mony against the integrity of the succession of the Roman bishops, is given by writers whose prejudices were all in favor of the papacy.

He who divests himself of preconceived opinions, and who considers these things without prejudice, will clearly see that those who endeavor to shelter themselves under the plea of antiquity and succession, involve themselves in a labyrinth in which they are easily entangled, from which it is scarcely possible for them to be freed."

Very pertinent also are the remarks of Bishop Hoadley. (Preservative, p. 75, &c.) "I do not love, I confess, so much as to repeat the principal branches of their beloved scheme; they are so different, whencesoever they come, from the voice of the gospel. When they would claim you, as their fellow-laborers the papists do, by telling you that you cannot hope for the favor of God, but in the strictest communion with their church, (which is the true Church of England, governed by bishops in a regular succession,) that God hath himself hung your salvation upon this nicety;-that he dispenses none of his favors or graces, but by the hands of them and their subordinate priests;-that you cannot be authoritatively blessed or released from your sins, but by them who are the regular priests;-that churches under other bishops, (i. e. other than in a regular succession,) are schismatical conventicles, made up of excommunicated persons, both clergy and laity; out of God's church, as well as out of his favor:-I say, when such arguments as these are urged; you need only have recourse to a general answer, to this whole heap of scandal and defamation, upon the will of God, the gospel of Christ, and the Church of England in particular-that you have not so learned Christ, or the design of his gospel, or even the foundation of this particular part of his church, reformed and established in England. The following arguments will justify you, which therefore ought to be frequently in the thoughts of all, who have any value for the most important points. God is just, and equal, and good: and as sure as he is so, he cannot put the salvation and happiness of any man, upon what he himself has put it out of the power of any man upon earth, to be entirely satisfied in.-It hath not pleased God, in his providence, to keep up any proof of the least probability, or moral possibility, of a regular uninterrupted succession. But there is a great appearance, and, humanly speaking, a certainty of the contrary, that this succession hath been interrupted."

NOTE B.

There is still another source of uncertainty, to which we may here allude. According to Maimbourg, the Jesuit, (Hist. du Grand Schisme, D'Occident, in Balt. Lit. and Rel. Mag. Ap. 1840, p. 146,) there have been about thirtyone established methods by which to make the popes the visible heads of the church. It appears that the election was made for the first five centuries by the clergy and the consent of the people-that the Arian King, Theodoric, usurped the right to create the pope himself, which example was imitated by the Gothic kings who followed him,-that this right was retained by Justinian, and afterwards regained by the tyranny of the marquis of Étruria and the counts of Tuscany, who created and deposed popes at their pleasure, instruments of their passions-and that for some centu ries this power having been obtained by the cardinals, is still retained by them. Most certain it is, then, that either this office is of divine right, and then the mode of its transmitted inheritance must be equally of divine appointment, in which case it cannot be pretended that any valid or proper succession has been preserved, unless there are some thirty-one modes of such succession laid down in the word of God; for Maimbourg himself asserts that in the great Schism whose history he writes, "it was morally impossible to decide who were true popes, and who anti-popes;"-or this office is not divine, but an usurpation and a despotism, and in this case it is equally a matter of indifference whether there have been thirty, or thirty thousand ways by which its retainers have gained possession of the papal chair. Most true it is, that if its present incumbents are validly elected and introduced, and therefore true successors for eleven centuries after Christ, no true pope could have occupied the see of Rome. See also Father Paul's Treatise on Benefices and Revenues. Westminst. 1727, p. 26.

LECTURE VI.

THE PRELATICAL DOCTRINE OF APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION TESTED

BY SCRIPTURE.

The claims which are involved in the doctrine of the apostolical descent, as maintained by many of its advocates, are not less arbitrary and despotic; not less exclusive of the just rights and privileges of other sovereignties; nor less regardless of their interest and happiness; than were those of the Babylonian despot. This doctrine being supposed true, there is but one church on earth, and that is the prelatic-there is but one order of ministry, and that is the succession of prelates-there is but one channel of efficacious grace, and that flows between the high embankments of prelacy-and there is but one covenanted gift of plenary mercy, and that is deposited in the hands of prelates.

This doctrine, in all its nakedness, and boldness, is proclaimed, as the fundamental principle of all church claims whatsoever, by the doctors of the Vatican and the Sorbonne; by the doctors of Maynooth, and the doctors of Oxford; by the Roman and the Anglican church. "It is the mystic pæan of sacerdotal power and glory."

Nor is this doctrine, at least in those essential elements, which drag with them, by necessary consequence, the whole train of awful and soul-shuddering consequences, received merely by those who are denominated high-churchmen, and who love and admire the church with an almost idolatrous attachment; but it is also, as would appear, avowed by many of those who are distinguished as evangelical, or low-church episcopalians.

