 
 (Art. Communion), his lordship says :— 
 
 “The English language has changed so agi since those Homilies were . 
 written, that they would scarcely now be understood by a common congrega- 
 tion ; and therefore the reading of them publicly, as it would no longer answer 
 any good purpose, has fallen into general disuse, with the tacit consent of the 
 governing part of the Church.” 
 
 Where these “ unhappy divisions” have been most painfully manifested, tae 
 lay members of the Church have resented the innovations. They have refused 
 to submit to them. But would it be just or fair to accuse them, on that 
 account, of resistance against lawful authority? Surely not. They are the 
 upholders of the best authority we have in these matters, viz., long-established 
 usage. Instead of acting on an unauthorised exercise of private judgment, 
 they have opposed themselves to those who were so acting, and haye thereby 
 entitled themselves to the grateful thanks of all who are conscientiously attached 
 to catholicity of practice in our Church, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. far is 
 
 or taking from, or in any degree altering the gospel which 
 they preached. Some among their contemporaries attempted 
 this at the outset, and their partial success in perverting the 
 minds of certain of the brethren in Galatia, led to this noble 
 declaration of the complete perfection, in matters of faith, of 
 _ the apostle’s preaching: “I marvel that ye are so soon removed 
 from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another 
 gospel: which is not another; but there be some that trouble 
 you and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But. though we, 
 or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than 
 that which we have preached, let him be accursed. As we 
 said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other 
 gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be 
 accursed ” (Gal. 1. 6—9). 
 
 But, it will be retorted again, this, after all, is to make 
 us the judges. In this one point, undoubtedly, it is. And to 
 this end is the Bible put into our hands, not as an all-sufficient 
 guide to supersede a living voice, a delegated authority, and a 
 discretionary power ; but as a rectifier and infallible standard, 
 in opposition to which Christian governors ought not to, com- 
 mand, nor Christian men to obey. Upon this one point, 
 whether a law or ceremony is, or is not, contradictory to 
 the Bible, let every man judge dispassionately, and decide 
 at his peril in the sight of God. But: let no man imagine 
 that he has any scriptural right to disobey a law of ithe 
 State, or disregard a eeremony of the Church (however he 
 may personally dislike it, or however inexpedient, or absurd, 
 or vexatious he may consider it), merely because there is 
 nothing concerning it in the Bible. On the contrary, if there 
 be nothing concerning it in the Bible, then it is clear it can- 
 not be contradictory to the Bible ; and, in that case, the 
 enactment of the ruler gives it, indirectly, the authority of 
 the Bible itself. 
 
 Surely, then, I may anticipate agreement in the conclusion, 
 that the common cry against many of the ceremonies of our 
 own Church, “Where do we find them in the Bible?” is 
 altogether unworthy of a place in the disputations of Chris- 
 
364 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 tian men of enlarged and enlightened minds. The question 
 is not, Are these ceremonies prescribed in the Bible ? but, Are 
 they contradictory to the Bible? It is not, Have the rulers 
 authority to enact? but, Have they transgressed the Scripeural 
 limits of their authority ? — 
 
 The rulers of the Romish system did so transgress. They 
 enacted not only things indifferent, things injudicious and 
 inexpedient (had they stopped there, they ought still to have 
 been obeyed), but they proceeded to enact things wnlawful— 
 things in direct, palpable, and even verbal contradiction to 
 Holy Scripture. They enacted, for example, the perpetual 
 repetition of the sacrifice of the death of Christ, as a pro- 
 pitiation for the sins of the quick and dead; while the 
 Scripture declares that sacrifice to have been offered once, 
 and only once—“once for all,’ εφαπαξ (Heb. x. 10). They 
 enacted the bowing down before images (in this point of 
 view it matters nothing whether there be worship, or what 
 species or degree of worship, in their bowing down), while 
 the Scripture says, “Ye shall not bow down unto them.” 
 They enacted encroachments on the secular power, even to . 
 the virtual assumption, and in many flagrant instances, the 
 actual exercise of complete temporal dominion. “ Jmperatores 
 Pontificibus debent subesse non presse,’ was the demand of 
 St. Peter's successor, (?) although the plain injunction of St. 
 Peter himself to both ministers and members of the Christian 
 Church, is submission to the king as supreme, and unto 
 governors as sent by him (1 Peter 11. 13, 14). 
 
 Many other such things did they enact in direct hostility 
 to the word of God. They unchristianised themselves. The 
 Christian course under such circumstances was to stand fast 
 at the line of separation between indifferent and wnlawful 
 enactments ; to persevere in obedience toa the former, for con- 
 science’ sake, and resolutely to disobey the latter, for the same 
 conscience’ sake. ' To submit to the unlawful enactment was 
 
 apostasy. To reject alike the indifferent and the unlawful - 3 
 
 was schismatic petulance. To discriminate between them, 
 retaining allegiance to the one, as the lawful exercise of 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 365 
 
 delegated authority ; and resisting the other as the unlawful 
 excess of the same—this was Christian wisdom. And this is 
 a brief but correct statement of the principle on which both 
 our Reformation and Revolution were effected. 
 
 V. But because this ministry, or Church government ap- 
 
 pointed by God, appeals to persons as its subjects, who are at 
 the same time subjects of the State, and because it requires of 
 the members of the Churches duties which may or may not 
 be in harmony with the duties prescribed to them by the civil 
 ruler, it is necessary, for clearness’ sake, in a scriptural exposi- 
 ‘tion of this matter, to advert further to the source, extent, 
 and limitation of the authority of the civil power; to the 
 duty also of that power with reference to God’s truth as 
 _ revealed in the Scripture, and God's society as consisting of 
 subjects of the realm. 
 
 The language of St. Paul concerning the authority of the 
 civil magistrate, and the submission thereto of the members 
 of the Churches of Christ. is familiar. “Let every soul be 
 subject to the higher powers. For there is no power but of 
 God. The powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever, 
 _ therefore, resisteth the power, resisteth ‘the ordinance of God, 
 and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. 
 _ For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. 
 Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is 
 good, and thou shalt have praise of the same, for he is the 
 minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which 
 is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain; for 
 he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon 
 him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, 
 not only for wrath, but also for conscience’ sake” (Rom. xiii. 
 
 1—5). 
 
 This is precise as ἜΜΗ͂ΣῈ the civil ruler. The power which 
 he possesses is not ΡΟΝ of man, but ordained of God; 
 and therefore submission is inculcated not merely to avoid the 
 wrath of man, but also as a matter of conscience towards God. 
 The Apostle Peter, in like manner, combines the subject with 
 
366 The Church and the ἜΧΕ 
 
 
 
 the Christian upon the only principle which can make loyalty - 
 a religious duty. He says, “Submit yourselves to every 
 ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake; whether it be to the 
 king as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are 
 sent by him for the punishment of evil-doers, and for the 
 praise of them that do well.” And in speaking of the unjust, 
 whom God reserves unto the day of judgment to be punished, 
 he thus describes them, in words which maintain a closer con- 
 nexion between religion and politics, than it accords with the 
 temper of these times to admit: “The Lord knoweth how to 
 deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust 
 unto the day of judgment to be punished : but chiefly,’ —among 
 the various classes of the unjust, who are all put in contra- 
 distinction to the godly—*“them that walk after the flesh in 
 the lust of uncleanness, and despise government: presump- 
 tuous are they, self-willed, they are not afraid to speak evil of 
 dignities” (1 Peter ii. 13, 14; 2 Peter 11. 9, 10). 
 
 The apostolical description of the ruling power, as the 
 minister of God, a terror not to good works but to the evil, 
 applies to the ordinance itself, and not to the personal character 
 of the individual man or men by whom the ordinance is 
 administered. When the apostles gave these instructions to 
 the Christian Church, the administration of the ordinance of 
 government was in the hands of the Emperor Nero, who, 
 personally considered, was a terror to the good rather than to 
 the evil. And the simple fact of the apostles having so written, 
 while under such a monarch, supplies of itself a very striking 
 proof that the distinction between an ordinance of God as 
 such, and the character of the human instrumentality by 
 which that ordinance is from time to time administered, is not 
 a cunningly-devised fiction, but an essential truth. 
 
 “The sovereignty,” says Bishop Horsley, “ particularly in- 
 tended in the immediate application of the precept to those to 
 whom the epistle was addressed, was the sovereign authority 
 of the Roman emperor, Nero was at that time the possessor 
 of that sovereignty ; and the apostle, in what he immediately 
 subjoins to enforce his precept, seems to obviate an objection 
 
 
 
«΄ 
 
 Churches Militant on Earth. 367 
 
 which he was well aware the example of Nero’s tyranny might 
 suggest. His reasoning is to this effect: ‘the sovereignty,’ 
 you will say, ‘is often placed in unfit hands, and abused to 
 the worst purposes. It is placed in the hands of sensual, 
 rapacious men, of capricious women, and of ill-conditioned 
 boys. It is in such sort abused, as to be made the instru- 
 ment of lust and ambition, of avarice and injustice. You 
 yourselves, my brethren, experience the abuse of it in your 
 own persons. It may seem to you that power, derived from 
 the Author of all good, could never be so misplaced, nor be 
 permitted to be so misused; and you may perhaps be ready 
 to conclude that the father of lies once, at least, spake truth 
 when he claimed the disposal of earthly sceptres as his own 
 prerogative. Such reasonings, saith the apostle, are erroneous. 
 No king, however he might use or abuse authority, ever 
 reigned but by the appointment of God’s providence. There is 
 no such thing as power but from God. To Him whatever 
 powers, good or bad, are at any time subsisting in the world, 
 are subordinate. He has good ends of His own, not always 
 to be foreseen by us, to be effected by the abuse of power, as 
 by other partial evils; and to His own secret purpose He 
 directs the worst actions of tyrants, no less than the best 
 of godly princes. Man’s abuse, therefore, of his delegated 
 authority, is to be borne with resignation like any other of 
 God’s judgments. The opposition of the individual to the 
 sovereign power is an opposition to God’s providential arrange- 
 ments ; and it is the more inexcusable, because the well-being 
 of mankind is the general end for which government is or- 
 dained ; and this end of government under all its abuses is 
 generally answered by it. For the good of government is 
 perpetual and universal; the mischiefs resulting from the 
 abuse of power, temporary and partial. Insomuch that in 
 governments which are the worst administered, the sovereign 
 power is, for the most part, a terror, not to good works, but to 
 the evil, and, upon the whole, far more beneficial than detri- 
 mental to the subject. - But this geneval good of government 
 cannot be secured upon other terms than the submission of 
 
368 Tie Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 the individual to what may be called its extraordinary 
 evils.” ἢ fuse 
 
 To apply this argument to our country: the providential — 
 rulers of our state—that is to say, the kings, lords, and com- 
 mons in parliament assembled—have enacted a great variety 
 of laws. As subjects we are bound to yield obedience, under 
 the sanction of temporal penalties. But by what scriptural 
 authority is it that we are called upon to obey an act of 
 parliament? There are no acts of parliament in the Bible. © 
 They all rest upon human authority. Obedience we see is 
 indispensable, on pain of present suffering in body or estate ; 
 but is there any scriptural ground for such obedience? Is 
 there any religion in submission? Am I at liberty to say, 
 “Asa Christian I have nothing to do with carnal elements. 
 Christianity is between me and my God. The command- 
 ments of men, though binding upon my person and property. 
 as a citizen, cannot have any weight upon my conscience ” ? 
 
 No, truly; as a Christian you have no such liberty ; for hear 
 what the apostle says: Ye must be subject, not only for wrath ; 
 not only for personal safety from temporal penalties, not only 
 for social or political expediency, but also. for conscience’ sake. - 
 A man’s conscience is open only unto God; yet we see here 
 that every Christian is bound to obey the commandments of 
 men in authority, for conscience’ sake, Why? Because God, 
 in His providence, has appointed the ruler, whatever the form 
 of government may be, and God in His Word has said, “ Obey 
 the ruler.” 
 
 But this requires further explanation. When the ruler is 
 an individual, invested, in the providence of God, with abso- 
 lute power, for the use of which he is responsible only to God, 
 then the limit of rightful authority and Christian obedience 
 has reference only to the law of God. There is no other 
 check, It is only when such a ruler commands what God has. 
 forbidden, or forbids what God has commanded, that Christian 
 subjects can, without sin, refuse to yield obedience. In such a 
 case, the things that are Cvesar’s include everything short of 
 
 1 Horsley, Sermon on Rom, xiii. 1. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 369 
 
 this, and it is the duty of the members of Christ's Church to 
 obey, remembering that Cvesar’s power is ordained of God. 
 This is the simplest case of all. This was the position of the» 
 members of the Church of God under Nebuchadnezzar and 
 Darius. They were obedient up to the point where the law 
 of God interposed ; and that point is illustrated by the history 
 of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the furnace, and of 
 - Daniel in the den of lions. This was the position of the 
 primitive Christians, under Nero, as we have seen. Christians, 
 under such a Cesar, were often required to do what, considered 
 in itself, it would have been much better not to do; but being 
 in Divine providence so politically situated, they had no 
 choice. They naturally, however, desired a change in their 
 political position; they desired a different kind of Cwsar, 
 under whom such things could not be lawfully required ; they 
 longed for some check upon the will of their absolute ruler in 
 matters not specifically provided for in the revealed law of 
 God. Such desires were not wrong, neither was it wrong to 
 aim, in a peaceable way, at their attainment, because the Bible 
 nowhere prescribes that every Christian government should be 
 absolute. 
 
 “Tt is true that in the world, taken as it now is, and hath 
 been for many ages, cases happen in which the sovereign 
 power is ΠῚ by the act of the people, and in which that 
 act alone can give the sovereign a just title. Not only in 
 elective monarchies, upon the natural demise of the reigning 
 prince, is the successor raised to the throne by the suffrages of 
 the people ; but in governments of whatever denomination, if 
 the form of government undergo a change, or the established 
 rule of succession be set aside by any violent or necessary 
 revolution, the act of the nation itself is necessary to erect 
 a new sovereignty—to transfer the old right to the new 
 possessor.” . . . . “But it is no just inference that the 
 obligation upon the private citizen to submit himself to the 
 ‘authority thus raised, arises wholly from the act of the people 
 conferring it, or from their compact with the person upon 
 whom it is conferred. In all these cases the act of the people 
 
 24 
 
 é 
 
70 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 is only the means which Providence employs to advance the 
 new sovereign to his station. The obligation of obedience pro- 
 eeeds secondarily only from the act of men, but primarily 
 from the will of God, who has appointed civil life for man’s 
 condition, and requires the citizen’s submission to the sovereign 
 whom His providence shall, by whatever means, set over 
 him.”? 
 
 I am well aware how readily and plausibly, and yet, for the 
 most part, how very unreasonably an argumentum ad 
 hominem is got up, and the testimony of such a man as 
 Horsley evaded, by an unworthy sneer at his interested 
 motives, or the prejudices of his high Church and monarchical 
 education. But so far as great names are concerned, similar 
 sentiments upon this subject have been left upon record by 
 Milton, Calvin,? and others; men of no ordinary minds, and 
 certainly of very different associations and prejudices from 
 Horsley. The question, indeed, is not to be decided by autho- 
 rity, but by the weight of sound reason. The reasoning, how- 
 ever, which has the combined suffrages of such men, is not to 
 be set aside by any flippant sneer at divine right, or any un- 
 proved assertions, however palatable to the natural insubordi- 
 nation of the human mind. Here, then, is the scriptural key. 
 
 1 Horsley on Rom. xiii. 1. 
 
 2 “Quasi vero Deus non ita regat populum, ut cui Deus vult, regnum tradat 
 populus.”’—Milton. Def. pro Pop. Angl. 
 
 “ Ratio cur debeamus subjecti esse magistratibus, quod Dei ordinatiggs sunt 
 constituti. Quod, si ita placet Domino mundum gubernare; Dei ordinem in- 
 vertere nititur, adeoque Deo ipsi resistit, quisquis potestatem aspernatur ; 
 quando, ejus, qui juris politici auctor est, providentiam contemnere, bellum cum 
 
 eo suscipere est.”— Calvin in Rom. xiii. 
 
 “Si in Dei verbum respicimus, longius nos educet; et non eorum modo 
 principum imperio subditi simus, qui probe, et qué debent fide, munero suo 
 erga nos defunguntur ; sed omnium, qui gueguo modo rerum potiuntur, etiamsi 
 nihil minus przestent, quam quod ex officio erat principum. 
 
 ‘In eo probando insistamus magis, quod non ita facile in hominum mentes 
 cadit ; in homine deterrimo, honorique omni indignissimo, penes quem modo 
 sit publica potestas, preeclaram illam et divinam potestatem residere, quam Do- 
 minus justicize ac judicii sui ministris, verbo suo detulit: proinde a subditis 
 eadem in reverentia et dignitate habendum, quantum ad publicam obedientiam 
 attinet, qua optimum regem, si daretur, habituri essent.”— Calvin Inst. iv. 20, 25. 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 371 
 
 
 
 
 
 The rulers have commanded and forbidden a variety of par- 
 ticulars ; and this key locks all such enactments, as imperative 
 upon the eonscience of Christian: men, because the one state- 
 ment, “the powers that be are ordained of God,” and the one 
 precept, “be subject for conscience’ sake,” as they imply an 
 authority in the power to make one law, and impose a duty 
 upon the Christian to obey that law, so they sanction the 
 ‘authority of a thousand laws. 
 
 Thus it appears, and the conclusion is of no small con- 
 sequence, that in reference to our duty as Christian subjects 
 the Bible is not a sufficient guide in details. It was never 
 designed to be so. It is all-sufficient in principle. It invests 
 the living ruler with authority as the minister of God upon 
 earth to command details; and it binds the Christian subject 
 to obey the details so commanded, although they be not 
 specified in the Bible. It appears also that there is true 
 religion in such obedience, and that there would be irreligion, 
 as well as rebellion, in disobedience ;1 for all true Christian 
 subjects, “knowing. whose authority their rulers have, do 
 faithfully serve, honour, and humbly obey them in Christ, and © 
 for Christ,” the divine Head of all constituted authority. 
 
 But we have now to consider the case of a limited and 
 complicated sovereignty. When Cesar is not an absolute 
 individual, but an arrangement made by mutual consent, and 
 consolidated into law, the limit of rightful authority and 
 Christian obedience has reference to that human code, as well 
 as to the divine law. Under such circumstances occasions may 
 arise when it may be right for the Christian to refuse obedi- 
 ence, although the thing demanded of him may have no direct, 
 or obvious connexion with the law of God. It is enough in 
 such case if the required act of obedience be opposed in any- 
 thing to the human compact. This is the case in our own 
 favoured nation. Our Cesar is a complicated arrangement 
 consolidated into law. The sovereign, considered as an indi- 
 vidual, is not our Cvesar; the hereditary branch of the legis- 
 lature considered in itself is not our Czesar; the representative 
 
 1 See 1 Sam. xv. 22, 23. 
 
2.7 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 branch of the legislature considered in itself is not our Ceesar ; 
 the electoral constituencies, who periodically select those re- 
 presentatives, are not our Cesar. But all these taken to- 
 gether, and considered in their mutual relations as established 
 by the laws, constitute our Cvesar; and each is involved in’ 
 certain duties to all the rest. be 
 
 The sovereign to whom is intrusted the execution of the 
 laws, is in duty bound to execute those laws and no other ; 
 and the nation in all departments is in duty bound to willing 
 submission and cordial co-operation with the executive. But 
 should the sovereign attempt to suspend any of those laws, 
 or to execute any different laws, the people are not bound to 
 submit, although the matter in question may have no direct 
 bearing upon the law of God. Our position therefore is . 
 essentially different from that of the primitive Christians 
 under the Roman emperors, and the contrast is highly in- 
 structive. .Nero was absolute: in himself alone, and without 
 human restriction, he was the Czsar; his will was law, his 
 word was life or death. It pleased God to allow it to be so; 
 and therefore the members of the Church of God could not 
 properly refuse to obey Nero, unless he ‘directly interfered 
 with the law of God. However vexatious or oppressive his 
 commands might have been in secular matters, Christians 
 were bound to obey, because it is better to endure vexation 
 and oppression than to die; but if he commanded them to 
 disobey God, then they were bound to refuse, because it is 
 better to die than to disobey God. 
 
 The sovereign of England is not absolute. He is only one 
 of the constituent parts of the English Cesar, and if he 
 attempt to act as if he were absolute, without reference to the 
 other parts, it ceases to be a Christian duty to obey him; 
 upon the contrary, it becomes a Christian duty to disobey him, 
 ‘and to maintain the balanced character of our Cesar even at 
 the extreme cost of rejecting the sovereign. altogether. This 
 is the hinge of our glorious revolution. 
 _ James II. attempted absolutism. Had he been indeed 
 absolute, as Nero was, under Divine Providence, obedience 
 
Churches MNititant on Earth. 272 
 
 would have been a Christian duty in everything short. of a 
 violation of the divine law, and when he commanded such a 
 violation, Christian duty would have been disobedience, and 
 passive submission to the consequences, however, extremely 
 calamitous. But he was not absolute. He was indeed a king 
 _ by Divine Providence, but by the same Providence he was a 
 king consenting to a legal compact with his people: he was 
 not in himself England’s Cesar, but only a constituent part 
 of it. And this made an essential difference. He was the 
 branch of our Czesar to whom was intrusted the execution of 
 the' laws, but instead of fulfilling his trust, he acted in violation 
 of it, against the laws. It was no Christian duty to submit ; 
 on the contrary, it was a Christian duty to refuse to submit, 
 as the six bishops did ; and not only so, but it was a Christian 
 duty to maintain the balanced character of our Cesar even at 
 the cost of rejecting and deposing the sovereign. And this 
 was the good service to the country performed by those men 
 who invited the aid and accomplished the accession of the © 
 Prince of Orange. 
 
