maintained in the New Testament, than either infant baptism, or the observance of the LORD's day; and has, equally with them, the strong bearing of the above-mentioned rule of interpretation, in favour of the fact of its being ordained of GOD, and binding upon men.

Whatever there is of connexion with the real question at issue in Dr. Miller's second head of what he calls argument, is amply discussed by the writers in these volumes. His reference to the comparative powers of baptizing and ordaining,* amounts just to this, that the apostles must have had equal powers with their LORD, and equal authority to ordain and send forth ministers, because they had the right to baptize.

Under this head, also, the Doctor fairly gives up the point that ordination by a presbytery, or any ordination at all, is necessary to constitute a minister of CHRIST. He maintains that even if we could prove the fact, that episcopal ordination is scriptural and primitive, it will not follow that it is of permanent obligation. Only substitute, in this proposition, the words Presbyterian ordination, or the simple term ordination, and the Doctor's argument furnishes a conclusive reason why the Congregationalist, who has had no other ordination than from his people, or the mystic, who pretends to no other warrant for preaching the Gospel than his own conviction of being sent, should be hailed by him as a brother in the ministry, and recommended to his communion as duly authorized to serve among them in the word and ordinances.

A smile would not be much out of place on reading Dr. Miller's grave assurance to his Christian brethren, that "the first reformers of the Church of England were substantially Presbyterians in principle." These venerable men, and those immediately succeeding them, have ample justice done to their sentiments in these volumes; on which point the reader will find the most enlightened and satisfactory information in the works of Dr. Bowden. One remark, however, here forces itself upon the present writer.

"The first reformers of the Church of England," says Dr. Miller, were substantially Presbyterians in principle." Now what evidence did they give of their Presbyterianism? In what could they have declared their principles more deliberately, and * Prelim, Letter, p. xvii. + Prelim, Letter, p. xviii.

under a more solemn sense of responsibility, than in their official, ecclesiastical acts, and especially in appointed forms of address to the Deity? What, under these circumstances, were their declarations? Such as these "It is evident unto all men, diligently reading holy Scripture, and ancient authors, that from the Apostles' time, there have been these orders of ministers in CHRIST'S Church, Bishops, Priests, and Deacons." Presbyterianism maintains that there was, in the Apostles' time, but one order of ministers." No man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful Bishop, Priest, or Deacon, in this Church, or suffered to execute any of the said functions, except he hath had episcopal consecration or ordination."* Presbyterianism considers it unscriptural and bigotted to insist on episcopal orders." Almighty GOD, who, by Thy Divine Providence, hast appointed divers orders of ministers in Thy Church."† "Almighty God, who, by Thy HOLY SPIRIT, hast appointed divers orders of ministers in the Church." Presbyterianism maintains that but one order of ministers was divinely appointed." Almighty God, who didst inspire thine Apostles to choose into the order of Deacons the first martyr, St. Stephen, with others; mercifully behold these Thy servants, now called to the like office and administration."§ The office and administration to which the persons in whose behalf this solemn address is made to the Deity, are called, is that of Deacons, as a grade of the ministry, with the power of preaching, baptizing, and performing other pastoral functions. The reformers of the Church of England, therefore, maintained this view of the office of Deacons, and believed that into such an office St. Stephen, and the rest of the seven Deacons, were chosen by divine inspiration. Presbyterianism maintains that Deacons are only lay officers, having no part nor lot in clerical functions.-And yet we are told that these reformers were "substantially Presbyterians in principle." A great blessing would it be to the Christian world, if such Presbyterians abounded more and more. The highest churchman could not go beyond them, in urging the claims of episcopacy. If ever those claims amounted to the jus divinum,

they did in the teaching of these reformers, and they do in the standards which the Protestant Episcopal Church has received from them. To borrow, in part, the language of the late excellent Bishop Ravenscroft, higher than the source to which the English reformers, and the standards of their Church, attribute episcopacy, none need attempt to carry it, and lower than this origin, none who know the true grounds on which the reformers and the Church stand in this matter, will degrade it.

Dr. Miller is certainly welcome to any advantage his cause may gain from the unworthy artifice of applying to the great and good men who conducted the English reformation the epithet, designed to be odious, of "Court reformers," repeated four times in two pages;* and the insinuation connected with it, that they sold their consciences to their prince, and served their king with twice the zeal they served their God. Fortunately, however, an argument so fraught with satisfaction to the Papist is triumphantly refuted by the impartial voice of history. Most of the leading reformers, it is well known, Calvin, Luther, Knox, and others, never objected to lean upon the civil arm, where it was disposed to favour them. It was the general sentiment of the age, that religion not only might, but should, be supported by the state; and because in their holy struggles for reform, good men found protection in the civil arm, is the enemy to be abetted by our allowing that they unworthily sacrificed a sense of right and duty to a desire to please and keep in favour with the ruling powers? No unbiassed and impartial examiner of the subject will come to that conclusion. It may be an adroit method of creating prejudice, but can hardly comport with the dictates of truth and soberness. The godly puritans, so lauded by Dr. Miller, showed their sense of the propriety of having a court-church, when, for a time, they triumphed over that church which these "court reformers" had established.