"Few episcopal readers of the tracts," (I quote from the Episcopal Recorder of Philadelphia, May 9, 1840, the organ of the low-church, or evangelic episcopalians)1 can hesitate to approve

the avowed design of the writers at the commencement of the series, or to acknowledge that there are many things in them deserving of the warmest commendation. There are certain fundamental principles recognized, precious in themselves and highly valuable and conservative when carried only to their legitimate results, which, however they may be presented as novelties, or as old truths long buried and forgotten, the churchman will recognize as familiar elements of his creed, which have always formed essential parts of the constitution of his faith. If the writers had confined their discussions to the divine institution of the ministry-the apostolical succession-the defence of liturgical services-an exposure of the evils of schism, and the modern rationalistic theology; if they had displayed far more zeal than they have, to revive the wholesome administration of discipline in the church, and a more reverent observance of the festivals and fasts-my thorough church principles would have prompted me to bid them God-speed, and be a zealous co-operator with them in their good work. If they had not gone beyond these points, though some might have questioned the validity of some of the arguments employed, and others have been dissatisfied with the results at which they arrived; yet none, I believe, would have complained of their well-intended efforts to fortify the church in these times of peril, by grounding her more thoroughly in the intelligent attachment of her members. The peace of the church would have been undisturbed, her landmarks unremoved, her foundation untouched. When we speak, therefore, of the Oxford tracts, we speak not of the truths they contain or advocate, which are received and acknowledged by all sound churchmen, but of those things which constitute their peculiarity, their characteristic traits-distinguishing them from the well known and long-received theology of our church."

It is thus more and more apparent, as we advance, that it is

appoint each other, or are not appointed at all; and so, in either case, their assuming the office is very wicked.

11. But are not dissenting teachers thought to be very good men? They are often thought to be such, and SO were Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, till God showed them to be very wicked.

12. But may we not hear them preach? No; for God says, "Depart from the tents of these wicked men.'

Again: "It is mentioned in the London Patriot. a paper not friendly to the English established church, that the evangelical party in that church is rapidly diminishing,

and that they who formerly professed low-church views, are now becoming the most rampant advocates of the Oxford heresy. It is said that with very few exceptions, such as Baptist Noel, there are no representatives in the establishment of the Scotts, Newtons, Venns, and Cecils of the last age. Two sons of the estimable Wilberforce, both ministers of that church, are said to be among the most zealous defenders of Puseyism. This is a statement for which we were not prepared, although we have seen in our own country some singular instances of low-church episcopacy suddenly veering to the opposite extreme." (The Presbyterian.)

all important, necessary, and advisable, that these claims, by which we are to be annihilated in our standing, character, and hopes, as a christian church, should be brought to the balances of the sanctuary, of history, and of sound reason, and there tested. For upon this issue depend the everlasting destinies of millions in past, present, and long-coming ages.

In our former discourse we made an entrance into the courts of the temple, and there, with the aid and assistance of these very men by whom we are to be adjudged, brought forth those balances or tests, by which the real merits of such claims are to be tried. We now proceed to an actual experiment of the question, and to make it manifest that, when weighed in these balances, they are found, like the doomed Belshazzar, TekelTekel.

We affirm, then, that these claims are found radically defective when brought to the balances of scripture. Scripture knows them not. They are neither in it, nor of it, nor accordant with it. They can only be imputed to that sacred volume, when it is opened amid the gloomy shadows of darkening ages, and when its meaning is eked out by the torturing crucible of ecclesiastical comments, groundless analogies, and the most inconclusive and illegitimate inferences. It is only when thus seen through the stained light, which streams upon the sacred pages from the cloistered windows of cathedrals, abbeys, and monkish cells, that the scriptures can be made to speak in the tones, and in the language, of prelacy. For this doctrine of apostolic succession, and for its distinctions of orders and functions, as of divine right and de fide, and therefore essential; we dare boldly challenge the production of any thing like a warranty, from the only infallible rule of faith and practice. These distinctions, we aver, are the offspring of time and custom, and the progressive advancement of spiritual despotism in the church. They are not, therefore, "de fide," but are "de jure ecclesiastico," and their authority can rise no higher than its source, and must sink with the depression of that source to its just subordination to the higher authority of God's only and true record. Such prelatic distinctions and deductions, with all their attendant claims, are on the evidence of a firm defender of episcopacy, "glaringly at variance with the usage of the apostolic church," and could only have arisen when "churchmen had renounced all respect for the example and injunctions of the inspired founders of christianity." These "divine episcopal prerogatives," this "consummation of church

1) Isaac Taylor in Spiritual Despotism, p. 208.