 The will of our component Cesar is expressed in law, and 
 with us law is absolute. If, therefore, the members of the - 
 Christian Church in England would obey our Saviour, and 
 “render to Caesar the things that are Czesar’s,” they must be 
 obedient, willingly so, to the laws ; they must be co-operative, 
 cordially so, in maintaining the efficiency and supremacy of 
 the laws. They must not only refrain. from any breach of 
 the laws themselves, but they must never eonnive at any such 
 breach in another. It is not enough to be passively harmless 
 in this matter,—they must be active to prevent harm. When 
 cognisant of an offence, they must never shrink from ae 
 the needful information to the proper authorities. This is 
 branch of Christian, duty, for the performance of which no 
 ordinary courage is required ; because, through an unhappy 
 perversion of liberty and morality, the character of an informer 
 has become as generally odious as the character of the offender, 
 and among certain classes of the community mueh more 
 odious ; but Christians must remember that men who will not 
 
374 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 co-operate to support the laws when violated against others, 
 do not deserve the protection of those laws when violated 
 against themselves. They must remember also, that in the 
 Scriptures, not the thief only is condemned, but the man also 
 who saw him, and consented with him; and therefore they 
 will not hesitate to inform against the violators of the laws 
 when they become acquainted in a providential, or, as men 
 speak, accidental way, with their offences, I need scarcely 
 - add that this is essentially different from the complicated 
 treachery of becoming spies first, hypocrites in crime, and then 
 informers, not for righteousness’ sake, but for the wages of 
 unrighteousness. 
 
 Considering magistrates as the manifold arms of the sove- 
 reign for carrying the laws into execution, what is all this but 
 an expansion of. the apostle’s language, “ Put them in mind to 
 obey magistrates ; to be ready to every good work”? I will 
 only add upon this point, that this subjection to the civil 
 power is as truly binding upon the ministers of the Christian 
 Church as it is upon the people. The laws of England, both 
 the common Jaw and the statute law, utterly reject the arro- 
 gant claim of the papal clergy to be exempt from the juris- 
 diction of the civil courts. 
 
 VI. This abstract would be very incomplete if confined to a 
 statement of the duties of Christians considered as subjects 
 under the law. Another question of deep interest arises 
 with regard to Christian duty in making or altering the laws, 
 and also in the selection of such representatives as shall be 
 from time to time invested with the power of making or 
 altering the laws. Upon this point the Christian duty of 
 rulers demands our attention, and in considering this we are 
 engaged in a discussion which, as will appear in the sequel, is 
 much more largely practical than is commonly supposed. 
 
 It is in practical matters affecting present duty—matters 
 concerning which God has spoken plainly ; but public opinion 
 has not spoken, or at least not with any emphasis of demand, 
 and still more in matters concerning which public opinion has 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 375 
 
 spoken loudly on the other side—that the real allegiance or 
 disaffection of a man’s mind towards the revealed will and 
 authority of God is truly tested. 
 
 In the matter now to be considered, What hath God spoken? 
 let an inspired king give answer. “The God of Israel said, 
 the Rock of Israel spake to me, he that ruleth over men must 
 be just, ruling in the fear of God.” 
 
 Here it is plainly declared by “Him from whom all power 
 is derived,” that all rulers among men should not only be reli- 
 gious men, living as immortal individuals in the fear of God ; 
 but also religious rulers, exercising their official authority 
 religiously, “ruling,” as well as living, in the fear of God. 
 This, as a general principle, is of the first importance, condemn- 
 ing, as it does, on the express authority of holy Scripture, 
 those who maintain that although all men of every station 
 should be religious, considered in their individual capacity as 
 heirs of immortality, yet that rulers, as rulers over the affairs 
 of this world, have no concern with, and no province in, 
 religion.” 
 
 In England the rulers are very numerous, and the discharge 
 of their official duties demands from them, in many instances, 
 considerations of religion. The Church of England so instructs 
 her members ; and, tracing all authority to its true source, she 
 
 1 2 Sam. xxiii. 3. 
 
 . 2 Dr. Wardlaw has put and answered the.question, “ Whatis the magistrate’s 
 province in regard to religion? His true and legitimate province is to have no 
 province at all.” Yet strangely enough the Doctor adds, “ As a man, he is 
 bound to believe the truths, and obey the precepts, of the word of God; as a 
 magistrate, he is bound to fulfil all his official functions on Christian principles, 
 from Christian motives, and according to Christian precepts, as every man is, 
 in every condition and every relation of life; but authority in religion he has 
 none.” —Lectures on Establishments, p. 191. 
 
 Upon this I ask how the performance of his “ official functions,” “asa magis- 
 trate,” is to be separated from his “ authority”? And if his official functions, 
 thus inseparable from his magisterial authority—which is, in truth, the mean- 
 ing of official—are to be performed on Christian principles, from Christian 
 motives, and according to Christian precepts, how is his official authority to pe 
 
 -kept wholly separate from his Christianity? And how is he in his official func- 
 tions—i.e., as a magistrate—to have no province in religion ?—Lectures on the 
 Church, pp. 187, 188, 
 
376 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 invites them to unite in prayer to God, “for kings, and for all 
 who are in authority.” ἢ 
 
 Elementary as the subject may ‘seem, and thereupon, to 
 some minds, comparatively insignificant, I have no doubt of 
 the real usefulness of a brief review of the question, Who are 
 the rulers in England ? as well as, What is their duty ? 
 
 The simplest form of government among men is an abso- 
 lute monarchy. If the monarch were perfect, this would be 
 perfect. There would be no risk of abuse of power, and 
 therefore no need for any limitation of power. There would 
 be no risk of any lack of wisdom, and therefore no occasion te 
 . multiply counsellors. It is ‘such a government we are taugat 
 by the sure word of prophecy to anticipate, when He,/the. 
 :eeptre of whose kingdom is a sceptre of righteousness, shall 
 take to Himself His great power, and reign over a renewed 
 earth wherein righteousness shall dwell. 
 
 But under ἐόν δ τ ἣν themselves fallen and sinful creatures, 
 this perfection is not to be had—is not to be expected. There 
 is risk of abuse, and therefore need for limitation; risk of 
 mistake, and therefore occasion for counsel. The modes of 
 meeting this necessity, and adjusting the conflicting claims for 
 the general good, are various—that is, there are various modes 
 of distributing power among different individuals in a nation, 
 and for different periods of time. But in whatever measure, 
 or for whatever period power is distributed, the persons exer- 
 cising it are, in their degree and time, rulers, and, as Christians, 
 are bake to rule im the fear of God. 
 
 In this realm the chief ruler, and for life, is the sovereign, | 
 supported by the hereditary peerage, who are also rulers for 
 life ; and that this branch of the rule may be conducted in the 
 fear of God, the Church of England instructs all her members. 
 to pray for Divine grace on the sacred head and heart of the 
 monarch, that “knowing whose minister he is, he may, above 
 all things, seek God’s honour and glory.”* But, secondly, 
 
 1 1 Tim. ii. ]—3. 
 2 That the nation may have a public guarantee for this, on which Christian 
 
 
 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 397 
 
 our sovereign rules by the. instramentality of responsible 
 advisers ; and that they may advise and carry out the advice 
 they give—that is, execute their part of the rule in the fear of 
 God—the Church prays for “the lords of the council and all 
 the nobility, that they may have grace, wisdom, and under- 
 standing.” Thirdly, these lords of the council rule—that is, 
 hold their places of authority as advisers of the sovereisn— 
 according to the decisions of parliament. These decisions are 
 come to by majorities after free debate ; and that these majori- 
 ties may decide religiously, or “rule in the fear of God,” the 
 Church continues her prayer to God, that it may please Him 
 to “ direct and prosper all their consultations to the advance- 
 ment of His glory.’ One step more, fourthly, parliamentary 
 majorities depend upon the selections of representatives 
 made by the voters among the people. This is the appeal, in 
 the last resort, for the rule of the kingdom; and Christian 
 men of every rank and station ought to make conscience of 
 “answering it “in the fear of God.’ Every voter at every 
 
 men may confide in all the enthusiasm of allegiance, the following questions 
 are put, and answers given, on the day of each coronation :— 
 
 I quote from Blackstone, Com. Ὁ. i. ο. 6. 
 
 “ The Archbishop or Bishop shall say—Will you solemnly promise and swear 
 to govern the people of this kingdom of England, and the dominions thereto 
 belonging, according to the statutes in parliament agreed on, and the laws and 
 customs of the same? 
 
 * The King or Queen shall say—t solemnly promise so to do. 
 
 * Archbishop or Bishop—Will you, to the utmost of your power, cause law 
 and justice, in mercy, to be executed in all your judgments? 
 
 * King or Queen—I will. 
 
 “ Archbishop or Bishop—Will you, to the utmost of your power, maintain 
 the laws of God, the true profession of the gospel, and the Protestant reformed 
 religion established by law ? 
 
 “ King or Queen—All this I promise to do. 
 
 “ After this, the king or queen, laying his or her hand upon the holy Gospels, 
 shall say—‘ The things which I have here before promised, I will perform and 
 keep, so help me God’ ; and then shall kiss the book.” 
 
 On this Mr. Christian, the editor of Blackstone, has a note thus :— 
 
 “ And it is required both by the Bill of Rights, 1 W. and M., st. 2, ο. 2, and 
 the Act of Settlement, 12 and 13 Wm. IIL, c. 2, that every king and queen 
 shall repeat and subscribe the declaration Skainat popery, Secddahe to the 30 
 Car. IT, Εὖ. 2::ν 1.7 
 
378 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 election is, during his appointed time, and according to his 
 appointed measure, a ruler; and every Christian voter who 
 has learned from the Scriptures what it is the high office of 
 the Church to teach, that whatsoever he does in word or deed, 
 he should do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, will not allow 
 his conduct at the polling-booth to be an exception to his 
 Christian life, but will endeavour, to the best of his wisdom 
 and knowledge, to give his vote in the fear of God. To do so 
 with intelligence, he must have regard both to the revealed 
 will of God, which is unchangeable, and to the balanced order 
 of things in the realm, which has been found to work well 
 upon the whole, and which ought not to be fundamentally 
 changed without very urgent necessity. 
 
 Referring to the former: in the details of religious doctrine 
 and ecclesiastical discipline, there may exist differences which 
 it is difficult for the most conscientious to adjust, which, I 
 may perhaps say with truth, it is utterly impracticable to 
 reduce to uniformity; and if the candidates for our parlia- 
 mentary suffrages were all men of avowed godliness, agreeing 
 in every fundamental truth substantially scriptural and Chris- 
 tian, and differing only where conscientious Christians may 
 differ—if they were all men who, in the language of St. Paul, 
 “hold the head,” repudiating every species of idolatry and blas- 
 phemy and infidelity, and maintaining openly and honestly- 
 that rulers should not only live as individuals, but rule as 
 rulers in the fear of God—then the duty of voters would be 
 simplified, then private, personal preferences might be lawfully 
 indulged, because, whoever was elected, the main points are 
 secure. But if the candidates for our suffrages differ on the 
 most vital matters,—if some of them do not “ hold the head,”— 
 do not acknowledge Jesus Christ to be God over all, neither 
 bow down nor worship Him ;—and if some of them bow down 
 to an image of Him, and to divers other images, in direct 
 defiance of God’s most holy law;—if some others of them, 
 rejecting these extremes of anti-Christianity, and professing 
 ‘themselyes members ,of a Christian Church, avowing also 
 that, as private individuals, they are bound to live in the fear 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 379 
 
 of God, do, nevertheless, as rulers, in their official capacity, 
 sink their Christianity, and make common cause and common 
 companionship with Socinians and Romanists,—how then can 
 we delegate power to such? How can we exercise our part 
 of the rule of the country in*the fear of God, if we do an act 
 tending to constitute such men our representatives ? 
 
 _ With reference to the balanced order of things in the realm 
 also, although the standard is not so precise, there are general 
 principles sufficiently known and tried which should be held 
 sacred ; a substantial prerogative, for example, on the part of 
 the crown, to guard against all encroachments of democracy ; 
 and well-defined privileges on the part of the people of all 
 ranks to guard against all encroachments of tyranny or op- 
 pression. On many matters of detail affecting the anticipated 
 improvement, or apprehended injury, to the working of this 
 balance, there may be differences of opinion amongst honest 
 and conscientious supporters of the British Constitution as it 
 is; and if the candidates for our suffrages differed only on 
 such details, all being real friends of the fundamental principles Ὁ 
 of well-balanced government, then there would be comparatively 
 little ground of preference for one above the other ; for who- 
 _ ever was elected, the British Constitution in its foundations 
 
 would be safe. But if some candidates present themselves, of 
 
 whom we know that they desire and aim at a new charter, 
 which would give a general election every year, and a vote to 
 every man, and a dark ballot-mask to every yoter—thus” 
 destroying our balance and our peace; and if other candidates 
 present themselves, of whom we know that they cannot be 
 true to their own Church and its Head, without being untrue 
 to the pledged Protestantism of our sovereign ; and that, con- 
 sequently, such persons, if sincere in their religion, as it 
 pledges them against heretics, especially heretical sovereigns, 
 must be insincere in their allegiance to the crown of England 
 as now limited; and, on the contrary, if they be indeed sincere 
 in that allegiance—notwithstanding the contracted, pledged, 
 and indefeasible Protestantism of our sovereign—that then they 
 must be insincere in their Romanism or Papalism, When 
 
380 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 
 
 such candidates present themselves, how can we delegate 
 power to them? How can we, as Christian people, thank- 
 ful to God for His mercies of peace and good government to 
 our land, vote for such persons in the fear of God ? 
 
 Thus, then, without requiring specific promises in detail 
 from candidates, and indeed objecting on principle to the 
 system of pledged delegates instead of free representatives, 
 we are nevertheless called in our measure to the defence and 
 support of our constitution on the general reputation of men 
 and measures. 
 
 Under such circumstances, is it not plainly impracticable to 
 separate our political acts from our religious principles and 
 motives; our duty towards our fellow-men from our duty 
 towards God? Where is the anatomist in theology, or in the 
 metaphysics of public and private morality, who can trace 
 the line of separation between the religious principle which 
 secures “just weights and measures” in the shop, and the 
 absence of it, which utterly dissociates religion and polities at 
 the hustings? Τῇ it be alleged tee religion has nothing to do 
 with “just weights and measures,” then, upon the ΝΠ 
 which separates morality from religion, I quite agree that it is 
 consistent to separate politics from religion. This i is to make 
 religion an exotic indeed, so delicate as, it is to be feared, to 
 be at the withering point unto death, The man, or the nation, 
 who puts away a good conscience towards God in his outward 
 duties, of Pibahscoter kind, will, with awful certainty, make 
 shipwreck concerning faith. If religion be not weleomed and 
 entertained as the practical guide of life, both public and 
 private, she will refuse to remain among men as a visitor or 
 a vision, to be made a convenience of, for hypocrisy or deceit. 
 If the revealed will of God be discarded by rulers as no longer 
 practicable, because of the varieties of conflicting opinions 
 among men, what have a set of servants to expect, who, while 
 endeavouring to please one another for present ease, are all 
 combined in a course displeasing to their master? I do not 
 mean to say that every interference with the British Consti- 
 tution as it now is must be offensive to God. I advance no 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 381 
 
 such untenable position. No arrangement of human sagacity, 
 however wisely constructed, can with safety be pronounced 
 perfect. The distribution of power between the various estates 
 of the realm, which has wrought so well, and under which the 
 country has so wonderfully prospered, may possibly have been 
 improved by those recent changes which have very decidedly 
 turned the balance in favour of popular influence; and I will 
 not take upon me to say that, all things considered, still 
 further changes in the same direction might not be made, 
 leading to still greater improvement. But the experience of 
 the world, as well as the sound philosophy of government 
 grounded on what man is, pronounces against the destruction 
 of the balance on either side, and gives warning—which only 
 infatuation can despise—that to destroy it on one side, is to 
 provoke the recoil which is sure to destroy it on the other. 
 _ Authority of some kind there must be for civilization ; and if 
 the people would avoid a military despotism in the end, they 
 should manifest the increase of wisdom which it is said they 
 have attained, by avoiding impatient insubordination in the 
 beginning. On all such questions the true Christian will 
 manifest moderation. Anxious for improvement, and open to 
 conviction, he will, nevertheless, as a general rule, bear in 
 “mind the warning of divine wisdom against them who are 
 “ given to change.” 
 
 It is when the law of God is set at nought by the civil 
 rulers of a State, that the Christian Church, in that State, 
 should bear her faithful testimony against the transgression ; 
 addressing herself to every ruler of every degree and grade 
 of influence, from the sovereign on the throne to the poorest 
 freeholder whose name is, or ought to be, on the registration 
 lists; and reminding them all of the revealed will of the 
 King of kings and Ruler of princes—which may indeed be 
 neglected and despised for the present, but certainly not with 
 permanent impunity—that “all who rule over men should 
 rule in the fear of God. 
 
 It is the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, 
 
382 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 and ascended to the right hand of the Majesty on high, to 
 whom all power is given in heaven and in earth. He it is 
 who sitteth upon the flood, controlling the waves of the sea 
 and the tumults of the people. He it is who setteth up kings 
 and removeth kings; who teaches senators wisdom, or pours 
 contempt and folly upon human counsels ; who maintains the 
 peace of empires, or, withdrawing His hand of restraint, 
 permits the proud and noisy waves of revolutionary tumult 
 to rise and swell, and burst with overwhelming fury over 
 the bulwarks of constituted authority. He it is, who, in 
 inscrutable wisdom, employs free agents of high intelligence 
 as the sure accomplishers of His purposes, albeit they think | 
 not so, neither does it come into their heads to serye or obey 
 Him. In vain do they combine and consult to establish 
 their own purpose, unless. it be a part of His. purpose also ; 
 the consultations of their highest. wisdom are baffled, and 
 the efforts of their utmost strength are crossed and reversed, 
 by the smallest, the most unthonght-of, and, as men speak, 
 accidental or untoward circumstance. ‘“ Behold,” exclaims 
 the prophet, “is it not of the Lord of hosts that the people 
 labour in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves 
 for very vanity ?”? 
 
 But when His own work is to. be accomplished: and His 
 time is come, then, however weak and inadequate, or even 
 foolish, the instrument whom He employs may be, opposition 
 vanishes, afid success is sure; for “the Lord sitteth king for 
 ever.” 
 
 “Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty, give unto. the Lord 
 glory and strength: give unto the Lord the glory due unto 
 His name.”” You are His, for life, and breath, and all things ; 
 among the rest, for your station and influence in the nation, 
 and, by means of the nation, in the world. You are His, for the 
 use you make of your influence in disseminating or withholding 
 His truth, as well as for the use you make of your own moral and 
 intellectual powers in examining or neglecting that truth. Join 
 not inthe vain attempt practically to banish Him out of His own 
 
 1 Hab. 11. 18. 2 Psalm xxix, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 383 
 
 
 
 world, and to deceive yourselves and others by those vague 
 unmeaning phrases and heathenish impersonalities so common 
 among statesmen and philosophers, who, nevertheless, “ profess 
 and call themselves Christians ”—nature—the laws of nature 
 —the general laws of Providence! 
 
 What and whence are those laws? Laws are the eénact- 
 ments of some living being or beings; and as for their enact- 
 ment, so also for their administration—they require in every 
 instance and at every step the actings of living beings. No 
 laws can administer themselves. If the legislative enactment 
 be not followed up by the personal living administration, the 
 law isa dead letter. You talk of the laws of nature; but 
 what is nature? Is nature a god, or an angel sent from God ? 
 or a “living being” at all? If not, how can nature act 2 How 
 can nature make or administer laws? If it be meant that the 
 Lord God Almighty, in the administration of the affairs of this 
 world—and, as far as we know, of all worlds,—acts upon a 
 uniform plan, (miracles being the exceptions,) here we have an 
 intelligible and scriptural truth.. The Christian definition of 
 the laws of nature is this: the uninterrupted and omnipresent 
 personal agency of the living God in Christ Jesus, by whom 
 all things were made, and in whom all things consist, or stand 
 together, τὰ παντα ἐν avtw συνεστηκε (Col. i. 15—18). 
 