Nor is any thing like a fair view of the subject given by Dr. Miller in his efforts to impress his Christian brethren with the idea that while these time-serving "court reformers" were modelling their church rather according to man's device than the precepts and authority of the word of God, the puritans (godly men) were for meekly following the Scriptures. The truth is, the Church of England reformers, partaking in the general sen* Prelim. Letter, pp. xx, xxi.

timent of the age in favour of an union of Church and State-a sentiment held by Presbyterian as well as Episcopal reformers, and to this day acted upon by the Presbyterian Church of Scotland-and aware, as every one acquainted with the subject must be, that besides the great essentials of the Christian Church, which are laid down in Scripture, there must be, in every organized ecclesiastical body, a variety of minor provisions, to be determined by the duly constituted officers of that body, maintained that these things might be regulated by the laws of the land; and provided the above-mentioned essentials were maintained, and communion with that branch of the Church thus involve no sacrifice of conscience, all good citizens should hold themselves bound by the laws in those minor matters. But the puritans, seeing that the then existing laws did not exactly meet their views, manifested, as many a restless subject of law has since done, a marvellous great reverence for Scripture, maintaining that without the express warrant of a text from the Bible, no act, even in common life, should be performed; much less in any matters relating to the Church. Any degree of elegance in a place of public worship, any solemn setting of it apart, any peculiar dress in the clergy, and any matters in the order of divine service, or in the conducting of ecclesiastical affairs, not required in Scripture, they ranked among those things with which, for conscience sake, they could not comply. And this circumstance, in connexion with the belief of the friends of the established Church, that the public authority might act in such cases, is worked up into the devout attachment of these puritans to the Scriptures, and the ungodly preference for man's authority on the part of the "court reformers."

It may be some consolation to the "very small sect" whom Dr. Miller brands with presumption for thinking that the truth is not always with the many, and that numbers are not always evidence of right, to recollect that there was a time when the state of Christianity led to the proverb that the world was on one side, and Athanasius on the other. This potent argument, however, of the Doctor's, is gradually growing weaker. The small sect is increasing in size, and is not a little indebted for this blessing, under the great Head of the Church, to the inquiry which the good Doctor himself, and its other opponents have, from time to time, excited and kept alive. Instead of the pigmy

being crushed by its gigantic adversaries, their opposition has fallen out rather unto the furtherance of its cause. It has ever derived, and ever will derive, benefit from the discussion which the mighty ones around it may condescend to bestow upon its pretensions. For the love they bear to the Gospel-and though Dr. M. may not believe it, it is to be hoped that all his Christian brethren will not deem it impossible that even high-churchmen have some remaining affection for the Gospel-the members of that little sect always regret to see any unchristian arts or tempers brought into controversy; but they never can object to a full and free discussion of its claims, from any apprehended injury to their

cause.

It is far from the writer's wish or design to say any thing that would wear the appearance of unkindness or discourtesy ; but really it seems difficult to find a term that might not be misconstrued into such a design, to apply to the strange manner in which Dr. Miller has allowed himself to write in the sixth and three following general divisions of his Preliminary Letter. The time has gone by when the mass of readers are to be taken by the artifice of representing the Episcopal Church as savouring of popery, and as unfriendly to the free institutions of our country. Every man acquainted with the subject knows that this is not so; that many of the ablest and best champions of the Protestant cause have belonged to the ranks of the highest churchmen; and that in the same ranks are to be found many of the most enlightened and devoted friends of our republic. Whatever there is of reason, rather than rant, in what Dr. M. says of some wonderful influence flowing from the hands of a diocesan Bishop,"* is another instance in which he strengthens the cause of those who would separate religion from all requirement of ordinances, and of a ministry. For if ordinances are a part of Christian obligation, and if the separation of a distinct order of men to the work of the ministry is of GOD, the Doctor's remarks apply to every definite practical shape in which these principles can be put. If men are to partake of ordinances, and every man is not authorized to administer them to his fellow, all this fine flourishing about "some wonderful influence flowing from the hands of" an ordainer, is out of place; and the wild