 For, to go deeper still, no creature has, or can have, in- 
 
 dependent. indefeasible existence. As the personal agency of 
 - Jehovah was necessary to create, so it is to sustain. If He 
 ceased personally to sustain the whole creation, universal 
 annihilation would be the instantaneous and inevitable con- 
 sequence. Neither is this confined to inanimate things. 
 Mind is as truly His as matter. He rules as completely and 
 as personally over the thoughts, over the powers of thought, 
 in every intelligent being, as He does over the processes of 
 germination or gravitation. “The Most High ruleth in the 
 kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever He will.” 
 “ He doeth according to His will in the army of heaven, and 
 among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay His 
 hand, or say unto Him, What doest Thou?” “Promotion 
 
384 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 cometh neither from the east, nor from the west: God is the 
 judge; He putteth down one, and setteth up another.” He 
 prolongs or puts an end to governments; using statesmen 
 as His instruments for the accomplishment of His purposes 
 in the world, and their own glory or shame, as the case may 
 be. “ When He giveth quietness, who then can make trouble ? 
 and when He hideth His face, who then can behold Him ? 
 whether it be done against a nation, or against a man only.”? 
 The king of Assyria was the rod of Jehovah’s anger. It did 
 not indeed enter into his mind that he was fulfilling God’s 
 purposes. In the pride of his own ambition, his design was 
 “to destroy and to cut off nations not a few.” Arguing upon 
 supposed general laws, without any real practical reference to 
 Almighty God, and calculating, from former victories, upon 
 the continued successes of his numerous armies, he said, “ Are 
 not my princes altogether kings? Is not Calno as Carchemish ? 
 Is not Hamath as Arpad? Is not Samaria as Damascus?” 
 —Are not my conquests as entirely mine as my own original 
 territory ? Is not Calcutta as London ?—“ As my hand hath 
 found the kingdoms of the idols, whose graven images did 
 excel them of Jerusalem, shall I not, as I have done unto 
 Samaria and her idols, so do to Jerusalem and her idols 2 
 By the strength of my hand’ I have done it, and by my 
 wisdom, for I am prudent; and I have removed the bounds: 
 of the people, and have robbed their treasures, and I have put 
 down the inhabitants like a valiant man; and my hand hath 
 found, as a nest, the riches of the eon: and as one 
 gathereth eggs that are left, have I gathered all the earth; 
 and there was none that moved the wing, or opened the 
 mouth, or peeped.” He had been successful far and wide, 
 making fresh conquests in divers countries, scattering the 
 inhabitants like frightened birds, and seizing upon their 
 property, or, as he truly expressed it, robbing their treasures, 
 as eggs are gathered out of a deserted nest; and all this he 
 ascribed to his own wisdom, and prudence, and power. , 
 
 The answer of the Lord of hosts to the king of Assyria is 
 
 1 Dan, iv. 32, 35; Psalm Ixxy. 6,7; Job xxxiv. 29, 
 
Churches Militant on Earth. 385 
 
 
 
 worthy of your best attention. “Shall the axe boast itself 
 against Him that heweth therewith ? or shall the saw magnify 
 itself against Him that shaketh it?” . . .-. “Hast thou 
 not heard long ago, how I have done it; and cf ancient times 
 how I have formed it? Now have I brought it to pass, that 
 thou shouldest be to lay waste defenced cities into ruinous 
 heaps. Therefore their inhabitants were of small power, they 
 _were dismayed and confounded.” And “it shall come to pass 
 that when I have performed my whole work upon Mount Zion 
 and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of 
 the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks.” 
 
 “God thundereth marvellously with His voice ; great things 
 doeth He, which we cannot comprehend. For He saith to the 
 snow, Be thou on the earth ; likewise to the small rain, and to 
 the great rain of His strength. He sealeth up the hand of 
 every man, that all men may know His work. Then the beasts 
 go into dens, and remain in their places. Out of the south 
 cometh the whirlwind, and cold out of the north. By the 
 breath of God”—mark the personality of the sacred Word— 
 «“ By the breath of God frost is given: and the breadth of the 
 waters is straitened. Also by watering HE wearieth the 
 thick cloud: HE scattereth His bright cloud: and it is turned 
 round about by His counsels: that they may do whatsoever 
 HE commandeth them upon the face of the world in the earth, 
 HE causeth it to come, whether for correction, or for His land, 
 or, for merey. Hearken unto this, O Job,’—and ye also, 
 ye rulers of England, rich in her conquests and proud of 
 her successes :—“ stand still and consider the wondrous works 
 of God.” ” 
 
 Realize all this; and let the revealed will of God be your 
 guide—neither be afraid or ashamed to avow that it is so—in 
 the nationalities of parliament and the cabinet, as truly as in 
 the integrities of commercial, or the amenities of domestic life. 
 If, in applying the revealed will of God to national questions, 
 you and others differ in opinion, what then? You differ as it 
 is, having no fixed standard for any one principle of honour, or 
 
 1 Tsa. x. and xxxvil. 2 Job xxxvil. 5—14. 
 
 25 
 
386 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 
 
 consistency, or truth. A real reference to the’ Word of God, 
 honestly made on both sides, would narrow your grounds of 
 difference into a question of interpretation only, the standard 
 being one; and whatever differences might arise there, they 
 could scarcely be so “utterly diverse” as those which now 
 exist in the absence of a standard altogether. Or if they 
 were, and were found equally perplexing among men, still , 
 they would not be so dishonouring to God as the present 
 system of deliberate neglect, avowed in the determination to. 
 raise no religious questions—to legislate, on professedly political 
 grounds, in defiance of the very letter of God's law; and to 
 stifle all reference to His authority by proclaiming Ss: own | 
 incompetency to discuss religious differences. 
 
 HE has raised you up, and caused you to bear rule over His 
 people in this land. Know ye, and cause the people to know, 
 whose ministers ye are: educate the people in these sublime 
 truths of Holy Scripture, not by any questionable instrumen- 
 tality of your own, constructed in the vain hope of pleasing all 
 parties ; but by means of a divinely-appointed instrumentality 
 ready at your hand ; by making the Church, whose office it is 
 to bear witness for God, commensurate with the wants of the 
 people. Honour God’s witness in the nation by an increase of 
 its resources and its efficiency, corresponding to the increase of 
 every other department of our polity. By so doing, you will 
 confer the greatest attainable benefits on the nation, directly 
 on those who will receive the teaching of the national Church, 
 and indirectly on all the rest, by the prolonged peace, and good 
 order, and prosperity of the whole realm. | 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 A. 
 PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.1 
 
 Tue first edition of this tract has disappeared in a few days. The 
 importance of the subject cannot indeed be exaggerated. The 
 Baptismal controversy has long agitated the Christian Church; and 
 writers on all sides have acquired a habit of taking much for granted, 
 that cannot be proved; and starting in the discussion from a point 
 where human traditions and glosses have already obscured the divine 
 word. 
 _ The author of these few pages is deeply impressed with the 
 conviction, that a recurrence to the fountain head for a definition of 
 terms, whatever reception it may meet with in some quarters, will 
 have the effect of relieving many minds from much embarrassment ; 
 “by placing before them the scriptural uses of the word ‘ baptism,” 
 and the scriptural ordinance of baptism in water, freed from the 
 unscriptural phraseology of the schools. 
 
 It would be gratifying, and might be profitable, if some of those 
 writers, with whom the word ‘‘ sacramental”’ is in such frequent and 
 convenient use, would have the kindness to define the meaning they 
 attach to it, and to point out on what “‘ warranty of Holy Scripture” 
 they ground that meaning. ; 
 
 It is sufficiently intelligible to say, that the pledge on oath (sacra- 
 mentum) which the soldiers of the Roman Empire gave for their 
 fidelity to the imperial standard, came to be applied in a way of 
 analogous accommodation to the Lord’s Supper ; wherein the early 
 
 1 “ Baptism doth Saye:” a Letter to the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of 
 Exeter. By the Rey. Hugh M‘Neile, D.D. “ Baptism doth also now save us ”’ 
 (1 Peter iii. 21). 
 
388 | Appendix. 
 
 
 
 Christians, as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, pledged themselves with 
 all solemnity to be ‘faithful unto death,’ in His service. But this 
 account of the word is by no means sufficient to bear the weight of 
 the complicated structure of ecclesiastical formalism which has ee 
 erected upon it. 
 
 To ascertain how the Latin word sacramentum, instead of con- 
 tinuing to signify an oath, as in Latin writers it does, began in Christian 
 writers to signify ‘“‘an outward and visible sign of an inward and 
 spiritual grace,” would be an investigation which, if it did not edify 
 the devout, would at least gratify the curious. 
 
 Holy Scripture is altogether silent upon the subject. 
 
 LETTER TO THE LORD BISHOP OF EXETER. 
 
 My Lorp,—The eyes of the Church are upon you. Some are look- 
 ing with hope, but without any clearly defined idea of what they 
 are'hoping for. Some are looking in anger, deeming your lordship a 
 needless and reckless disturber of our peace. Some are looking in 
 sorrow, grieved that the amount of inconsistency with itself, which 
 belongs to our ecclesiastical system, should afford an opportunity, and 
 supply even an appearance of excuse, for such vexatious and agitating 
 proceedings as your lordship sees it right to persevere in. 
 
 1 am one of these. I can entertain no hope of good from your 
 course. I feel no anger, because I am persuaded you are conscien- 
 tious in what you are doing. But I am grieved, in common, I believe, 
 with all real lovers of peace and unity in the Church, I am deeply and 
 sincerely grieved that your lordship should have repudiated with so 
 high a hand that forbearance, which our unfinished and in some degree 
 inconsistent system of ecclesiastical polity and doctrine demanded on 
 either side.? 
 
 Your lordship could not be more exclusive and dictatorial, if the | 
 whole volume of our Book of Common Prayer, in the natural sense of _ 
 it, were an undeniable echo of your lordship’s private judgment: 
 whereas, what is the fact ? 
 
 Your lordship is respectfully but earnestly invited to consider what 
 as a matter of fact, is the present state of the case among us. 
 
 1. The Prayer-Book, considered as a whole,-is in some degree 
 inconsistent with itself ; so that readers of the most*discordant senti- 
 
 ! This was written when the bishop was endeavouring to make his own 
 private judgment on the subject of Baptism, the law of the Church, 
 
Appendix. : 389 
 
 ments on some subjects, each seizing on what accords with himself, 
 claim it as their own on both sides. 
 
 Let it be acknowledged, as in fairness and candour it ought to be, 
 that in the simplest, most obvious, and most natural sense of our 
 language, each side has some claim upon it. To instance in your 
 lordship’s favourite topic, one who holds baptismal regeneration can 
 quote from the Prayer-Book that baptism is regeneration: another 
 who rejects the opinion, can quote from the Prayer-Book that baptism 
 is a sign of regeneration. One can quote concerning all baptized 
 persons that they are thereby made the children of grace. Another 
 ’ can quote, that.in those only who worthily receive baptism it has a 
 wholesome effect or operation. 
 
 This is not an opinion. It is matter of fact. And as: such what 
 does it demand before we go further? Surely, my lord, it demands 
 either an alteration which shall deprive one party of their quotations, 
 or forbearance from both parties. If your object be alteration, why 
 not avow it? Τὸ 15 a legitimate object. Our system ought not to be 
 inconsistent with itself. But you have not avowed it. Your lordship 
 aims at what would be tantamount to an alteration, and what would 
 practically work as an alteration, while you profess to desire no alter- 
 ation. Is this candid ? . 
 
 2. But secondly, and with reference to proportions on either side, 
 the great bulk of the Prayer-Book, all of it, indeed, except three or 
 four sentences, is clearly and powerfully on the side of your Metro- 
 politan’s private judgment. Three or four sentences of it are as 
 clearly on the side of your lordship’s private judgment. To make the 
 Prayer-Book harmonise with your Metropolitan, and consistent with 
 itself, the erasure of three or four sentences would be abundantly 
 sufficient. 
 
 To make it harmonise with your lordship, and consistent with itself, 
 it should be all re-written, except three or four sentences. 
 
 For example. The archbishop and those who agree with his grace 
 find their views admirably expressed in the natural-sense of the 
 Thirty-nine Articles, and would not if they might make the least 
 alteration: while the natural. sense of the Thirty-nine Articles abso- 
 lutely demolishes all the peculiarities of your lordship’s scheme. Mr. 
 Newman, when writing his celebrated Tract XC., found it impossible 
 to reconcile his views of sacramental grace with the natural sense of 
 the Thirty-nine Articles. He frankly avowed a non-natural sense. 
 He has since made progress ; but his views then appear to have been 
 very identical with your lordship’s views now. 
 
390 ! Appendix. 
 
 
 
 ‘‘One Baptism FOR THE REMISSION oF sins!” This is the article 
 of the faith for which your lordship is so deeply concerned. “Of their 
 adherence to this, you invite from the clergy of your diocese a fresh 
 avowal. It may not be uninteresting to your lordship to know what 
 some of the clergy and laity in other parts of the kingdom think upon 
 this subject ; and a public address to your lordship, under existing 
 circumstances, can scarcely be deemed intrusive in any member of © 
 the Church. 
 
 I must premise that, taking our sixth aries literally and naturally, 
 I believe that “ whatsoever is not read in Holy Scripture or may be 
 proved thereby,” without the aid of any human authority, ‘is not to 
 be required of any man to be believed as an Article of the Faith, or 
 be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.” 
 
 Although the sacred writers have not said so much on the subject 
 of Baptism, commonly so called, as certain controversialists in all ages 
 have been disposed to do, yet they have said something, and it is 
 obviously our first duty in this matter carefully to examine what they 
 have said, praying for and expecting the teaching of God the Holy 
 Ghost, by whom aloné, in this and in everything connected with our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, we can be guided into saving truth. 
 
 Putting the subject catechetically, to begin with, I may ask, What 
 mean we by this word Baptism? This may seem a strangely elemen- 
 tary question in a letter to your lordship; but ‘‘it is worth obsery- 
 ing,” says Archbishop Whately, in his instructive Treatise on Logic, 
 ‘‘ that the words whose ambiguity is the most frequently overlooked, 
 and is productive of the greatest amount of confusion of thought and 
 fallacy, are among the commonest, and are those of whose meaning the 
 generality consider there is the least room to doubt. It is, indeed, 
 from those very circumstances that the danger arises: words in very 
 common use are both the most liable, from the looseness of ordinary 
 discourse, to slide from one sense into another, and also the least 
 likely to have’ that ambiguity suspected. Familiar acquaintance is 
 perpetually mistaken for accurate knowledge. 1 
 
 On the importance of defining words in common use, the same 
 acute writer remarks :— 
 
 ‘It is important to observe, that the very circumstance which in 
 any case makes a definition the more necessary, is apt to lead to the 
 omission of it; for when any terms are employed that are not 
 familiarly introduced into ordinary discourse, such as ‘ parallelogram,’ 
 or ‘ sphere,’ or ‘ tangent,’—‘ pencil of rays,’ or ‘refraction,’ ‘ oxygen,’ 
 
 - 1 Whately’s Logic, p. 346—Hdit. vii. 
 
Appendix. : 301 
 
 —_— 
 
 
 
 or ‘alkali,’ the learner is ready to inquire, and the writer to anticipate 
 the. inquiry, what is meant by this or that term. And although, in such 
 cases it is undoubtedly a correct procedure to answer this inquiry’ by 
 a definition, yet of the two cases a definition is even more necessary 
 ‘in the other, where it is not so likely to be called for; where the 
 word not being new to the student, but familiar to his ear, from its 
 employment in every-day discourse, is liable to the ambiguity which 
 is almost always the result, for in respect-of words that sound ‘ some- 
 
 _. thing new and strange,’ though it is, as I have said, much better to 
 
 define them in the outset, yet even without this, the student would 
 ᾿ gradually collect their meaning pretty correctly, as he proceeded in 
 his study of any treatise, from having nothing to mislead him— 
 nothing from which to form his notions at all, except the manner in 
 ᾿ς which the terms were employed in the work itself that is before him. 
 And the very desire he had felt of-a definition would lead him in this 
 - way, to form one, and generally a sufficiently correct one, for himself.” 
 
 ‘Tt is otherwise with ‘terms to which we are familiarly accustomed. 
 
 Of these, the student does not usually crave definitions, from suppos- 
 ing, for that reason, that he understands them well enough: though, 
 perhaps (without suspecting it), he has in reality been accustomed to 
 hear them employed in various senses, and to attach but a vague and 
 inaccurate notion to them. If you speak to an uninstructed hearer of 
 anything that is spherical, or circular, or cylindrical, he -will probably 
 beg for an explanation of your meaning ; but if you tell him of any- 
 thing that is round, it will not strike him that any explanation is 
 needed, though he has been accustomed to employ.the word indis- 
 criminately, in all the senses denoted by the other three.”’ } 
 ’ Convinced as I am that a serious fallacy has arisen, not from the 
 indiscriminate, but from the limited use of the word baptism by 
 ecclesiastical writers, I revert to the question, What mean we by this 
 word? The right answer, in the first place, if we would avoid 
 ambiguity, is this—The meaning of the word depends upon the con- 
 text wherein it is found: for, in Holy Scripture, the word baptism 
 does not, in every passage where it occurs, mean the same thing, 
 What, then, are its various scriptural meanings ? 
 
 I. Baptism signifies acute sufferings. So our Lord Himself uses 
 the word to express His own sufferings and also the sufferings of 
 His disciples. : 
 
 His own sufferings—‘‘I am come to send fire on the earth; and 
 what will I, if it-be already kindled ?” 
 
 1 Whately’s Logic, pp. 214, 215, 
 
392 Appendix. 
 
 ‘But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I strait- 
 ened till it be accomplished ? ””! 
 
 I have a suffering to suffer, and how am I pressed, and anxious, 
 . and uneasy—pained is our marginal translation (πως ovvexopar)—until 
 it is accomplished! Here, then, it is not to be denied that baptism 
 is used in a figurative or metaphorical sense, to signify suffering, 
 and especially that suffering which was peculiar to our Lord Himself. 
 
 In a similar way, He uses the word to express those sufferings , 
 of His, of which His disciples were to be partakers : ‘‘ Can ye drink 
 of the cup that I drink of, and be baptized with the baptism that I am 
 baptized with? And they say unto Him, We can. And Jesus 
 said unto them, Ye shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink of; 
 and with the baptism that I am baptized withal, shall ye be bap- 
 tized.””? 
 
 Can you, as witnesses for God, ‘suffer patiently from an evil world 
 as Ido? We can. Ye shall indeed so suffer. Ye are not of the 
 
 world, as I am not of the world. If they call the Master ofthehouse | 
 
 Beelzebub, they will equally miscall those of His household who 
 are true to Him. If they persecute me, they will also persecute 
 you. If they give mea cup of bitterness to drink, and baptise me 
 in blood, you may prepare yourselves for similar treatment at their 
 hands. Here again it is so clear, that nothing can be clearer, that 
 baptism is used to signify suffering. 
 
 II. Secondly. Baptism signifies endowment with the miraculous 
 powers of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 In this sense John the Baptist used it, when speaking of what 
 Christ would confer on His disciples: ‘‘He that cometh after me 
 is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: He 
 shall baptise you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.’ 
 
 In the same sense our Lord used the word, when He spoke to 
 His disciples, after His resurrection from the dead: “Wait for the 
 promise of the Father, which, saith He, ye have heard of me: for 
 John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be γάρ with the 
 Holy Ghost, not many days henna τὴ 
 
 And so it is applied. Ὀγ St. Peter, when giving an account of what 
 occurred in the house of Cornelius, the Roman centurion: ‘“ As 1 
 began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the be- 
 ginning. Then remembered I the word of the Lord, how that He 
 
 1 St. Luke xii. 49, 50. 3 St. Matt. iii, 2. 
 2 St. Mark x. 38, 39. “4 Acts 1/6, 
 
Appendix. 303. 
 
 said, John indeed baptized with water ; but ye shall be baptized with 
 the Holy Ghost.” 1 ; 
 
 
 
 III. Thirdly. Baptism signifies what by some is called conversion, 
 by some ‘egeneration—what our Lord calls being born of the Spirit, 
 what St. Paul calls a new creation. Τ 15. that inward and spiritual 
 change, by the secret. energy of the Holy Spirit, whereby a sinner 
 
 ~is renewed in the spirit of His mind, united spiritually, with Jesus 
 _ Christ by faith, in His death and in His: resurrection—dead with 
 
 Christ, buried with Christ, risen again with Christ, pardoned in 
 Christ, clothed with Christ, a new creation in Christ. 
 
 Thus St. Paul writes to the Romans: ‘‘ Know ye not, that somany 
 of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? 
 Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death ; that, like 
 as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, 
 even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have 
 been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also 
 in the likeness of His resurrection.” 
 
 The meaning of this passage will not be altered by substituting for 
 baptism, conyersion, or regeneration, or renewal. Know ye not, that 
 so many of us as were renewed into Christ were renewed into His 
 death. Therefore we are buried with Him, by renewal (or conver- 
 sion, or regeneration), into death; that like as Christ was raised 
 up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even we also should 
 walk in newness of life, being converted or regenerated. ‘On the 
 fifth verse we may remark, that whatever baptism in this passage 
 
 means, it is inseparable, according to St. Paul, from salvation, If 
 
 we have it, or, as the apostle himself here paraphrases what he 
 had said, if we have been planted together (another figurative mode 
 of saying the same thing) in the likeness of Christ’s death (by | 
 baptism into Him), we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrec- 
 tion—i.e., we shall have glory, body and soul, or finished salvation 
 in the image of Him. 
 
 Similar is St. Paul’s use of the word baptism, i in his Epistle to the 
 Colossians: ‘‘ Ye are complete in Him who is the head of all princi- 
 pality and power; in whom also ye are circumcised with the cir- 
 cumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins 
 of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: buried with Him in baptism, 
 wherein also ye are risen with Him, through the faith of the opera- 
 tion of God, who hath raised Him from the dead. And you, being 
 
 » Acts xi, 15, 16. 2 Rom. vi. 3—35. 
 
304, Appendix. 
 
 dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath He quick- 
 ened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses.””! 
 
 Here the spiritual conversion, or regeneration, or quickening of the 
 Colossian believers, is expressed figuratively by both circumcision and 
 baptism—a circumcision made without hands, a baptism δον 
 effectual through the faith of the operation of God. 
 
 This spiritual change is variously expressed in Holy Scripture. 
 One mode of expressing it, adopted by St. Peter, as a description 
 of baptism in this sense, is ‘‘ the answer of a good conscience towards 
 God.” With this definition of his meaning, and thus guarding as far 
 as plain words can guard against being misunderstood, the apostle 
 did not scruple to say, that baptism saves us. 
 
 Tae passage is in the third chapter of his first epistle. He was 
 writing concerning Christian suffering. It is hard to suffer unjustly, 
 but much harder to deserve to suffer. It is better to suffer for well- 
 doing than for evil-doing. This he argued by reference to the 
 example of Christ. He suffered for well-doing in man’s treatment 
 of Him. He suffered for righteousness’ sake. In this sense, we 
 must suffer with Him; and so the apostle pursues the subject in 
 the following chapter, exhorting the brethren to arm themselves 
 with the same mind that was in Christ. 
 
 But Christ suffered also as a sacrifice, the Just One for, or instead 
 of, the unjust ones, to bring us to God: being put to death in the 
 flesh, but quickened by the Eternal Spirit, by which Spirit He 
 preached the gospel in His apostles. And not in them first. He 
 had always been so preaching by His Spirit in His faithful servants. 
 He did so in Noah to the Antediluvians who were lost, and are 
 now in the prison of eternal death. They were unpersuaded by His 
 preaching, during their lifetime, in the days of Noah. He waited 
 long for them, even an hundred and twenty years (Gen. vi. 3). 
 
 Two wonders characterised the old world—the long-suffering of 
 God, and the continued ungodliness of man. The same now. 
 The issue then was, that a small family were saved in the ark, by 
 water bearing them up. That was a type or figure. 
 
 Now, a small family, a ‘“‘little flock,” for ‘‘the way of life, is 
 narrow, and few there be who find it,’’? are saved by the antitype, 
 or like figure of the ark—that is, baptism—the resurrection of Jesus 
 Christ bearing them up. " 
 
 Thus it appears that baptism does save. Uudoubtedly, what 
 the apostle here means by baptism does save; and he is very ex- 
 
 + Col, ii, 10—18, 2 Matt. vii. 13, 14. 
 
 \ 
 
Appendix. ; 395 
 plicit as to his meaning, both negatively and positively, both as to 
 what he did not mean and what he did mean. For no sooner had 
 .hé written that baptism does save us, than he added, ““ ποὺ the " 
 putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good 
 conscience toward God.”’ 
 
 Conscience is God’s witness in man. , The answer of a good 
 - conscience toward God is an inward testimony of sincerity in the 
 sight of Him unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known, and 
 from whom no secrets are hid. This St. Paul gives as the genuine 
 characteristic of truly Christian, 1.6., of converted or regenerated, 
 or (in this sense) baptized persons. He says, “ Our rejoicing is 
 this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly 
 sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we 
 have our conversation in the world.”’} 
 
 ‘The purified condition of the whole soul may well, as here it 
 doth, go under the name of the good conscience, it being so prime 
 a faculty of it, and as the glass of the whole soul, wherein the state 
 
 τ Οὗ it is represented. Therefore (Heb. ix. 14) the efficacy of the blood 
 of Christ is expressed thus, that it ‘ purifieth our consciences from 
 dead works;’ which expression is the same thing in effect with 
 that here, ‘the answer of a good conscience unto God.’ 
 
 ‘‘The answer (ἐπερώτημα), the asking or questioning of con- 
 science, which comprises likewise its answer ; for the word intends 
 the whole correspondence of the conscience with God, and with 
 itself as towards God, or in the sight of God. And, indeed, God’s 
 questioning it is by itself; it is His deputy in the soul. He makes 
 it pose itself, for Him and before Him, concerning its own condi- 
 ‘tion ; and so the answer it gives itself in that posture—He, as it 
 were, sitting and hearing it in His presence, is an answer made 
 unto Him. This questioning and answering (if such a thing were 
 at this time, as it certainly was soon after), yet means not the 
 questions and answers used in the baptism of persons who, being 
 of years, professed their faith in answering the questions moved; it 
 possibly alludes unto that, but it further, by way of resemblance, 
 expresses the inward questioning and answering which is transacted 
 within, betwixt the soul .and itself, and the soul and God, and so 
 is allusively called ἐπερωτημα, ‘a questioning and answering,’ but 
 it is distinctively specified, εἰς Θεὸν ; whereas the other was towards 
 men, this is unto God.’”? 
 
 Such is the apostle’s definition of saving baptism, and that, be 
 
 ? 2 Cor. 1. 12. 2 Archbishop Leighton in loco, 
 
396 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 it observed, in avowed contradistinction from ‘the putting away 
 of the filth of the flesh.” Baptism doth save—i.e., the answer of a 
 good conscience toward God—to wit, the renewal of the inward 
 man, in its examination of itself, in the sight of God. 
 
 IV. Fourthly. Baptism signifies an outward and visible ordinance 
 _ of revealed religion, in which, by divine commandment, water is. 
 applied to the human body. 
 
 Thus it is used to describe the ministry of John the Baptist. “1 
 indeed baptise with water.” And again, ‘‘John was baptizing in 
 Enon, near to Salim, because there was much water there: and 
 they came and were baptized.” 
 
 So also it is used to deseribe this part of the ministry of the 
 apostles, and their fellow-labourers in the gospel: “As they went 
 on their way they came to a certain water, and the eunuch said,’ 
 See, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized? And 
 Philip said, If thou believest with all thine. heart, thou mayest. 
 And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son 
 of God. And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they | 
 went both down into the water, both Philip and the eunuch, and 
 he baptized him.” , 
 
 In like manner in the case of Cornelius and his house: ‘ While 
 Peter yet spake to them, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard 
 the word. And they of the circumcision who believed were aston- 
 ished, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles 
 also. was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost; for they heard 
 them speak with tongues and magnify God.” 
 
 We have already seen how St. Peter called this their baptism in 
 the sense of miraculous endowment. But now in another sense: 
 ‘Peter answered, Can any man forbid water that these should not 
 be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well. as we ? 
 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord.” 
 
 This was the ordinance which the Lord instituted when He said, 
 ‘“‘Go ye therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them 
 in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.” 
 
 The washing of water serving in nature for the cleansing away 
 of the filth of the flesh, this ordinance was, in its outward act, signi- 
 Jicant of an inward and spiritual cleansing, though altogether distinct 
 from it—distinct from it, for Jesus was baptized with water, and 
 in His case no inward and spiritual cleansing or forgiveness was, 
 
 1 Acts vii, 36—38, 
 
 \ 
 
Appendix. 307 
 
 
 
 
 
 or could have been, required. Distinct from it, because, when St. 
 Peter says that baptism saves, he expressly denies that he says so 
 of the outward ordinance—“ not the putting away of the filth of the 
 flesh,” and as expressly affirms that he says so of the inward 
 change—‘‘ the answer of a good conscience towards God.” 
 
 It was the Lord’s will to establish a visible society upon earth, as 
 well as to save a spiritual Church. To-this end, a visible ordinance 
 of separation between his society and all the rest of mankind was 
 indispensable. Baptism in. water is such an ordinance, and as such 
 was, and still is, a test of discipleship. It is, as might be expected, a 
 - most appropriate test. Its outward act is significant of that inward 
 washing which makes a real disciple. Therefore we truly say of 
 it, ‘“‘ Baptism is not only a sign of profession, and mark of difference, 
 whereby Christian men are discerned from others that. be not 
 christened.” It is that, ὮΝ not that only—‘‘it is also a sign of 
 regeneration or new birth.” 
 
 Appearing in itself to be useless, and resting on no moral claim 
 in the nature of things for our adoption, the dutiful ‘use of it pro- 
 claims submission to the supremacy of Him on whose authority it 
 rests as its ultima ratio. And thus, the willing and intelligent 
 baptism in water of an instructed adult was a practical proof, as 
 well as a significant sign, of his inward submission to God. It 
 certified him to the Church around as a man whom God had 
 graciously baptized into Christ, and whose sins were washed away 
 in the blood of Christ. And therefore, in such a case, as his sins 
 were washed away in the sight of God by baptism in one sense, 
 ‘he might very appropriately be said to wash them ek diss in the sight 
 of the Church by baptism in the other sense, 
 
 Of this, the most notable case is that of Saul of Tarsus. He was a 
 zealous Jew. He did not believe’ that Jesus of Nazareth was. risen 
 from the dead. When the apostles preached ‘“‘ Jesus and the resur- 
 rection,’ he opposed and persecuted them. The whole question 
 turned upon this point, Is Jesus’risen? When Saul, on the way | 
 to Damascus, saw and heard Jesus alive, the whole question was 
 settled in his mind. His whole intelligent and moral nature was 
 penetrated with conviction. The apostles were right. He had 
 been fearfully wrong up to that moment. ‘‘ Lord,’ he exclaimed, 
 ‘< what wilt thou have me to do?’’? He was a changed man—a 
 praying man. He was baptized into Christ’s death, buried with 
 Christ by baptism into death, and risen with Christ through the 
 
 1 Art. xxvii. 2. Acts ix, 6. ; 
 
398 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 faith of the operation of God, who had raised him from thé dead, 
 So far as his own salvation was concerned, had he died that moment, 
 he would have been saved. 
 
 But he was a chosen vessel of God to bear His name before the 
 Gentiles and kings, and the children of Israel. To this end, he must 
 ’ be aceredited to the Church around him, have their confidence, and 
 work with and by means of them. It became, therefore, indis- 
 pensable that he should not only be washed from his sins in the 
 sight of God, by the baptism made without hands, but also in the 
 sight of the Church, by the baptism made with hands. “Hence the 
 exhortation’ of “Ananias to him: ‘ Why tarriest thou? Arise and 
 be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the 
 Lord.”! The God of our fathers hath chosen thee. You are His: 
 avow yourself such without delay. You are His soldier, secretly but 
 really enlisted: enrol yourself in the ranks openly, according to His 
 general orders. You are a pardoned sinner before God: proclaim it 
 before all men. 
 
 Thus we perceive the value, and even the great necessity, of this 
 baptism in water, ‘‘ where it may be had.”’? When it cannot be had, 
 the man baptized in a deeper sense must go on without it ; but where 
 it may be had, as it is the man’s duty not only to serve Christ in the 
 spirit, but also to confess Him before men in the flesh, he is bound 
 to adopt that mode of making his confession which the Lord Himself 
 has appointed. 
 
 The same line of argument applies to the Lord’s Supper, wherein, 
 as often as we eat the bread and drink of the cup which the Lord 
 has commanded to be received, ‘‘ we do show the Lord’s death until 
 He come.” We proclaim to others what is already a truth concerning 
 ourselves. His death is our life—His coming again is our hope. 
 
 It is easy to call this heresy, and say it does not agree with the — 
 Church; but it is not so easy to prove it to be heresy, by showing 
 that it does not agree with the Scriptures. 
 
 Here there are Four distinct scriptural meanings of the word 
 baptism. ς 
 
 1. Suffering. 
 
 2. Endowment with the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 3. Conversion, or regeneration, or renewal of soul; or, as St. Peter 
 calls it, “ the answer of a good conscience toward God,” In — 
 none of these is there any mention of water.~ 
 
 1 Acts xxii. 16. 2 Office for Baptism of adults. 
 
Appendix. 399 
 
 4, An application of water to the body, in the name of the Lord, 
 and in obedience to the commandment of the Lord; or, as St. 
 Peter calls it, ‘ the putting away of the filth of the flesh.” 
 
 
 
 It is much to be regretted that ecclesiastical writers have not 
 continued to use the word baptism in all these senses, after the 
 example of the inspired writers. Had they done so, the meaning 
 of the word must in every case have been sought for in the con- 
 text where it stood, because in itself it might have any one of four 
 meanings. Of course, when the same word is used in so many senses 
 there is a liability to confusion ; but the proper way to avoid such 
 confusion is the spiritual way, by distinction and discrimination. 
 
 The Apostle Peter hath shown us the way. He says, Baptism doth 
 save us. But in so saying, what does he mean by baptism? He tells 
 us. As if he had prophetically anticipated a mistake which would 
 afterwards arise, and entered his protest against it, he said, ‘‘not the 
 putting away of the filth of the flesh,” not the outward ordinance, not 
 baptism in that meaning of the word. Baptism, so understood, does 
 not save. What I mean is, ‘“‘the answer of a good conscience 
 towards God,” the inward change. Baptism, so understood, does 
 save. Thus, according to the different meanings attached to the 
 word, these two sayings are both true,.and both equally trae—bap- 
 tism does save, and baptism does not save. 
 
 But your lordship says that the outward ordinance and the inward 
 regeneration are inseparable. _ : 
 
 Of this opinion, the distinction here made by St. Peter seems to 
 supply an unanswerable refutation. If the two things were insepa- 
 rable, why make the distinction at all? If inseparable, where the one 
 is the other must be, and thus the distinction made by the apostle 
 would be utterly meaningless. But if the one may be where the. 
 other is not, and if the one gives salvation and the other does not, 
 then the distinction is of vital moment, worthy the apostle’ 5 Ben, and 
 _ entitled to our most serious consideration. 
 
 Scriptural facts corroborate this argument. 
 
 Baptism saved the dying thief on the cross: not the outward 
 ordinance—he had it not—but the inward change. He was baptized 
 into Jesus Christ, and put on Christ, and had the remission of his 
 sins and the regeneration of his heart; and this baptism saved him, 
 by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. 
 
 Baptism did not save Judas Iscariot—i.e., the outward ordinance 
 ‘which he had. He had no more, and this baptism does not save. 
 
400 Appendrx. 
 
 
 
 St. Paul was the chief instrument which it pleased God to make 
 use of to convey to the Corinthian Christians the baptism which 
 saves. ‘Though ye have ten thousand instructors in Christ,” said 
 the apostle to them, ‘‘ yet have ye not many fathers: for in Christ 
 Jesus 1 have begotten you through the Gospel.” 1 He had baptized 
 them into Christ, with the baptism made without hands,: the one 
 baptism for the remission of sins. This he had done through the 
 gospel. 
 
 But with respect to the baptism made with hands, the ordinance 
 ‘in water, the apostle says to the same persons: ‘‘I thank God I 
 baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius. ... . For ΘΗΝ sent 
 me not to baptise, but to preach the gospel.” ? 
 
 Instead of following the scriptural example, and using the word 
 baptism in different senses, ascribing to each its proper meaning, the 
 common practice has been to call every meaning of the word baptism, 
 except one, by some other name or description—to confine the use of 
 the word baptism to one only of its meanings, viz., the outward ordi- 
 nance in water, and then to contend about what is, and what is not, 
 inseparable from that ordinance. 
 
 This is an anti-scriptural practice, and has involved many in anti- 
 scriptural consequences. ΤῸ some persons, it is true, no evil conse- 
 quences have resulted, because, although not using the word as St. 
 Peter did, they have still made the same substantial distinction that 
 he made between the two meanings of it, as applied to the outward 
 ordinance and the inward change, ascribing to each what he asonies 
 to them. 
 
 But, as regards others, a serious evil has arisen. They have found 
 the word baptism habitually applied to the outward ordinance, and to 
 nothing else, by writers on all sides. Then, they have found certain 
 spiritual effects ascribed to baptism in Holy Scripture. The natural 
 result was, that they should conclude that those spiritual effects 
 were in some way inseparably connected with the outward ordinance. 
 
 They have done so; and hence their doctrine of regeneration by 
 the outward ordinance, and remission of sins by the outward ordin- — 
 ance. ΤῸ be scripturally consistent, they should pave added salvation 
 by the outward ordinance; for ‘baptism doth save.’ ἜΝ 
 
 This last was too grossly against evidence to. be maintained. Hence 
 their fiction of a regeneration and a remission of sins, which do not 
 lead to salvation, and of new-born children of God having a tem- 
 porary life and perishing after all, concerning whom our Lord and 
 
 1 1 Cor, iv. 15, 2 Tbid., i. 14—17. 
 
Appendix. | GOH 
 
 
 
 Saviour says, “1 give unto them eternal life, and they shall never 
 perish.” Ὁ 
 
 To some persons this is no difficulty ; because, although the Serip- 
 ture hath spoken, and the Church hath spoken,? and with no Ὁ 
 uncertain sound, they ‘do not, and will not, believe the certainty of 
 salvation in the regenerate. They will not be persuaded with the 
 apostle, that where God hath begun a good work in any man, He 
 will perform it, or finish it (ἐπιτελέσει) until the day of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 To others it is a difficulty; and to escape from it, an attempt has 
 been made to limit the meaning of the word regeneration, confining 
 it-to an ecclesiastical change of position and privilege, or to some 
 supposed, but undefined and inexplicable, germ of grace, which may 
 or may not bud and bear fruit—that is, which may or may not prove 
 to be grace at all. A more successful attempt would be that which 
 aimed at enlarging the application of the word baptism, calling both 
 the inward change and the outward ordinance by that name, as the 
 Scripture does—boldly declaring with the apostle that baptism doth 
 save us, and faithfully distinguishing with the apostle between the 
 baptism which does save and the baptism which does not save. 
 
 When, therefore, the question is put, Does the Church hold, and do 
 you hold, that all baptized persons are regenerate? the answer 
 ought to be—That depends upon the meaning of baptized in the 
 question. If the word be used in one of its scriptural senses—if it be 
 
 -used as St. Paul used it in Romans vi. and in Colossians ii.—then, 
 certainly, yes; all persons so baptized are regenerate, in its plain 
 grammatical sense, i.e., born again: all such persons are grafted into 
 Jesus Christ, and have redemption by His blood, even the forgiveness 
 of their sins, and the salvation of their souls. We acknowledge this 
 ONE BAPTISM FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS ! 
 
 This is the saving privilege of Christ’s true Church, the bride, the 
 Lamb’s wife, even of that whole family which the Scripture so copiously, 
 and the Church so concisely and comprehensively, declares that ‘‘ God 
 hath chosen them in Christ, out of mankind, to bring them by Christ to 
 everlasting salvation, as vessels made to honour.” * Thisis a precious 
 portion of the “Catholic Truth” entrusted to the Church’s keeping. 
 We do well to be zealous for this fundamental article of the faith, ONE 
 BAPTISM FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS. 
 
 But if the word be used in another of its scriptural senses—if it be 
 
 1 St. John x. 27—30. 3 Phil+i. 6: 
 
 2: Art, Xvils 4 Art. xvii. 
 26 
 
402 | Appendix. 
 
 used to signify endowment with the miraculous gifts of the Holy 
 Ghost, as in Acts i. 5, or if it be used to signify the outward ordinance 
 in water, as in Acts viii. 13—then the answer to the question is, We 
 cannot say positively whether all persons so baptized are regenerate 
 or not. Ifthey have only the baptism intended in the question, they 
 are not; but they may have, in addition to that, the baptism that 
 saves; and therefore, although we can pronounce upon things, dis- 
 criminating between them, we cannot so pronounce upon persons, 
 since they may or may not be persons who combine in themselves 
 very different things. 
 
 The persons of whom our Lord speaks in St. Matt. vii. 22, 23, were 
 baptized, and wrought miracles, and yet Jesus will say to them, I 
 never knew you. Simon Magus was baptized, and remained without 
 any change, in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity.1 
 
 Your lordship not only refuses to hold this interpretation of the one 
 baptism for the remission of sins, but you refuse also to allow others 
 to hold it. Permit me to enquire, upon what ground? If your lord- 
 ship has a right to put your own interpretation on the words of the 
 creed, other persons have the same and equal right to put theirs. 
 Upon what principle is it supposed that the Church speaks more 
 plainly and unequivocally than the apostles? And if men put 
 different interpretations upon anything and everything spoken by the 
 apostles, how can it be reasonably expected that they will not do like- 
 wise with anything and everything spoken by the Church ? 
 
 For wise purposes of moral discipline, it has pleased God to leave 
 us, during the present dispensation, without any infallible tribunal. 
 The liberty of judgment consequent upon such a state of things is, like 
 every other privilege, attended with responsibility and difficulty and 
 danger. All these must be encountered with the best measure of 
 wisdom and discrimination, -of. moderation and forbearance, that we 
 can bring to the sacred cause. Still difficulties must and will remain; 
 they are inseparable from liberty; they are tests of discretion; they 
 are snares to the rash. Rome has relieved herself from much of this 
 embarrassment by investing a sinful man with an imaginary infallia 
 bility, and making it a religious duty to submit to the idol. This 
 is to fly from the difficulties of liberty by a voluntary entering into 
 bondage. We cannot so escape. Contend we must; and if rash men 
 aggravate the contention, we must endure it as best we may, endea- 
 vouring to prove ourselves ‘‘ good soldiers of Jesus Christ.” 
 
 I have said nothing about the baptism of infants, because, except in 
 
 1 Acts viii. 12—23. ; 
 
Appendix. ite Ὁ 
 
 
 
 the way of inference and analogy, the word of God says nothing about 
 it; and where it has pleased God not to be explicit, it becomes both 
 churches and individuals to be modest. 
 
 But your lordship will say,—The Church has spoken, and very 
 plainly ; and her ministers are bound to maintain her deposit of truth. 
 
 I have the happiness to agree with you in this, and to be fully per- 
 
 suaded that ‘‘the baptism of young children is in any wise to be 
 retained in the Church as most agreeable with the institution of 
 Christ.” 1 There is a modesty about this declaration which seems to © 
 me very instructive. Concerning other declarations of the Church 
 upon this subject, which are not so modest, differences must exist so 
 long as we have: liberty, and must be permitted to exist if we are to 
 have peace; and not on this subject only. In the hope of suggesting 
 at least to your'lordship’s mind the value of a judicious forbearance, 
 permit me to ask respectfully but faithfully— 
 
 Does the Church hold, and do you hold, that ‘‘ before the founda- 
 tions of the world were laid, God hath constantly decreed by His 
 counsel, secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those 
 
 whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind ?”? 
 
 Does the Church hold, and do you hold, that’ God hath constantly 
 decreed ‘‘ to bring. such persons by Christ to everlasting salvation, as 
 vessels made to honour” 3 ὃ 
 
 Does the Church hold, and do you hold, that “" they. which be: 
 endued with. so excellent a benefit of God, be: called according to 
 God’s purpose, by His Spirit working in due season’”’ ? 4 
 _ Does the Church hold, and.do: you hold, that ‘‘ they through grace 
 o ey the calling” ὃ 
 
 Does the Church: hold;, and do you hold, that ‘‘ they be justified . 
 freely ? that they be made the sons of God by adoption ? that they be 
 made like the image of His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ? that they 
 walk religiously in good works,. and that at eg alias by God’s merey, 
 they attain to everlasting felicity” ?°° 
 
 Suppose your lordship a candidate for ordination : and suppose the 
 Bishop to put these questions in the ipsissima verba of the Article, and 
 to insist upon answers affirming the Calvinistic,—i.e., the natural and 
 grammatical interpretation of the Article—would you not feel your- 
 self aggrieved? Would you not protest with eloquent indignation 
 against ‘the unfairness of such an exercise of private judgment? 
 Would you not argue, and most conclusively, that such a course, 
 
 7) Art. xxvil. 8 Tbid. 5 Ibid. 
 Art. xvii. 4 Lbid. / 
 
404 Appendix. 
 
 pursued by all the bishops in England, would issue in as many 
 Churches as there are dioceses in the kingdom? And would you 
 not quote with crushing power against the innovation, the language of 
 the Royal Declaration prefixed to our Articles,—‘‘ We will that no 
 man hereafter shall either print or preach to draw the Article aside 
 any way, but-shall submit to it in the plain and full meaning thereof ; 
 and shall. not put his own sense: or comment to be the meaning of the 
 Article, but shall.take it in the literal and grammatical sense’’ ὃ 
 
 The truth.is, my lord, that you are wielding with dangerous dex- 
 terity a sword which has at least two edges; and it does not seem too 
 much to say, that after the agitation which, in defiance of the Church’s 
 highest Court of Appeal, has been urged forward by your lordship, 
 that sword will never again be sheathed; nor the armistice under 
 which Churchmen in England have lived in peace ever be restored. 
 But the agitation must go on, until some revision of our Book of 
 Common Prayer shall be forced upon the Church as established in 
 this realm, and one or other of the contending parties be driven from 
 her pale. 
 
 The Judicial Committee of Her Majesty’s Privy Council by and with 
 the advice of the two Archbishops, have done their utmost to per- 
 petuate among us that mutual forbearance without which it is manifest 
 to every moderate man we cannot proceed in peace. Your lordship 
 appears to be doing your utmost to banish such forbearance, as 
 unfaithfulness to identify “your own sense and comment” with 
 eatholic truth, and at all risks of division and disruption to propagate © 
 your own private interpretation of our Church's language, to the 
 excommunication of all who cannot or will not agree with you. 
 
 I believe, my lord, that instead of remaining patiently and quietly 
 on the:«defensive against such an agitation carried on from such a 
 vantage ground, it will soon become the duty of all sound Churchmen 
 to raise a counter-agitation ; and, if a change must take place in our 
 comprehensive polity, to have it effected avowedly and above board, 
 by authority, in the words of the Prayer-Book, and not indirectly, by 
 the one-sided practical operation of an unscrupulous private judgment. — 
 
 The issue of such a struggle is not, I think, to be dreaded, however 
 painful the process. Much that for a season was little more in the 
 ears of our great community than the unintelligible jargon of a 
 middle and dark age, has of late acquired a definite meaning. The 
 defections from our clergy and aristocracy to the ranks of the ever- 
 ageressive and intolerant Papacy, have made manifest the Romeward 
 tendencies, to say no more, of the ‘Sacramental system,” and awakened 
 
Appendix. aay. 8; 
 
 
 
 the serious apprehensions of good men, both among clergy and laity. 
 To my eye the prospect brightens, and it is more than possible we 
 may have to thank your lordship as the instrument, however unde- 
 signedly, of helping forward a reformation in that Church, which, - 
 though vastly superior to anything else of the kind in Christendom, is 
 not yet as absolutely faultless as to be incapable of improvement.—I 
 have the honour to be, my lord, faithfully yours. 
 
 , 
 
 ἘΣ 
 CANON LAW.} 
 
 Apam Hopreson, Esq., on taking the chair, called upon the Rev. Μὲ. 
 Rawson to open the proceedings with prayer; after which he ad: 
 dressed the meeting as follows :—It would, I am sure, ill accord with 
 your wishes, as it would, I am sure, with my own inclination, to 
 detain you by any long preliminary observations. I may, however, 
 be permitted to remind you that this is not ἃ public meeting— 
 that it is not a meeting for discussion.. It is a private meeting, to 
 hear a lecture; and all persons who have entered this room have 
 entered it on the implied, almost the express condition; that they will 
 offer no interruption or opposition whatever to what may be stated here 
 to-day. We are met together to hear from our reverend friend, Dr. 
 M‘Neile, a lecture, at this important crisis, on one-veryimportant branch 
 ‘of that subject which is occupying and distracting the minds of this 
 kingdom from one end to the other. And it is impossible to meet our 
 esteemed and reverend friend on this occasion, and in this place, with- 
 out being forcibly reminded of our deep obligation to him for his 
 untiring services in the Protestant cause. I am not surprised at that 
 response ; for, with the fidelity of a Christian minister, and with the 
 courage and constancy of a British patriot—with an utter disregard 
 of every personal consideration—he has persevered, in season and: 
 out of season, through evil report and through good report, in the 
 face of discouragement, misconception, misrepresentation, and oppo- 
 sition, in exposing to the country at large the insidious designs and 
 the ambitious policy of the Church of Rome. I need not remind 
 
 1 A Lecture on the Canon Law of the Papacy. Ry the Rey. Hugh M'Neile, 
 D.D. With the Speeches of the Chairman, Adam Hodgson, Esq., and the Rey. 
 Chancellor Raikes. 
 
 " 
 
406 ) Appendix. 
 
 this meeting of the confirmation his’ statements have received from 
 recent events. I need not remind you how persons.of every shade © 
 of opinion, and from every part of the kingdom, some of them the 
 distinguished representatives of the old Whig families of the land, 
 whose names have been associated for centuries with the principles 
 of civil and religious liberty,—I need not remind you how these 
 parties have re-echoed, from one end of the kingdom to the other,’ 
 opinions which were denounced as bigoted and intolerant when uttered 
 a few years ago, and in no stronger terms, by our friend Dr. M‘Neile. 
 And although the British people have, with an intuitive sagacity, detected 
 the danger that lurks under the specious pretences under which the 
 recent audacious aggression has been made, it 18 of the utmost im- 
 
 portance that you should be well informed as to the precise nature 
 
 and source of that danger, that you may be proof against the sophisms » 
 of Papal apologists on the one hand, and the fallacies of ultra-liberal- 
 ists on the other. Both these parties will have shortly to be met 
 in the House-of Commons. The members of that House are to be 
 told, and you must learn to tell them, ‘that the British people under- 
 stand this question, and that they will have no representatives who 
 will not take the trouble to understand it also. The House of 
 Commons are to be told, respectfully, but in a tone which no Minister 
 can misunderstand, and which no foreign potentate will dare to mis- 
 take, that the British people are conscious that they have been 
 forced into a contest from which there is no retreat—a contest 
 in which there is no intermediate stage between the security 
 of entire victory and the ignominy: and degradation of utter 
 defeat. They know that the question is, whether Queen Victoria 
 
 or the Pope of Rome-—whether Lord John Russell or Dr. Wiseman— 
 whether the British people or a conclave of cardinals, shall rule in 
 ‘this realm. They are determined that this question shall be settled— 
 
 that they will not have it evaded for any ministerial convenience— 
 
 ‘that they will not have it sacrificed in the collisions of party warfare, 
 
 or over-ruled by precedents bad in themselves, and inapplicable to the 
 present case. The House of Commons must be told that the people 
 of this country venerate the sacred principles of civil and religious 
 liberty with an enlightened devotion, but that they do not worship 
 them with a blind and. abject syperstition—that in common with those 
 great men, the lights of the world, the defenders of freedom, the 
 enlightened advocates of toleration, to whose pages we still resort 
 as to mines of political wisdom—in common with those eminent 
 patriots who achieved, by their exertions in the cause of freedom, 
 
Appendix. | 407 
 
 all that gives Great Britain her place among the nations, we venerate ' 
 the rights of conscience—we shrink from the impiety of intruding 
 into the sanctity of the human breast, where man holds intercourse 
 with his God. | We are anxious to extend as far as possible to every 
 class of our fellow-subjects, equality of civil rights and religious 
 privileges. But, in common with those great men, we maintain that, 
 in the exigencies of human society, and the complication of human 
 relations, cases will arise where the paramount interests of society 
 demand that a limit should be placed to the application of these 
 abstract principles. And we maintain that it is neither bigotry nor 
 intolerance to say, as these great men have emphatically said, that 
 
 allegiance to a foreign power, however defined, however modified, 
 however qualified, establishes pre-eminently such a case. And when 
 that foreign power is one that pretends to universal dominion— 
 that endeavours to establish universally a system—shall I call it a 
 system of persecution?—a system which, if successful, would crush 
 the rights of conscience, prostrate your altars, invade your hearths, 
 violate the sanctity of your homes, poison your domestic relations, 
 stop the circulation of the Holy Scriptures, extinguish your civil 
 and religious liberties, and corrupt the simplicity of your Protestant 
 faith ;—I think we are justified in stating that the necessity which 
 must sometimes occur—rarely, indeed, and always to be deplored— 
 of placing a check on the application of the abstract principles referred. 
 to, pre-eminently exists in the case of the Romish Church. It would 
 accord alike with the justice and the generosity of this kingdom, that 
 in no instance should the restriction exceed the necessities of the 
 ‘ease. But, at the same time, the theory of this ecclesiastical system 
 has taught us—all history has taught us—the events of the last few 
 weeks have taught us—that, for the sake of society, that restric- 
 tion must be équal to those necessities, and co-extensive with them. 
 I speak not of past legislation—it is not necessary that I should do 
 so now. Our immediate business is with the crisis we are at present 
 involved in. And when you become acquainted, as you shortly will, 
 with the nature of the Canon Law, and when you are told by our 
 reverend friend that the recent aggression involves the introduction . 
 of that law into this kingdom, I think you will join your voice to that 
 of the whole country, and say that it is imperative it should be met, 
 not by letters, however resolute, nor by protests, however indignant, 
 but by’some overt act of the government, prompt, unequivocal, 
 decided, and effectual. 
 
408 Appendix. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. M‘Nemz,—Mr, Chairman, our subject, as you have 
 heard, is the Canon Law of the Church of Rome; under the govern- 
 ment of which we allege that Papal jurisdiction in spiritual things 
 becomes an engine for coercion and oppression in temporal things. 
 The reason for a special discussion of this subject at this time is 
 obvious. All the moderate apologists of the recent aggression of the 
 Pope in this country—that is, all the writers, from Dr. Wiseman 
 down—ground their defence mainly, if not exclusively, on this, that 
 the authority to be exercised by the Pope and the Romish bishops in 
 England is entirely spiritual—that it is not calculated, and not in- 
 tended, to interfere in any way with the temporal affairs of British 
 subjects, or the temporal supremacy of the British sovereign. Now, 
 if this were so—if, as they say, the division of England into dioceses 
 by: the Pope threatened no more interference with the liberties of 
 England than the division of England into districts by the Wesleyans 
 (one of their favourite similitudes)—if a Popish bishop, however his 
 oath may be modified to suit a purpose, were under no obligations to 
 his superiors essentially different from the obligations of a Wesleyan 
 minister to his conference—if the government of a Papal bishop in 
 his diocese consisted as exclusively in the teaching of religious doe- 
 trines as does the mission of the Wesleyan minister—what then ? 
 Why, then, Englishmen, who are cordially attached, and who, we 
 trust, will always be cordially attached, to the full and free enjoyment 
 of civil and religious liberty by every class and every individual— 
 Englishmen, who have confidence, and not without cause, in the 
 triumph of their scriptural faith in any contest where the only weapons 
 are reason and argument—Englishmen would make no more objection 
 to a cardinal archbishop than they do to an itinerant preacher. But 
 this is not the case. I hope to.prove to you that this is not the case. 
 And, in the meantime, I may allude to what the Chairman has pro- 
 perly called the intuitive sagacity of Englishmen. England protests 
 by instinct against.the vain pretence—hundreds and. thousands, of all - 
 grades and professions, habits and opinions, without waiting to argue ~ 
 the question, but feeling secretly and surely persuaded that sound 
 argument is on their side, are quickened by this instinct as by the 
 vibration of one national string; and a loud, long, unanimous deter-' 
 mination is heard from hill and dale, from town and country, from 
 steeple and tower, from peer and peasant, from Churchman and Dis- | 
 senter, sounding in the ears of priest and bishop and cardinal, that, 
 not in opposition to our love of civil and religious liberty, but because 
 of that love, and because we are determined to keep down the strong 
 
Appendix. 409 
 
 
 
 arm of tyranny by the strong arm of law; therefore, we will not 
 willingly have a cardinal archbishop, we will not have a Popish hier- 
 archy, we will not have the perpetual conflict, issuing, in all human 
 probability, in a sanguinary revolution, which, we are persuaded, 
 would be the inevitable consequence of such an establishment. 
 
 In this determination, those who are best instructed in the con- 
 troversy are confirmed by the language of the cardinal himself. He 
 tells us in his manifesto, that the object of the present movement on 
 the part of the Pope is to render the Canon Law applicable to Eng- 
 land. He does not tell us why the Canon Law is not applicable 
 under the Vicars Apostolic ; but he asserts that it is not; and on this 
 ground he defends the introduction of bishops with territorial juris- 
 diction, because that under such an hierarchy the Canon Law wotld 
 be applicable. His words are :— 
 
 “ Hither the Holy See must issue another and full constitution, 
 which would supply all wants, but which would be necessarily com- 
 plicated and voluminous, and, as a special provision, would necessarily 
 be temporary. 
 
 ΚΟΥ the real and complete code of the Church must be at once 
 extended to the Catholic Church in England, so far as compatible 
 with its social position: and this provision would be final. 
 
 “ἐ But, in order to adopt this second and more natural expedient, 
 one condition was necessary, and that was, the Catholics must have an 
 hierarchy. The Canon Law is inapplicable under Vicars Apostolic : 
 and, besides, many points would have to be synodically adjusted, and 
 without a metropolitan and suffragans, a provincial synod was out of 
 . the question.” 
 
 That is, two courses were open to the Pope. One was, to construct 
 a special constitution or form of government suited to England in her 
 present social position. This was rejected, because it would have 
 been complicated and voluminous; but more particularly, because it 
 would necessarily have been temporary. We-may ask, Why so? 
 And the answer is instructive. A special form of government, in so 
 far as it was made compatible with the present social condition of 
 England, must have been a departure from the full and complete code 
 of the Romish Church, and therefore incapable of development to 
 meet and satisfy the full and complete domination which she expects 
 to have in England in due time: therefore it must necessarily bave 
 been temporary. A very satisfactory reason for not adopting it. 
 
 The other course open to the Pope was to extend the ‘‘real and 
 complete code of the Church,” 1.6., the Canon Law, to England ; 
 
410 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 applying it now as far as our social position will permit, and having 
 it ready for convenient expansion as England shall be found able to 
 bear it. ‘* This provision would be final.” It was determined, there- 
 fore, to save the Pope the trouble of making another constitution, 
 by making such a one now as would fully apply to the complete 
 social position in which it is hoped and expected England may 
 speedily be found; and not only so, but such a one as would lend 
 its powerful aid towards accelerating the desired change in the social 
 position of England. ies 
 
 ‘In order to adopt this second and more natural expedient, one con- 
 dition was necessary, and that was, the Catholics must have an hierarchy. 
 The Canon Law is inapplicable wnder Vicars Apostolic.” 
 
 Thus our attention is fixed by the cardinal upon the Canon Law, 
 *‘the real and complete code of the Church.” Let this be borne in 
 mind; for you will doubtless be told that the Canon Law is obsolete, 
 
 a code of the dark ages not suited to modern improvement, and not 
 
 to be ascribed to Roman Catholics of our times without extreme 
 prejudice and bigotry. If you believe such representations, after this 
 manifesto of the cardinal, all I can say is, that you will supply a 
 practical exception to the truth of one of the proverbs of Solomon, 
 δ Surely in vain is the snare laid in the sight of any bird.” The 
 
 snare is laid in your sight, in open day, and if you put yee foot into Ἶ 
 
 — it, it shall not be my fault. We inquire, then, 
 
 1. What is the Papal Canon Law ? and 
 
 2. How would it operate if made applicable to England? 
 
 (1) What is it ?— 
 
 This will be best answered by stating generally of what it con ae 
 and then giving characteristic extracts from it. I know it will be 
 said that the extracts selected from it do not give a fair specimen of 
 the whole—that the Canon Law contains a vast variety of enactments, 
 a copious system of jurisprudence, civil as well as ecclesiastical, and 
 is not, and ought not to be, judged of as a whole by an ew parte 
 selection of extracts, made for a specific purpose. 
 
 I grant this ; but I must remind you that it is not at all necessary 
 for you to form an adequate judgment of the Canon Law as a whole. 
 -All that is necessary for you is, to know that it contains such atro- 
 cities as you are determined not to have carried into execution in 
 England by any one. No amount of statements of a more moderate 
 
 character can make excuse for these. All such statements are in fact 
 deceitful, because they are practically neutralised by these. It is ' 
 
 sufficient condemnation of the whole system, that it contains such 
 
 —— | 
 
A pendix. ἌΤΙ 
 
 things as I shall now quote; and while they remain unvepealed, it 
 cannot be introduced with safety to the civil and religious liberty of 
 any state. ee 
 
 Speaking comprehensively, the Canon Law should be divided into 
 three parts or periods—the ancient, the middle, and the modern. 
 
 (1) With the ancient we have no immediate concern. It contains 
 what are called Zhe Apostolic Constitutions, the Codex Ecclesia 
 Orientalis, and the laws of some particular Churches. The period 
 assigned to it is from the first to the end of the eighth century. 
 
 (2) The middle commences with the appearance of Isidore Mer- 
 cator’s collections of canons, in the ninth century. They were 
 followed by what are called the Capitularies of Adrian, in Α.Ὁ. 845. 
 The tenth century was famous for the collection of Rheginon, abbot 
 of Prumia; the eleventh for the collection of Buchardus, bishop of 
 Worms, entitled Magnum decretorum, sew Canonun Volumen; the 
 twelfth, for the collection of St. Ivo; and then we come to the 
 
 εν celebrated Decretum Gratiani, which appeared a.p. 1150. Gratian 
 
 was a Benedictine monk, in a monastery of Bologna. His work is 
 an epitome of Canon Law, drawn from the decrees of councils, the 
 letters of pontiffs, and the writings of ancient doctors. Pope Eugenius 
 III. was extremely satisfied with the work, and-it was soon adopted 
 in every part of the Western Church. 
 
 Subsequent collections were made by Popes Innocent III. and 
 Honorius III. From all these together, and some decretals of his 
 own, Pope Gregory IX, commissioned Raymond of Pennafort, a 
 Dominican, to form a new collection of canons. This was pub- 
 lished in 1280. A further addition was made by Pope Boniface 
 VIII. in ap. 1298; and in 1318 another volume was added by 
 Clement V., containing decrees of the Council of Vienne, at which he 
 presided. 
 
 The last article in the code is the Extravagantes. It is divided into 
 two parts—the Hxtravagantes Joannis, or the decretals of John XXII., 
 published about 1340; and the Extravagantes Communes, containing 
 decrees of Popes from Urban VI. to Sixtus IV., and published about 
 A.D. 1483. 
 
 These all comprise the code in accordance with which the Church of 
 Rome would rule the world, if the world would allow her; and to the 
 contents of which our attention is now forcibly drawn by.the attempt 
 of the Pope, and his cardinals and his bishops, to introduce it for the 
 rule or ‘‘ government”’ of England. 
 
 (3) The modern period of the Canon Law contains the canons of 
 
412 Appendix. 
 the Council of Trent, and the various transactions and concordats 
 between sovereigns and the See of Rome in more modern times. 
 
 For the facts condensed into this statement, I am indebted to Mr. 
 Charles Butler, in his work entitled ‘‘ Hore Juridice Subsecive.”’ 
 
 The general character of the middle code, or Canon Law properly. 
 so-called, of the Church of Rome, is' thus given. and exemplified by 
 Mr. Hallam: ‘‘ The superiority of the ecclesiastical over the temporal 
 power, or at least the absolute independence of the former, may be 
 considered as a sort of key-note, which regulates every passage in 
 the Canon Law. It is expressly declared that subjects owe no allegi- 
 ance to an excommunicated sovereign, if, after admonition, he is not 
 reconciled to the Church; and the rubric prefixed to the declaration 
 of Frederick II.’s deposition in the Council of Lyons,.asserts that ‘ the 
 
 Pope may dethrone the Emperor for lawful causes.’ ”—Huallam. 
 
 , 
 
 In confirmation of these statements, the following citations are 
 
 ‘ 
 
 given :— 
 
 “Constitutiones principum ecclesi- 
 asticis constitutionibus non, preemi- 
 nent sed obsequuntur.” 
 
 “Statutum generale laicorum, ad 
 ecclesias, vel ad ecclesiasticas personas, 
 vel eorum bona in earum prejudicium, 
 non extenditur.” 
 
 “ Queecunque a principibus in ordin- 
 
 ibus vel in ecclesiasticis rebus decreta 
 inveniuntur, nullius auctoritatis esse 
 monstrantur.”’ 
 
 “ Domino excommunicato, manente, 
 subditi fidelitatem non debent; et si 
 longo tempore in ea perstiterent, et 
 monitus non pareat ecclesiz, ab ejus 
 debito absolvuntur.” 
 
 “ Papa imperatorem deponere potest. 
 ex causis legitimis,” 
 
 The laws of kings have not pre- 
 eminence over ecclesiastical laws, but 
 are subordinate, or subservient, to 
 them. h 
 
 The statute law of laymen-does not 
 extend to churches or ecclesiastical 
 persons, or to their goods to their pre- 
 judice. : 
 
 Whatever decrees of princes are 
 found injurious to the interests of the 
 Church are declared to be of no au- 
 thority whatever. 
 
 While a sovereign remains excom- 
 municated, his subjects owe him no 
 allegiance; and if this state of things 
 shall last for some time, and the sove- 
 reign being admonished do not submit 
 himself to the Church, his subjects 
 are absolved from all fealty to him. 
 
 The Pope may dethrone the Emperor 
 for lawful causes.' 
 
 Archbishop Cranmer published:a tract entitled, ‘‘ A Collection of 
 Tenets extracted from the Canon Law, showing the extravagant pre- 
 tensions of the Church of Rome.” It is thus spoken of by Strype, in the 
 first volume of his memorials of Cranmer :—‘‘ One of the first things 
 wherein. he (i.e., Cranmer) showed his good service to the Church was 
 done in the Parliament, in the latter end of this year, 1533. When the 
 supremacy came under debate, and the usurped power of the Bishop 
 of Rome was propounded, then the old collections (from the Canon 
 
 1 Hallam’s Middle Ages, chap. vii. 
 
A ppenarx. 413 
 
 Law) of the archbishop did him good service; for the chief, and in 
 a manner, the whole burden, of this weighty cause was laid on his 
 shoulders.” 
 
 On the subject of the usurped authority of the Bishop of Rome, 
 Cranmer made the following selections, and gave them with accurate 
 references to the several decretals in which they are found. They 
 have been frequently verified, and cannot be gainsaid. They are re- 
 printed; and may be examined, in the Parker Society’s edition of the 
 archbishop’s works. To that I refer, and therefore do not burden 
 these pages with references in detail, 
 
 “ The See of Rome hath neither spot nor wrinkle in it, nor cannot 
 
 ” 
 
 err, 
 
 “The Bishop of Rome is not bound by any decrees, but he may 
 compel, as well the clergy as laymen, to receive his decrees and canon 
 laws.” 
 
 “The Bishop of Rome hath authority to judge all men, and 
 specially to discern the articles of faith, and that without any council ; 
 and may assoil (acquit) them that the council hath damned; but no 
 man hath authority to judge him, nor to meddle with anything that 
 he hath judged, neither emperor, king, people, nor the clergy; and it 
 is not lawful for any man to dispute of his power.” 
 
 ‘‘ The Bishop of Rome may excommunicate emperors and princes, 
 depose them from their states, and assoil their subjects from their 
 oath of obedience to them, and so constrain them to rebellion.” 
 
 __ “The emperor is the Bishop of Rome’s subject, and the Bishop of 
 Rome may revoke the emperor’s sentences in temporal causes.” 
 
 (ΤῸ belongeth to the Bishop of Rome to allow or disallow the 
 emperor after he is elected; and he ey translate the owes from 
 one region to another.” 
 
 ‘* The Bishop of Rome is judge in temporal things, and hath two 
 swords, spiritual and temporal.” 
 
 ‘‘The Bishop of Rome may give authority to arrest men, and im- 
 prison them in manacles and fetters.”’ 
 
 ‘The Bishop of Rome may compel princes to receive his legates.” 
 
 “It appertaineth to the Bishop of Rome to judge which oaths ought 
 to be kept, and which not.” 
 
 ‘« Prince’s laws, if they be against the canons and decrees of the 
 Bishop of Rome, be of no force nor strength.”’ 
 
 - ἐς All kings, bishops, and nobles that allow or suffer the Bishop of 
 Rome’s decrees in anything to be violate, be accursed.”’ 
 ‘The Bishop of Rome may be judged of none but of God only ; for 
 
414 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 although he neither regard his own salvation, nor no man’s else, but 
 draw down with himself innumerable people by heaps unto hell, yet 
 may no mortal man in this world presume to reprehend him. Foras- 
 much as he is called God, he may be judged of no man, for God may 
 be judged of no man.” 
 
 ‘The Bishop of Rome may compel by an oath all rulers and other 
 people to observe, and cause to be observed, whatsoever the See of 
 Rome shall ordain concerning heresy, and the favourers thereof; and 
 who will not obey, he may deprive them of their dignities.” 
 
 ‘‘He that acknowledgeth not himself to be under the Bishop of 
 Rome, and that the Bishop of Rome is ordained by God to have’ 
 primacy over all the world, is a heretic, and cannot be saved, nor is 
 not of the flock of Christ.” 
 
 Such is the position assigned to the Bishop of Rome, and such. the 
 authority claimed for him by the Canon Law. It is difficult to deter- 
 mine which is greater, the blasphemy of the assumption itself, | 
 or the cool effrontery with which it is called only a spiritual! juris- 
 diction. 
 
 Well might the author of our homily against wilful rebellion 
 
 
 
 ‘Tt is well known, as well by all histories as by daily experience, 
 that none have either more ambitiously aspired above emperors, kings, 
 and princes, nor have more perniciously moved the ignorant people to 
 rebellion against their princes, than certain persons who falsely chal- 
 lenge themselves to be only counted and called spiritwal.”—Homily 
 against Wilful Rebellion, 5th part. 
 
 It is a favourite objection against our English Church, urged from 
 divers quarters, that we give to the Queen, or the Queen’s Govern- 
 ment, the supremacy in spiritual things which Roman Catholies give 
 to the Pope. But is this the case? Surely it is reasonable to ask 
 that-so grave a question should be carefully investigated before posi- 
 tive assertions are made. 
 
 You have now heard a description from the Papal Canon Law of 
 the absolute supremacy of the Pope. Looking back at it, allow me to 
 ask, What analogy exists between it and the supremacy of our consti- 
 tutional sovereign? Where do we say, or on what evidence is it 
 alleged, that we think that the Queen, or the Queen’s Government, is 
 ‘not bound by any decrees or laws, but may compel as well clergy 
 as laymen to receive her decrees?” Nay, our Queen and_ her - 
 Government are as much and truly bound by the laws of the realm, 
 ecclesiastical and civil, as the meanest of the subjects of the realm 
 
Appendix. eg 
 
 
 
 The Queen’s supremacy in Church matters is administrative of exist- 
 ing laws, not absolute nor legislative. We have no exclusively 
 ecclesiastical legislature. Parliament, not considered as distinct from 
 the Church, but as a part of the Church, the bishops forming a 
 part of it, was considered sufficient, and convocation was practically 
 suppressed. If ‘recent changes have rendered Parliament less 
 suitable for the discussion of such subjects than it was, (and 
 doubtless they have done so,) we are reduced to a choice of evils. 
 Convocation would be the greater evil, because it would open 
 an arena for the worst possible meddling, and, if successful, the 
 worst possible tyranny—that is, clerical meddling and clerical tyranny. 
 We are thankful for the ecclesiastical laws and the Articles of Religion 
 already established among us; and while the royal supremacy is ad- 
 ministrative of these, no one, whatever the extent of his nonconform- 
 ity may be, need entertain the slightest apprehensions of tyranny. 
 
 It may indeed be said, as it has been said, that within a short 
 couple of centuries ago, the prisons of England were filled with good 
 and holy men, because they were Noncodnformists. It may be added 
 with some pathos, as it has been added, that the ‘‘ Pilgrim’s Progress” 
 and the ‘Saint's Rest” were written in gaol; but it should be 
 remembered that between the reign of Charles II. and our time an’ 
 important revolution’ has taken place; the Protestantism of the sove- 
 reign (previously contingent) has been secured by law, and the Bill of 
 Rights has been passed. No Nonconformist need now feel the finger 
 of our ecclesiastical laws, except on the portion of his real property 
 legalised to the Church; and as he acquires all property subject 
 to this impost, and with a corresponding reduction of what would 
 otherwise be its price, and as the payment. involves him in no 
 expression whatever of approval of the thing paid, for, he has little 
 to complain of. 
 
 Again, I would ask, Where do we say, or on what evidence is it 
 alleged, that we think that our sovereign ‘‘ may be judged of none but 
 of God only; so that though he should neither regard his own salva- 
 tion, nor no man’s else, but draw down with himself innumerable - 
 people by heaps into hell, yet may no mortal man in this world pre- 
 sume to reprehend him?” On the contrary, if our sovereign were to 
 forsake the Protestant religion, and exert the prerogatives of the 
 ‘crown to-bring back the nation to Popery, our laws would fully justify 
 "us in doing what our forefathers under James II. did; not only repre- 
 hending him, but, if he continued obstinate, dethroning him, and 
 placing his nearest of kin, being Protestant, in his place. 
 
416 A ppend: 1X. 
 
 That some members and ministers, and even dignitaries, of the 
 Church of England take a different view of the supremacy, and of 
 ecclesiastical independence and synodical legislation, and even mani- 
 fest in their hearts and tempers the seeds of ecclesiastical domination, 
 is no really sound argument against the English Church herself. 
 There are extreme men on either side; but happily on both sides 
 they are legally helpless. They may for a time complain, and dis- 
 turb, and partially pervert ; but the utmost they can do is to retire. 
 
 In saying this, I do not allege or imply that the Church of England 
 is without fault. No institution intrusted to human management, 
 however perfect at-first, can, without a miracle, continue long without 
 fault. There are blots on her fair face—blots which her first re- 
 formers had not courage to remove, and which the jealousy of con- 
 flicting opinions among her children renders it difficult to remove 
 now. But though faults may be found in her system, vastly greater 
 faults may be found in every other; and in a fallen world like this, 
 
 _ the choice of wisdom is a lesser evil, 
 
 In this brief digression, I hope I have shown that there is an 
 essential difference between the irresponsible supremacy arrogated 
 by the Pope under the Canon Law, and the constitutional, legal, and 
 limited supremacy of our most gracious Sovereignan—whom God 
 preserve. 
 
 To return. 
 
 Touching the immunities claimed for the clergy, the following are 
 specimens'of the Canon Law, contained in Cranmer’s Tract :— 
 
 ‘‘ Princes ought to obey the bishops and the decrees of the Church, 
 and to submit their heads unto the bishops, and not to be judges over 
 the bishops ; for the bishops ought to be forborne, and judged of no 
 laymen.” 
 
 “Kings and princes ought not to set bishops beneath them, but 
 reverently to rise before them, and assign them an honourable seat 
 by them.” 
 
 ‘‘Laymen may not meddle with elections of the clergy, nor with 
 any other thing that belongeth unto them.” 
 
 ἐς ΤῸ is not lawful for any layman to iy an imposition of taxes, 
 subsidies, or any charges upon the clergy.” 
 
 ‘“‘Laymen may not be judges to any of the clergy, nor compel. 
 them to ke] their undoubted gees but the bishops only must be 
 their judges.” 
 
 Of course, these high immunities, these distinguishing privileges, 
 are dear to the hearts of Popish priests and bishops. ‘These are 
 
Appendix. 417 
 
 their rights, according to their own Canon Laws. What, then, is 
 to be expected when the laws of the country in which they live 
 refuse to recognise these rights? What is to be expected where 
 Popish priests and bishops are compelled by the laws of the land to pay 
 their just debts and taxes’? Is it possible, is it within the ordinary 
 rules of human ‘nature, that such men can be friendly to such laws, 
 or teach the people to be so? Is it not inevitable that they will | 
 chafe under the restraint of such laws, and long and labour for power 
 to throw off the irksome burden ἢ. Will they not feel it one of their 
 dearest interests to disturb, and, if possible, to revolutionise, a State 
 which thus depresses them, depriving them of their cherished, their 
 (supposed) divine rights? Will they not, must they not, look to 
 the Bishop of Rome, the source of all their authority, and immunity, 
 and distinction as to their real sovereign? And how religiously, 
 with all the power of superstitious zeal, must they in their hearts 
 detest and curse the excommunicated heretics, be they princes, judges, 
 or magistrates, who thus dare to degrade the holy priesthood into 
 the ordinary rank of citizenship ? 
 
 Oh, yes; so-long as the Canon Law remains unrepealed—so long 
 as the Bishop of Rome is held up to the prostrate consciences of his 
 followers as the vicar and sword-bearer of Jesus Christ, the King of 
 kings—so long as his bishops and priests are taught that of divine 
 right, by infallible authority, they are entitled to superiority over 
 laymen, and over the laws of laymen, so long must the Church of 
 Rome be a practical and restless adversary to the supremacy of the 
 laws of laymen, and consequently to the peace and order of king- 
 doms. , 
 
 Returning to the contents of the Canon Law, under the head of 
 excommunication, in that bull of assumed infallibility which is read 
 once a year (on every Maunday Thursday) in the presence of the Pope, 
 and republished, as they tell us, for the purpose of ‘‘ solemnly exer- 
 cising the spiritual sword of ecclesiastical discipline, and the salutary 
 weapons of justice by the ministry of the Supreme Apostolate,” thus 
 it is decreed :— 
 
 ‘“We excommunicate and curse, on the part of God Almighty, 
 Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, by the authority of all the blessed 
 Apostles, Peter and Paul, and by our own, all Hussites, Wicklephists, 
 Lutherans, Zuinglians, Calvinists, Huguenots, Anabaptists, Trini- 
 tarians, and Apostates whatsoever from the Christian faith, and all 
 and singular others heretics, under whatsoever name they may be 
 ~ classed, and of whatsoever sect they may be ; and those who believe, 
 
 | atm 
 
418 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 receive, or favour them, and all those who defend them in general, 
 whosoever they be; and all those who, without our authority, and 
 that of the Apostolic See, knowingly read or keep, print, or in 
 any way whatsoever, from any cause, publicly οὐ privately, upon any 
 pretence or colour whatsoever, defend their books which’ contain 
 heresy or treat of religion ; also, schismatics, and those who perti- 
 naciously withdraw themselves or secede from obedience to us, and 
 to the Roman pontiff for the time being.” 
 
 The second section is as follows :— 
 
 “ΤῊ like manner we excommunicate and curse all and singular, 
 of whatsoever station, degree, or condition they may be, (but the 
 Universities, Colleges, and Chapters, by whatsoever name they may 
 be called, we interdict,) who appeal from the ordinances or commands 
 of us, and of the Roman pontifis, for the time being, to a future 
 general council; as also those by whose aid or favour the appeals 
 shall be made.” 
 
 The eleventh section curses— 
 
 ‘* All those who kill or injure in any way, cardinals, archbishops, 
 and other dignitaries, or drive them from their territories.’ 
 
 Section fifteen proceeds :—‘‘ Or (that. is, we excommunicate and 
 curse those) who, under pretence of their office, or at the instance of 
 any party, or of any others whatsoever, draw, or cause or procure to 
 be drawn, directly or indirectly, upon any pretence whatsoever, 
 ecclesiastical persons, chapters, convents, colleges, or any churches 
 whatsoever, before them to their tribunal, audience, chancery, council 
 or parliament, contrary to the disposition of the Canon Law; as also 
 those who, from any cause or pretence whatsoever, or even under _ 
 pretext of any custom or privilege, or in any other manner whatso- 
 ever, shall make, ordain, and publish or use, when made or enacted, 
 statutes, ordinances, constitutions, pragmatics, or any other decrees 
 in general or particular, whereby ecclesiastical liberty is violated, or 
 in any way injured or depressed, or in any other way restricted, or 
 the rights of us, or of the said See, and of any other churches what- 
 soever, are, in any way whatsoever, directly or indirectly, tacitly or 
 expressly prejudiced.” 
 
 Sections seventeen and eighteen proceed thus: ‘‘ Again, (we ex- 
 communicate and curse,) those who usurp the jurisdictions, fruits, 
 revenues, and emoluments which belong to us and the Apostolie See, 
 and to any ecclesiastical persons whatsoever, upon account of churches, 
 monasteries, and other ecclesiastical benefices ; or even who sequester 
 upon any occasion or cause, the said reyenues, without the express 
 
Appendix. 419 
 
 licence of the Roman pontiff, or of others having legitimate faculty 
 for that purpose.”—Bulla Cene Domini. 
 
 This is sufficiently explicit. All we of this realm, from the Queen 
 to the cottager, are doubly and trebly excommunicated and cursed ; 
 
 seeing that, in defiance of the Canon Law, we read and defend books 
 which treat of religion, and contain what that law pronounces to be 
 heresy ; seeing also that we do draw, or cause to be drawn, before 
 our secular tribunals, all offenders against our national laws, whether 
 they be ecclesiastical persons or lay persons, and without any respect 
 of persons. It is to be hoped that we shall presently incur another 
 of these curses, by taking heretical liberties with cardinals, arch- 
 bishops, and other dignitaries, and ‘‘ driving them from our terri- 
 tories.” 
 
 If the dean and chapter of Westminster have not an express licence 
 from the Roman pontiff, or from some person holding from him a 
 legitimate faculty to give it, they are made prominent at present as 
 lying under an especial curse and excommunication. 
 
 Dr. Wiseman says, “‘ Perhaps the dean and chapter are not aware 
 that, were I disposed to claim more than the right to tread the 
 Catholic pavement of that noble building, and breathe its air of ancient 
 consecration, another might_step in with a prior claim. For succes- 
 sive generations there has existed ever, in the Benedictine order, an 
 Abbot of Westminster, the representative in religious dignity of those 
 who erected, and beautified, and governed that church and cloister, 
 _ Have they ever been disturbed by this ‘titular’? Have they heard 
 
 Geeny claim or protest on his part, touching their temporalities ?” 
 
 » Teannot venture to say how far the dean and chapter of West- 
 minster are acquainted with the Canon Law. I believe some of them 
 to be remarkably well instructed in the whole subject. But I am 
 quite sure that while Dr. Wiseman was writing this declaimer, he 
 knew perfectly well the claim, and, as he is bound to believe, the 
 legal elaim of the Abbot of Westminster to the fruits, revenues, and 
 emoluments which belong to that noble building, and as to a protest 
 against the present proprietors, he knew perfectly well that once a 
 year at Rome, in the .presence of the Pope, they are cursed as 
 usurpers, and all their emoluments claimed as ealy due to the 
 Apostolic See! 
 
 To this specimen of who are excommunicate according to the 
 Canon Law, I add the following description of how it is lawful to 
 treat such persons. 10 is from Gratian, under the head De Co oercendis 
 
 Hereticts :— 
 
Appendix. 
 
 
 
 “Si ergo viri sancti et publics 
 potestates bella, gerentes, non fuerunt 
 transgressores illius mandati, non 
 occides,. quamyvis quosque flagitiosos 
 digna morte perimerant ; si miles suze 
 potestati obediens, non est reus homi- 
 eidii, si ejus imperio quemlibet flagi- 
 tiorum interfecerit; si homicidas et 
 venenarios punire, 
 sanguinis, sed legum ministerium ; si 
 pax ecclesiz moestitiam consolatur 
 perditorum; si illi, qui zelo matris 
 ecclesize accensi excommunicatos in- 
 terficiunt, homicide non judicantur ; 
 
 ᾿ patet quod malos non solim flagellare, 
 sed etiam interfict licet.—Decreti IL, 
 pars. Causa XXITI. Quastio VI. an 
 mali cogendi sunt ad bonum. 
 
 non est effusio, 
 
 If therefore good men and public 
 authorities, waging war, be in no wise 
 transgressors of the commandment, 
 “Thou shalt not kill,” although they 
 occasion many deaths; if the soldier, 
 obedient to his commander, be not 
 guilty of homicide, though he slay men 
 with his own hand; if the punishment 
 of assassins or poisoners be not a guilly 
 bloodshedding, but a just administra- 
 tion οὗ the law ; if the peace of the 
 Church be a source of consolation 
 under the distress occasioned by the 
 death of the heretics; if those who, 
 inflamed with zeal for mother Church, 
 _put excommunicated persons to death, ; 
 are not to be considered homicides, 
 it is evident that it is lawful not only 
 to flagellate, but also to slay the bad, 
 
 In connexion with this, I turn to the fourth Council of Lateran, 
 held under Innocent III. Its decrees form part of the Canon Law, 
 and are in an especial manner endorsed by the Council of Trent. 
 The fourth Council of Lateran is called by Trent a sacred council,— 
 Sess. xxiv. c. 1; and a general council,—Sess. xxv. 6. 8. To plead 
 for the introduction of the Canon Law, and at the same time to reject 
 the fourth Council of Lateran, would be an absurdity too gross to 
 
 escape detection. 
 
 Bearing this in mind, we open another page of the © 
 
 Canon Law, and there read this memorable canon :— 
 
 “3. De Hereticis—Si necesse fuerit 
 per censuram ecclesiasticam COMPEL- 
 LANTUR seculares Potestates,. quibus 
 cunque funguntur officiis, ut sicut 
 reputari cupiunt et haberi fideles, ita 
 pro defensione fidei praestent publice 
 juramentum quod de terris sua juris- 
 dictione subjectis, UNIVERSOS H@RE- 
 TICOS ab ecclesia denotatos, bona fide 
 pro viribus EXTERMINARE studebunt ; 
 ita quod, amodo quandocunque quis 
 fuerit impotestatem sive spiritualem 
 
 sive temporalem assumptus, hoc 
 teneatur capitulum juramento  fir- 
 mare.” 
 
 “ Si vero dominus temporalis, requi- 
 
 _ situs et monitus ab ecclesia terram 
 suam purgare neglexerit ab hac heere- 
 tica ioeditate; per metropolitum et 
 czteros comproyinciales episcopos ex- 
 communicationis vinculo innodetur, 
 Et si satisfacere contempserit infra 
 annum, significatur hoc summo Ponti- 
 fici, ut extunc IPso vasallos ab ejus 
 jidelitate denunciet absolutes, et terram 
 exponat catholicis occupandum, qui 
 
 Secular princes shall, if necessary, 
 be COMPELLED, if they desire to be | 
 accounted faithful, that for the defence 
 of the faith they shall publicly make 
 oath, that they will endeavour, bond 
 jide, with all their might, to extirpate 
 Srom their kingdoms all heretics marked 
 by the Church, so that when any one 
 shall be about to assume any authority, 
 whether spiritual or temporal, he shall 
 be held bound to confirm his title by 
 this oath. 
 
 And if any temporal prince, being 
 required and admonished by thé 
 Church, shall neglect to purge his 
 kingdom from this heretical filthiness, © 
 he shall be bound in the chain of ex-— 
 communication by the metropolitan 
 and other provincial bishops, and if 
 he shall not make satisfaction within 
 a year, it shall be signified to the 
 Chief Pontiff, that then he may pro-- 
 claim his subjects absolved from their 
 
Appendix. 421 
 
 eam exterminatis hereticis, sine ulla allegiance, and bestow his kingdom 
 
 contradictione possideant, et in fidei upon good Catholics, who (the heretics 
 
 puritate conservent.” being exterminated) shall, without any 
 
 contradiction, possess the land, and 
 preserve it in the purity of the faith. 
 
 You will probably hear the authenticity of this tremendous canon 
 called in question, seeing that the time is not yet come for openly 
 avowing.it. It may be well, therefore, to state here some cireum- 
 " stances of its history. ἊΝ 
 It so happens that in the Mazarine copy of the canons of this 
 Council, the leaf containing this third canon is found torn. The 
 beginning and the end are preserved, but the middle part is wanting. 
 In other copies the whole canon is found entire. Crabbe, a Fran- 
 ciscan friar, published three editions of the Councils—in 1538, 1551, 
 and 1558. In all these the canon is inserted complete. It is curious 
 to observe the use which a Romish bishop in our own times endeéa- 
 voured to make of the fact of the torn leaf. Doctor Doyle, in his 
 evidence before a committee of the House of Lords, denied the genuine- 
 ness of this canon, pleading the chasm in the Mazarine copy. On the 
 contrary, the President of the College of Maynooth (Dr. Crotty), in 
 his evidence before the Commissioners of Education Inquiry, acknow- 
 _ ledges the genuineness of the canon, though he endeavours to soften 
 its meaning. It is well observed by Doctor Grier, from whom I quote 
 these facts, that the canon in question is proved to be a regular 
 ecclesiastical one, which the Pope might or might not act upon 
 according to circumstances ; or, to come nearer to our own concerns, 
 which a Popish hierarchy, a living, speaking authority of the Church 
 of Rome in this country, might at any time reduce to practice, suo 
 motu. It is indeed of little consequence whether the canon in ques- 
 tion be spurious or not, so long as the bull In Cane Domini exists, | 
 which enjoins the excommunication and anathematizing of heretics ; 
 which, in compliance with the injunction, is read in the presence of 
 the Pope every Maunday Thursday; and which would be as obligatory 
 ow Dr. Wiseman or Dr. Ullathorne to read, and to enforce within 
 their respective jurisdictions, as it is on the pontiff himself, if the 
 circumstances in which they are placed afforded them the opportunity — 
 of so doing, with due regard to ‘ ecclesiastical utility.” £ 
 
 Here, then, we have a sample of the Canon Law under these 
 several heads, (1) the usurped authority of the Bishop of Rome; 
 (2). the extravagant immunities of the clergy; (8) the excommuni- 
 ‘cation of heretics; and (4) the intolerant persecution of the excom- 
 municated. : 
 
422 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 Much, very much, is of necessity left untouched; but I must now’ 
 proceed briefly to inquire how this system of ecclesiastical domination 
 would operate if Dr. Wiseman’s scheme were carried out in accordance 
 with the Papal bull of this year, and the Canon Law made applicable 
 to England. 
 
 If. This inquiry obviously divides itself into two branches; first, 
 
 how it would operate on subjects of the Papal Court resident in - | 
 
 England; and, secondly, how it would operate on the Protestant 
 community who at present reject and disr egard it. 
 
 (1) Its operation .on Romanists resident in England is direct and 
 obvious. It places them in the predicament so happily described in 
 a recent letter by Lord Beaumont. His lordship says,—‘‘ The Pope, 
 by his ill-advised measures, has placed the Roman Catholics in this 
 country in a position where they must either break with Rome, or 
 violate their allegiance to the constitution of these realms.” And — 
 again,—‘‘ It is impossible to act up to the spirit of the British con- 
 stitution, and at the same time to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the 
 Pope in local matters. Such is the dilemma in which the lately- | 
 published bull places the English Roman Catholic.” Clearly so. 
 The British constitution utterly repudiates the Canon Law of the 
 Papacy. To introduce the one, is to exclude the other. To be in 
 obedience to the one, is to be in rebellion against the other. It is 
 impossible to serve both. And, therefore, if the Canon Law of the 
 Church or Court of Rome be made applicabie to England, the English 
 Romanist, who scorns to be a dissembler and a hypocrite, must make 
 his choice. He must either ‘“‘ break with Rome,” as Lord Beaumont 
 expresses it, and thus become a Protestant, or he must break with 
 England, and thus become a rebel or a refugee. England is not 
 content with half-hearted subjects. She knows nothing of equivo- 
 cation or mental reservation in swearing allegiance to her beloved 
 sovereign. 
 
 Lukewarmness in allegiance is akin to disaffection. Lord Beaumont 
 speaks of Rome in like manner. He says,—‘‘ The Church of Rome 
 admits of no moderate party among the laity ; moderation in respect ἢ 
 to her ordinances is lukewarmness, and the lukewarm she invariably 
 spews out of her mouth. You must be with her against all opponents, 
 or you are not of her; and, therefore, when Rome adopts a measure 
 such as the present, it places the laity in the awkward dilemma I 
 have alluded to. Believing, therefore, that the late bold and clearly- 
 expressed edict of the Court of Rome cannot be received or accepted 
 by English Roman Catholics without a violation of their duties as 
 
 ) 
 ‘ 
 
Appendix. 423 
 
 
 
 citizens, 1 need not add that I consider the line of conduct now 
 adopted by Lord John Russell as that of a true friend of the British 
 constitution.” 
 
 This is as creditable to the noble lord’s sincerity as a gentleman, 
 as it is to his sagacity as a Romanist; and we cannot doubt that he 
 will extricate himself from the awkward dilemma, by either ceasing 
 to be a subject of the Court of Rome, or ceasing to be a resident 
 under the constitution of England. 
 
 Among English Romanists of a less scrupulous character than Lord 
 Beaumont, the operation of the Canon Law must be, as it has been 
 in Ireland, to produce slavery under their priesthood, and disaffection 
 towards their sovereign. The jurisdiction of the Pope, though in 
 words confined to things spiritual, does, in fact, in the hands of an 
 ambitious priesthood, become an engine for coercion and oppression 
 in things temporal. The sacramental ordinances of Romanism, multi- 
 plied and extended over every relation of life for the purpose, are 
 presented to the mind from infancy, and pressed upon the conscience, 
 as absolutely indispensable to peace and prosperity in this world, and 
 salvation in the world to come; while the administration of them, 
 left to the sovereign choice and decision of the hierarchy, is made 
 the coercive condition of political. and financial subserviency. Let a 
 Romanist presume to assert his temporal independence, and himself 
 and his family may be placed under an interdict. He must then 
 make up his mind either to dispense wholly with the sacramental 
 ordinances of his Church, or submit himself wholly to the dictation 
 of kis priest. Making the latter his choice, he becomes a ready agent 
 for disturbance. Not only is his vote, if he possess the franchise, 
 secured, but his personal activity also; in any combination year 
 for its object to defeat the ends of British justice, or to. accomplish 
 the purposes recommended in the Canon Law. Let it be remembered 
 that, according to the Canon Law, it is neither murder nor homicide, 
 but an act of justice, to kill a heretic. 
 
 Need we go further than this for an explanation of the modern 
 history of the south and west of Ireland? Surprise is expressed that 
 the surrounding population make no attempt to arrest the assassin 
 when a murder is committed in the open day. Such surprise may be 
 spared. That which we call murder, and he who, in the eye of the 
 British law, is an assassin, are looked upon in altogether a different 
 _ light by a Romish population, “‘ governed” by a hierarchy under the 
 Canon Law. In ‘their estimation nothing unlawful has occurred ; 
 only ‘‘ the spiritual sword of ecclesiastical discipline has been drawn, 
 
424 Appendix. - 
 
 and a salutary weapon of justice made use of, by the ministry of the 
 supremeapostolate.” Hence it is that the British constitution, even 
 in the outward letter of it, cannot be maintained in Ireland except by 
 a British army. And as for inward affection towards it, that is wholly 
 banished from the Roman Catholic bosom. 
 
 The operation upon a Roman: Catholic population of the Canon . 
 Law, quickened into vigorous exercise by fresh missives from the 
 Papal court, is such, that every Roman Catholic government in Europe 
 has been compelled to guard against it, in order to secure their own 
 independence even in temporal things. 
 
 On this subject, I refer to a parliamentary document every way 
 worthy of our serious attention. It is a report ordered to be printed 
 by the House of Commons on the 25th of June, 1816. It emanated 
 from a select committee, who thus describe the object they had in 
 view :—‘‘ Strictly to investigate and report facts, as they appeared to — 
 be substantiated by documents or other admissible testimony, in order 
 to present to the House, as distinctly as their materials will allow, a 
 view of that system of policy which, under different shades of vari- 
 ation, appears to obtain in the various states of EKurope with respect | 
 to ecclesiastical regulation, as it refers to their subjects of the Roman 
 Catholic communion, and their intercourse with the See of Rome.” 
 One of the points to which the committee directed their chief atten- 
 tion was, ‘‘the restraint or restraints imposed upon the intromission 
 of Papal rescripts, by submitting them to the inspection of’the civil 
 government, previous to their publication. This is called the Regium 
 exequatur, or the placitum Regium.” On this subject the committee 
 report on the provisions made by the various European governments. 
 I cite a few samples. 
 
 By the Austrian laws, it is provided ‘‘ That all Papal rescripts, as 
 well original as authenticated copies, are to be laid before the provin- 
 cial government, and afterwards submitted to the supreme tribunal, 
 along with the opinion of the attorney-general, and of the provincial 
 government. That this is to be observed, not only with regard to 
 newly-emitted bulls, briefs, or other regulations of the Pope, but also 
 with regard to Papal rescripts in former times at whatever period they 
 have been issued, so that whosoever desires to take use of them is 
 bound to obtain the Imperial placet.”’ 
 
 Concerning the Venetian states, the committee report :—“ So long 
 since as the year 1483 the Council of Ten ordered all bulls from 
 Rome to be sent to the officers of state without the seals being broken.” 
 By more recent decrees of the Council of the Pregadi of Venice, in 
 
᾿ς Appendix. ΟΣ ΤῊ 
 
 1745, made to renew and confirm all the ancient laws on the subject, 
 “it is not lawful for any one, under any pretence whatever, to execute — 
 any bull, patent, brief, rescript, citation, monitory, or general letter of 
 whatsoever nature it may be, that came from abroad, if it be not first 
 laid before the College of Senators, to be examined and licensed, 
 
 ᾿ς under penalty of the nullity of the execution, and of such punishment 
 as the quality of the offender and the magnitude of the transgression 
 shall deserve.” | 
 
 Concerning the kingdom of Naples, after stating the ancient practice 
 on the authority of Giannone, the committee report :—‘ As to the 
 present practice, Mr. A’Court, the British minister, in his despatch, says, 
 “1 have the authority of the secretary of state for assuring your lord 
 ship that no bull, rescript, or dispensation has ever been acted upon 
 in the kingdom of Naples without previously receiving the Regium 
 exequatur, ‘These papers are always officially sent by the secretary of 
 state to the procuratore generale, not only for his signature, but also 
 for his approbation on the part and behalf of his Majesty.” 
 
 Concerning Sardinia, the committee report the complete recognition 
 and exercise of the Regiwn exequatur, which consists in this—‘ that 
 no bull, brief, or rescript from Rome, or any other country, with refer- 
 ence to the external form, or in the least connected with the external 
 policy of the Church, is to be published or executed without having 
 been previously presented to the supreme magistrate, who taking, 
 were it necessary, the commands of the sovereign on the subject, either 
 keeps them back, or by means of letters or otherwise, permits their 
 being executed.” 
 
 Concerning France, the committee make a three- fold report :— 
 First, under the ancient régime ; secondly, under the National Conyen- 
 tion; and, thirdly, under the Consular Government :—(1.) By an 
 edict of Louis XI., a.p. 1475, ‘‘ Any bulls, letters, or writings coming 
 from Rome, are to be examined on the frontiers, to see whether they 
 contain anything against the rights of the kingdom and liberties of the 
 Gallican Church.” (2.) The National Assembly, on the 9th of June, 
 1791, decreed that ‘‘No brief, decree, bull, or constitution of the 
 Court of Rome, shall be printed, posted, published, or executed, if 
 they are not presented to the legislative body and approved, and 
 their execution sanctioned and promulgated in the forms prescribed by 
 law.” (3.) The Consular Government established ‘‘ Regulations of 
 the Gallican Church,” commonly known by the name of the Organic 
 Articles. These were seventy-seven in number. The first was, 
 Bs “That no bull, rescript, decree, provision, or anything in the place of 
 
426 : Appendix. 
 
 
 
 a provision, nor other missive from the court of Rome, even though it 
 should relate to individuals only, shall be received, printed, or other- 
 wise put in force, without the authority of the government.” 
 
 Concerning Spain, the committee report that the Regium exequatur 
 is in full force, in accordance with an edict of Charles III., published 
 in 1761, and again in 1762—‘ That every brief, bull, rescript, or 
 pontifical letter, directed either to the tribunals, the juntas, the magis- 
 trates, the archbishops or bishops, in general or in particular, provided 
 it be intended to establish any new law, regulation, or observance, or 
 even to convey simple admonition, shall, in the first place, be seen 
 and examined by the king, without which it shall not be published 
 nor put in execution.” 
 
 The reason for all this caution is found in the nature of the laws 
 referred to, and the species of influence which they would not fail to 
 exercise. Emanating from the See of Rome,'the source of divine 
 authority according to the Canon Law, if they were duly published by 
 the Roman hierarchy in any country, they would, in the minds of 
 conscientious Roman Catholics resident therein, supersede the laws 
 of that country. In defiance of the precautions here described, the 
 Romish bishops on the Continent have, within the last few years, 
 provoked numerous contests with the different governments. A 
 few of these have been thus well and briefly stated :— 
 
 In 1823 the government of the Netherlands was obliged to dissolve 
 two religious confederacies, as dangerous to the state. In 1824 there 
 were serious disputes and commotions, on religious points, in Bavaria, 
 Saxe Weimar, and Saxony. In 1825 the Belgian government had a 
 conflict with the Archbishop of Mechlin. In 1827 the bigoted Ferdi- 
 nand of Spain had such a struggle with the Papal pretensions that he 
 forbade the Pope’s nuncio to enter Spain. In 1828 the French 
 government felt itself obliged to suppress the Society of the Jesuits, and 
 it met with great opposition from the bishops. In 18380, Charles X., 
 under the advice of ecclesiastical bigots, endeavoured to enslave his 
 people, and lost his throne by it. In the same year the Romish bishops 
 in Belgium united themselves with the Radical party, whom they in their 
 hearts hated, in order thereby to accomplish a revolution, and to get rid 
 of a Protestant king, whose sway they would not submit to. In the 
 same year the Jesuits occasioned great disturbances in Saxony. In 
 1834 the Spanish government was obliged to make very strong laws | 
 for the punishment of many bishops and priests who aided the Carlists, 
 In 1837 the Archbishop of Cologne set the Prussian government at 
 defiance, and they were obliged to place him in confinement. In 1838 
 
Appendix. 427 
 
 
 
 the Austrian bishops induced the government to banish the entire body 
 of inhabitants of the Zillerthal for becoming Protestants. In 1842 the 
 Church party in France raised a great clamour (as they are doing in 
 Ireland now) against the university system maintained by the govern- 
 -ment. To propitiate them, the government consented to send an 
 expedition to root up the Protestant missions in Tahiti; and thus was 
 very near involving these two great nations in war. In 1844 Switzerland 
 was utterly convulsed and driven to~civil war, by the demands and 
 conspiracies of the Romish bishops. And in the present year, the Sar- 
 dinian government, a government wholly Popish, has been obliged to 
 send two archbishops into exile because they resolutely refused to obey 
 the laws. Here are no fewer than fifteen instances, in the course of 
 thirty years, of troubles, commotions, and civil war, brought-on by 
 the Romish bishops and the agents of Rome. 
 
 We may well say with the notorious Dr. Doyle, in his examination . 
 before a committee of the House of Lords, on the 21st of April, 1825, 
 when asked, ‘‘Is the bulla Coenz Domini now in force ?” he answered, 
 
 - “Tf that were in force, there is scarcely anything would be at rest.” 
 
 (2.) But it may be asked, and it remains further to be answered, 
 
 How would the introduction of the Canon Law affect the Protestant 
 ‘community of this country, who have no respect for its authority ? 
 
 The operation here is not, of course, so direct, nor so complete, nor 
 so immediate, but it is real and dangerous. 
 
 Protestants are unsuspecting and uncombined, because they are free. 
 The cultivation of personal responsibility is inseparable from a cor- 
 responding cultivation of independence of thought and feeling. This 
 is one inevitable result of the free exercise of private judgment; and 
 as every one individually must give account of himself at the judgment- 
 seat of Christ, it is right and proper that every one, individually, 
 should think for himself now. As there will be no vicarious religion 
 then (except in Christ Himself), so there ought to be none now. No 
 mortal can answer for another then, therefore none should dare to do 
 so now. This constitutes the excellence of our condition as self- 
 examining Christians; and although circumstantial uniformity is 
 incompatible with it, we have, to a greater extent than many seem 
 to think, substantial unity. . Our unity in word is not, indeed, the 
 sing-song of a flock of parrots, all taught to reiterate ‘‘ Church, church, 
 church!’’ Our unity in action is not the unthinking mechanism of’ a 
 regiment all shouldering or ordering arms at the word of command, 
 or at the example of a fugleman. There cannot be such unity where 
 reason and freedom are in exercise. If we give ourselves up to a 
 
 x 
 
428 Appendix. | 
 
 general, to be wielded at his will, and others do the same, there may 
 then be uniformity of movement, but there ceases to be personal 
 liberty. Such is Papal uniformity—a great piece of human mechanism, 
 the responsibility of the unthinking and unquestioning masses being 
 transferred to the presiding geniuses, who touch the secret springs, 
 and keep the giant arms in motion. 
 
 Dr. Wiseman, in his inaugural sermon, has given a different ae. 
 tration of Catholic unity and unchangeableness, full of interest doubt- 
 less to antiquaries. It is somewhat strange that he should go to the 
 catacombs for a symbol of his Catholicism; but to the catacombs, 
 sure enough, he did go, and there he found a symbolical chair, which 
 he identified with the see—see and chair meaning tle same. Let us 
 hope that the symbol is prophetic. 
 
 It has been said of Protestants by a Romish controversialist arch- 
 bishop, that ‘if God would make known what is the specific creed of 
 each individual of fifty millions of them, it is probable that not ten — 
 out of the whole number could be found to agree, on all points, in 
 substance and detail, in the principles and doctrines of Christian 
 revelation.”” This is a gross libel. They would not, it is quite 
 possible, give the same expression in detail to their views—the 
 evangelists themselves differ thus—but millions among them would 
 give substantially, in everything fundamental, the same confession of 
 their faith; while Romanists, though they might give memoriter the 
 same words in answer to the same question, could boast no more of 
 intelligent unity, than exists between the priest who reads Latin, and Ὁ 
 the Irish labourer who can read nothing. 
 
 But the very excellence of our condition, as individualized self- 
 examining Christians, constitutes a main part of our exposure to the 
 machinations of such a conspiracy as Romanism. Its object is tem- 
 poral supremacy. Its means are unscrupulous. Its organization is 
 complete. Where force can be used with safety and effect, it may— 
 where fraud, it may—where a combination of both, it may. The | 
 Canon Law lays bishops, and through them their priests, under an 
 obligation to endeavour by all means, force and fraud, to obtain 
 ascendancy. For this purpose, having brought their own people into 
 a state of convenient vassalage, they would, as in Ireland they do, 
 and it is already commenced in England, employ them in divers 
 disingenuous missions among Protestants: to foment divisions, to 
 suggest doubts, to discourage reliance on the Bible, by insinuating 
 uncertainty as to its canon, and obscurity as to its contents. ᾿ 
 
 In a country like this, containing a teeming population, to thou- 
 
Appendix. — 429 
 
 
 
 sands of whom we have no means of extending the blessings of true 
 Christian teaching—our voluntary friends objecting to a public pro- 
 vision, while they and all fail to make a sufficient private one—there 
 must always be a large number of persons open to the machinations 
 of such a body as the drilled agents of a Romish hierarchy. 
 
 Those agents are employed skilfully, according to their qualifica- 
 
 tions for fraud or force, for perfidy or audacity, to unsettle the 
 foundations of heretic society, and keep up communication with 
 their priests. Noisy bullies are employed to interrupt Protestant 
 meetings, and from all parts of the house they recognise, and respond 
 to, a certain signal from the platform. Sisters of charity are employed 
 to commend themselves to the good graces of unwary and indigent 
 Protestants, by visits of sympathy, and little dowceurs of tea and 
 sugar, beginning with cases of mixed marriage, where some members 
 of the family are Popish, and so extending their insinuating influence. 
 Writers of tales and catechisms are employed to captivate and indoc- 
 trinate the youthful mind. Poets and musicians are employed to 
 gratify the taste and entrance the senses. 
 ' Nor does the plan of the campaign end here. Witnesses are 
 suborned, and party confederacy prevails, to defeat the course of 
 justice. And simultaneous combinations, with intent to intimidate, 
 act in divers localities, with all the precision and punctuality of a 
 disciplined army, while no man sees the officers in command. 
 
 Romanism has seldom of late years been regarded steadily under. 
 its genuine and exclusive aspect, of an unappeasable foe to civil 
 liberty. Popery may be in many senses a cheat, but in every sense 
 a tyrant. In vague and abstract terms we allow Popery confines her 
 jurisdiction to things spiritual, but in practice, by vigilant and subtle 
 induction, by claims of relationship between things spiritual and 
 things temporal, she brings all the affairs of this world within her 
 constructive empire. In the council-room, in the confessional, in the 
 closet, in the chamber, in the street—ever watchful, ever menacing, 
 ever exacting, ever calculating ; where Popery, through her minister, 
 finds admission, there is no security nor confidence, no free agency, 
 no free speech, no bold nor independent thought—all is unconscious, 
 irretrievable and unvarying bondage. 
 
 An illustration of this has just occurred in our own town. 1 have 
 the fact under the hand of a reverend brother, assistant to the minister 
 of St. John’s Church, and I now tell it to you. A Roman Catholic 
 priest, learning that some Roman Catholic children attended the 
 ragged school in Hodson Street, publicly threatened the parents of 
 
430 Appendix. 
 
 
 
 those children that, if they persevered in sending them to the school, 
 he and the other priests would not attend them on their deathbeds. 
 Sir, this is the way Romanism assails the poor in temporal things ; 
 and the same thing “is done with regard to their votes, and their 
 conduct in other respects, as to sending their children to school. If 
 they do not vote for the priests’ nominee, whether for parliament, 
 tewn council, or board of guardians—interdict! The rites of the 
 Church are refused. They will not baptise the child. They will not 
 church the wife. They will not give them extreme unction on their 
 deathbeds. Σ 
 
 What Mr. Wise, in his ““Ἡϊβίουυ of the (Roman) Catholic Asso- 
 ciation,” says of that most cunningly devised confederacy may, with _ 
 truth, be said of the entire machinery by which a Popish hierarchy 
 assails a Protestant community :—‘‘ It was designed to tell ministers, 
 in a language which could no longer be misunderstood, that, wherever 
 the association chose to call, there were the people ready to follow ; 
 that obedience to the association was the paramount principle in the 
 heart of every peasant in the country; that the power of the asso- 
 ciation was, therefore, absolute and universal; that it could not be 
 got rid of by the law, because it never infringed the law; that it 
 could not be got rid of by brute force, because it never rendered 
 brute force necessary; that it was, therefore, unattackable and en- 
 during ; that, unattackable itself, it could attack others; that, without 
 injuring, existing institutions, it might make use of these very insti- 
 tutions for every purpose of injury ; that it could wield the constitution 
 against the constitution; introduce a sullen, perpetual war into the 
 bosom of peace; disturb every relation of society, without violating a 
 single enactment on which such relations repose ; and, finally, pro- 
 duce such an order of things as to compel the minister to choose 
 between coercion and conciliation.”’ 
 
 It is from this we have to defend ourselves. It is with reference 
 to this that our senators should learn wisdom. Self-defence by law 
 _against such a system is not intolerance. To treat such a system as 
 if it were ‘merely religious opinion is infatuation. To exclude the 
 agents of such a system from offices of power and trust in the State is | 
 nothing more than common prudence. England may rest assured . 
 that her choice is narrowed to the painful but inevitable alternative of 
 exclusion or submission. Fair participation is utterly impracticable. 
 Romanism is not to be judged of or treated according to the ordinary 
 principles of human nature. Reason and argument are all-sufticient 
 against falsehood ; but, in the absence of miracles, they are insufficient 
 
Appendix. 431 
 
 
 
 against violence or treachery. Romanism, beaten in argument again 
 and again, continues to say and do as before with unblushing effrontery. 
 Dr. Wiseman, 6.6.5, reiterates the absurdity, the gross and blasphemous 
 absurdity, of transubstantiation, just as if Dr. Turton had never 
 written. Yet Dr. Turton’s book demolishes the sophistries and mis- 
 representations of Dr. Wiseman, and remains to this day unanswered. 
 But what cares Romanism for this? If she cannot continue fairly to 
 argue, she can and does continue daringly to act. The. same un 
 founded misrepresentations in defiance of historical truth, and the 
 same dogmatic absurdities in defiance of unanswered argument, are 
 reiterated on every side. In like manner the same abuse of their 
 spiritualities, as they call them, into an engine for coercion in things 
 temporal, and the same ostentatious denial before Protestants of those 
 principles to which they are pledged on oath among themselves, are 
 everywhere practised. In vain shall English statesmen diplomatise— 
 in vain shall English law-officers prepare bills for the application of 
 moderate penalties—if men who refuse to abjure the Pope of Rome, 
 the audacious and ambitious head of the code of the Canon Law—if 
 Romanists, persisting in their foreign allegiance, though called only 
 spiritual, be not by law excluded from place and power in Britain, and , 
 that without any interference with them in the exercise of their reli- 
 gion, as was the case previous to 1829—if, in a word, the privileges 
 conferred upon them by the Emancipation Bill be not substantially 
 withdrawn, all the boasted light, and liberty, and liberalism of England 
 will not save her institutions, will not perpetuate to her children the 
 blessings of real civil and religious freedom. 
 
 For the Christian Church, in the highest and best sense of the term, 
 we entertain no apprehensions. We know in whom we have believed, 
 and who said, and still says to His own, ‘Fear not, little flock, it is 
 your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” ‘ All that the 
 Father giveth to me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I 
 will in no wise cast out.” ‘I give unto them eternal life, and they 
 shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my 
 hand.” ‘‘My Father which gave them me is greater than all, and no 
 man shall be able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.” “TI and 
 my Father are one.” Yes, for the members of Christ’s mystical body, 
 the bride, the Lamb’s wife, the blessed company of all faithful people, 
 we fear nothing, and have nothing to fear. The promises of God to 
 them are all yea and all amen in Christ Jesus. Neither the gates of 
 hell, nor the machinations of Antichrist, shall prevail against any one 
 of them. Their loud hallelujahs shall ascend before the ‘Throne, when 
 
432 Appendix. 
 
 nnn af = 
 
 
 
 the smoke of the torments of the beast and the false prophet shall 
 also ascend. Babylon the great is fallen! is fallen! and ai they 
 shall cry, Hallelujah ! 
 
 But we have no such promise for our beloved country. The golden 
 candlestick of pure and apostolical Christianity may be removed from 
 England, as it has been from other lands; and we confess we have — 
 not become so transcendental or so cosmopolitan as to have abjured 
 all Christian patriotism. If this be a weakness in the eyes of abstract 
 philosophy, we must plead guilty of it. Patriotism is permitted—nay, 
 it isto be cultivated—in the followers of Him who wept over Jeru- 
 salem; and England is called, and loudly called, to the decision and 
 energy essential to the present crisis, in the name, the sacred, the ani- 
 mating name of Christian patriotism. Christian patriotism! the most 
 touching, and, next to the love of God in Christ, the noblest passion 
 of the human heart—the love, the undying love, of that country which 
 protected the cradles of our infancy, and encloses the ashes of our 
 fathers; the happy scene of childhood, when all was hope and joy; 
 when innocerce was in every heart, and pleasure in every eye; when 
 every smile was bliss, and every thought was buoyant rapture ; when 
 a father’s benignant encouragement, a mother’s affectionate embrace, 
 _ a sister’s softening and humanizing companionship, conveyed to the 
 ripening character indelible impressions of philanthropy—impressions 
 associated for ever with the walks, the trees, the rivers, the mountains, 
 amongst which the gentle influences twined themselves around the 
 yet plastic soul. Christian patriotism ! the holy romance of sensibility 
 and virtue! Free-born Englishmen, be wise, be firm. Deliver your 
 country, your beloved country, unequalled on the globe—oh deliver 
 her, and keep her delivered, decidedly, and no mistake, from the 
 despotic grasp of Antichrist, from the iron chain of the Canon Law. 
 
 The Worshipful Chancellor Rarxes said, ke felt it would be in vain "Ὁ 
 to attempt by any words to which he could give utterance, to express 
 so fully as the meeting had already done the universal feeling of grati- 
 tude which they entertained towards their respected friend, ' Dr. 
 M‘Neile. Alluding to the designation applied to Mr. Pitt, of ‘‘the 
 pilot that weathered the storm,” he said it was his honour and privi- 
 lege to direct their gratitude, if not to the pilot that weathered. the 
 storm, yet to the watchman who had first given warning of the 
 coming tempest. It was his privilege to hold up to their gratitude, 
 and through them to the gratitude of the United Kingdom, the © 
 individual whose eye, quickened by the steady study of the — 
 
 \ 
 
Appendix. 433 
 
 
 
 Word of God—growing in light from that testimony of Jesus 
 which was the spirit of prophecy—foresaw, in the dark abyss, 
 the invasion that was preparing, and prepared to meet that invasion 
 by rousing up the feeling which had actuated that great assembly 
 that day. They themselves were witnesses to the fact that he 
 had not laboured in vain; and if the invader came, and found the: 
 coasts of England guarded, as they ever had been, against foreign 
 aggression, thanks to him who sounded the alarm—whose trumpet 
 gave no uncertain sound—whose clarion, sounding from one end of 
 the kingdom to the other, had united all sects and denominations in a 
 firm determination to resist the aggressions of the See of Rome, and 
 to contend with might and main for the Briton’s best privilege— 
 the privilege of worshipping God according to the dictates of his con- 
 science, and the letter of the revealed Word of God. If they would 
 permit him for a minute to allude to the prospect that was before 
 them, he would say that the same power that had appointed bishops 
 throughout every part of this country, without the leave or sanction of 
 the constituted authorities—that had presumed to dictate to Protestant 
 England, and to send the canons of a poor, trembling Italian bishop to 
 supersede the laws of this land—that same power might and would 
 send into every one of our parishes agents that would carry into the 
 interior of society the spirit of that Canon Law which had been so 
 admirably and beneficially discussed. But let them mark the effect 
 that must follow. In every parish new sources of collision and con- 
 trovyersy would arise. And let them not doubt that agents would be 
 fouud. We had ourselves supplied them. Maynooth would send forth 
 its hundreds. Men trained and exercised in all the low polemics. of 
 the Canon Law would be sent forth to disturb the peace of our local 
 communities, and to add one fresh element of discord to those which ~ 
 already interrupted the peace and prosperity of the land. He con- 
 cluded by moving a.vote of thanks to the Rev. Dr. M‘Neile for his 
 able and instructive lecture. 
 
 28 
 
434 
 
 > Appendix. 
 
 
 
 OATH TAKEN BY ROMAN CATHOLIC BISHOPS AND 
 
 - ARCHBISHOPS. 
 
 EgoN. Electus Ecclesiz N. ab hac 
 hora in antea fidelis et obediens ero B. 
 Petro Apostolo, Santeeque Romanze 
 Kecclesiz, et Domino nostro, Domino 
 N. Papze N. suisque successoribus 
 canonicé intrantibus. Non ero in 
 consilio, aut consensu, vel facto, ut 
 vitam .perdant, aut membrum ; seu 
 capiantur mala captione; aut in eos 
 manus quomodolibet ingerantur; vel 
 injurie aliquee inferantur, quovis quee- 
 sito colore. Consilium vero quod mihi 
 credituri sunt, per se, aut Nuncios suos, 
 seu literas, ad eorum damnum, me 
 sciente nemini-pandam. Papatum 
 Romanum et Regalia Sancti Petri ad- 
 jutor eis ero ad defendendum et retin- 
 endum, salvo meo ordine, contra om- 
 nem hominem. Legatum Apostolice 
 Sedis in euendo et redeundo honoroficeé 
 tractabo, et in suis necessitatibus adju- 
 vabo. Jura, honores, privilegia, et atic- 
 toritatem Sanctee Romane Kcclesiz. 
 Domini nostri Papz et Successorem 
 predictorum conservare, defendere, 
 augere, promovere curabo. Nequeero 
 in consilio, vel facto, seu tractatu in 
 quibus contra ipsum Dominum nos- 
 trum. vel eandem Romanam Ecclesiam 
 aliqua sinistra vel preejudicialia per- 
 sonarum, juris, honoris, status et 
 potestatis, eorum machinentur. Et 
 si talia ἃ quibuscunque tractari vel 
 procurari novero, impedium hoc pro 
 posse, et quanto citiis potero signifi- 
 cabo eidem Domino nostro, vel alteri 
 per quem possit ad ipsius notitiam 
 pervenire. Regulus Sanctorum Pa- 
 trum, decreta ordinationes, seu dis- 
 positiones, reservationes, provisiones 
 et mandata Apostolica totis viribus 
 
 observabo, et faciam ab aliis observari. © 
 
 Heeriticos, Schismaticos et Rebelles 
 cidem Domino nostro vel successoribus 
 predicatis pro posse persequar et im- 
 pugnabo. Vocatus ad Synodum veni- 
 am, nisi, prepeditas fuero canonica 
 prepeditione. Apostolorum lemina 
 singulis trienniis personaliter per me 
 ipsum visitabo, et Domino nostro ac 
 
 successoribus preefatis rationem red- © 
 
 dam de toto meo pastorali officio ac 
 de rebus omnibus ad mez LKcclesiz 
 
 I, N. Elect of the Church of N. 
 from henceforward will be faithful 
 and obedient to St. Peter the Apostle, 
 and to the holy Roman Church, and 
 to our Lord, the Lord N. Pope N, 
 and to his’ successors canonically 
 coming in. I will neither advise, 
 consent, or do anything that may lose 
 life or member, or that their persons 
 may be seized, or hands anywise laid 
 upon them, or any injuries offered to 
 them under any pretence whatsoever, 
 The counsel which they shall entrust 
 me withal, by themselves, their mes- 
 sengers, or letters, I will not know- 
 ingly reveal to any to their prejudice. I 
 will help them to defend and keep the 
 Roman Papacy, and the Royalties of 
 St. Peter, saving my order, against all 
 men. The legate of the Apostolic 
 See, going and coming IJ will honour- 
 ably treat and help in his necessities. 
 The rights, honours, privileges, and 
 authority of the holy Roman Church, 
 of our Lord the Pope and his foresaid 
 successors, I will endeavour to defend, 
 increase. and advance, I will not be 
 in any counsel, action, or treaty which 
 shall be plotted against our said Lord, 
 and the said Roman Church, anything 
 to the hurt or prejudice of their per- 
 sons, right, honour, state, or power; 
 and if I shall know any such thing to 
 be treated or agitated by any whatso- 
 ever, I will hinder it to my power; 
 and as soon as I can will signify it to 
 our said Lord, or to some other by 
 whom it may come to his knowledge. 
 The rules of the holy Fathers, the 
 Apostolic decrees, ordinances or dis- 
 posals, reservations, provisions, and 
 mandates I will observe with all my 
 might, and cause to be observed by 
 others. Heretics, schismatics, and 
 rebels to our said Lord or his fore 
 said successors I will to my utmost 
 power persecute and wage war with. 
 I will come to a council when I am 
 called, unless I be hindered by a 
 canonial impediment. I will by my~ 
 self in person visit the threshold of the 
 Apostles every three years; and give 
 an account to our Lord and his fore- 
 
Appendix. 
 
 435 
 
 
 
 statum, ad cleri, et populi disciplinam, 
 animarum denique quae mez fidei 
 traditee sunt, salutem quovismodo per- 
 tinentibus, et vicissim mandata Apos- 
 tolica humiliter recipiam et quam 
 diligentissimé exequar. Quod si le- 
 gitimo impedimento detentus, fuero 
 preefata omnia ad implebo per certum 
 Nuntium ad hoe speciale mandatem 
 habentem de gremio mei Capituli, aut 
 alium indignitate Ecclesiastica consti- 
 tutum, seu alias personatum habentum ; 
 aut, his mihi deficientibus, per dicece- 
 sanum Sacerdotem ; et.clero déficiente 
 omnino per aliquemalium Presbyterum 
 seecularem vel regularem spectatze pro- 
 bitatis et religionis de supradictis om- 
 nibus plené instructum.. De hujusmodi 
 autem impedimento docebo per legiti- 
 
 mas probationes ad Sanctze Romane _ 
 
 Ecclesiz Cardinalem Proponentem in 
 Congregatione Sacri Cdncilii per su- 
 pradictum Nuntium transmittendas. 
 Possessiones verO ad mensam meam 
 pertinentes non vendam, nec donabo 
 
 neque impignorabo, nec de novo in- © 
 
 feudabo vel aliquo modo alienabo, 
 etiam cum consensu Capituli Ecclesiz 
 mez, inconsulto Romano | Pontifice. 
 
 Et si ad aliquam alienationem deven- - 
 
 ero, poenas in quadam super hoc edita 
 constitutione contentas eo ipso incur- 
 rere volo. Sic me Deus adjuvet et 
 heec Sancta Dei Evangelia.—[ De Con- 
 secratione Electiin Episcopum. Pon- 
 tificale Romanum, pp. 59—61. Ant- 
 verpiz, 1627.) [Romanez, 1738, vol. 
 i., Ὁ. 178.] And [page 88. edit. Paris, 
 1664, at Cardinal Wiseman’s Episcopal 
 residence, Golden Square. ] 
 
 THE 
 
 said successors of all my pastoral 
 office, and of all things anywise be- 
 longing to the state of my church, to 
 the discipline of my clergy and people, 
 
 ‘and lastly, to the salvation of souls 
 committed to my trust; and will in 
 like manner humbly receive and dili- 
 gently execute the Apostolic com- 
 mands. And if I be detained by a 
 lawful impediment, I will perform all 
 the things aforesaid by a certain mes- 
 senger hereto specially empowered, a 
 member of my chapter, or some other 
 in ecclesiastical dignity or else having 
 a parsonage; or in default of these, by 
 a priest of the diocese; or in default 
 of one of the clergy (of the diocese) by 
 some other or secular priest of ap- 
 proved integrity and religion, fully 
 instructed in all things above men- 
 tioned. And such impediment I will 
 make out by lawful proofs to be 
 _ fransmitted by the foresaid messenger 
 to the Cardinal proponent of the holy 
 Roman Church in the congregation of 
 the Sacred Council. ‘The possessions 
 belonging to my table I will neither 
 sell, nor give away, nor mortgage, nor 
 grant anew in fee, nor anywise ali- 
 enate, no not even with the consent of 
 the chapter of my church! without 
 consulting the Roman Pontiff. And 
 if I shall make any alienation, I will 
 thereby incur the penalties contained in 
 acertain constitution put forth about 
 this matter. So help me God and 
 these holy Gospels of God. 
 
 \ 
 
LETTER FROM THE LATE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTER- 
 BURY TO THE AUTHOR OF “THE CHURCH AND 
 THE CHURCHES.” 
 
 Eaton Square, April 24, 1846. 
 
 My pear Mr. M‘Nerte,— 
 
 I have long intended to thank you for your volume on the 
 
 Church, and can now only hope that you will excuse my delay. I 
 
 have read it with the greatest interest; particularly the chapters on 
 
 Unity and Holiness. 
 
 Before you reprint, give a second consideration to your new inter- 
 pretation of our Lord’s remarks concerning John Baptist. I do not 
 think that the usual interpretation at all affects your argument. 
 
 In return, let me confess that what you write, and what you quote 
 concerning the address to St. Peter, makes me waver in the opinion 
 which I have hitherto held; for though I still think that the turn of 
 the sentence most naturally points to the person as the rock, the word 
 merpa and the stream of ancient exposition incline the balance other- 
 wise. As a disputed passage, can tever be of real use in argument — 
 we need not be concerned as to the solution of the difficulty from any 
 apprehension on the score of doctrine, 
 
 I am, my dear Mr. M‘Neile, with great regard, very sincerely 
 yours, 
 
 J. B. CHESTER. 
 
 Hazell, Watson, and Viney, Printers, London and Aylesbury. 
 

 

 

 
 
 
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