LAT. AND PHIL. INTEL...Great Britain, Archbishop Leighton, Cow-pox, Ladies Committee...France. .Germany....Rus- Sia... New South Wales... List of New RELIG. INTEL...Missions of the United Brethren, West Indies, South Ameri- ea, North Americu...Bengal. .Otaheite Pua. AFFAIRS...France...Germany...East Indies ..New South Wales...America, Death of Gen. Hamilton...St. Domin- go, Massacres....West Indies.....Great Britain, Parliamentary Proceedings, Middlesex Election, Naval and Domes- tie Occurrences............ p. 509-517. REL. COM...Account of St. Polycarp...He- brew Vowels...On an Extract from Bi- shop Kidder...On Deut. xxii. 11... Prayer for a Family...Grace and Holiness... Extempore Preaching...On Preaching... MISCIL.....Magaret Johnson's Letter... Council of Jews in Hungary...Lines of Sir H. Wotton...Fragments, p. 544- REVIEW OF...The Controversy respecting Marsh's Hypothesis...The Fashionable World displayed...Lord Chatham's Let- ters:..Daubeny's Vindicia Ecclesiæ An- glicane...Evangelical Magazine.... Bri- .......................p. 548-570. LIT, AND PHIL. INTEL..,Great Britain... France... Italy..... Germany....I REL. INTEL...Mission of United Bre- thren...Methodist Conférence...Baptist Mission in Bengal.... p. 575-579. PUB. AFFAIRS...France. Spain...Germa- ny...East Indies..-St. Domingo...Great RELIC. COM...Epistle of St. Polycarp...In- MISCEL.....On Praying-Machines.... Ex- tracts from Mackenzie's Travels..... Places of Worship and Charity in Lon- REVIEW OF...Hints respecting the Lawful- ness of War...Life of Sir William Jones ...Daubeny's Vindicia Ecclesiæ Angli- canæ...Evangelical Magazine, p. 611- LIT. AND PHIL. INTEL...Great Britain... France.....Spain....Italy....Germany.... Holland...Russia,..Ceylon...List of New RELIG. INTEL....America.... Presbyterian Church....South Africa...Great Britain, Clerkenwell Election p. 640-644. PUB. AFFAIRS...France... Spain...Germa- ny...Holland... Sweden... Russia... Ame- rica....St. Domingo....Surinam....Great Britain, Naval Occurrences, Domestic RELIG. Coм...Life of Justin Martyr...Ob- duracy of Pharaoh...On Evil of unre- strained Religious Feeling...Practical Preaching...Extemporary Preaching... Charity Schools..... p. 649-663. MISCEL...On Phenomena supposed super- natural...Account of Madame Toussaint ...American Slave Trade...p 669-678. REVIEW OF...Daubeny's Vindiciæ Eccle- sie Anglicanæ...Life of Sir William Jones...Anti-jacobin's Review of Chris- tian Observer...Censures on Christian LIT. AND PHIL. INTEL...Great Britain... Switzerland...Germany... Sweden... List RELIG. INTEL...Account of the Mission to Puz. AFFAIRS... Continental Intelligence. RELIG. COM...Character and Writings of Justin Martyr.....On hardening the Heart, &c...Bishop Fell's Charge in 1685...Reflections of a Clergyman..... Abstaining from the Lord's Supper...On Satire and Ridicale.....Extemporary Preaching...Effects of Party Zeal...On attaching ludicrous Ideas to Passages of MISCEL..Charity Schools...Remarks on Christian Observer...Public Concerts... Fragments...............................................p. 737–745. REVIEW OF...Bp. of Gloucester's Thoughts on the Trinity...Freylinghausen's Ab- stract of the Doctrine of the Christian Religion...Daubeny's Trial of the Spirits ...Dick on the Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures....Anti-jacobin's Review of · 1804...France...Germany...Denmark... Prussia.... Russia.....America....List of New Books............................................. RELIG. INTEL.... Protestant Missions in East Indies...Society in Bartlett's Build- Pus. AFFAIRS...France, Bonaparte's Co- ronation, &c...Spain...Holland...Sweden ...Russia...East Indies...United States ...Great Britain, Naval News, Domestic Occurrences, Trials for Perjury, p. 775 ECCLESIASTICAL PREFERMENTS, p. 777. OBITUARY...Account of Rev. C. W. Ge- ricke...Rev. Dr. Archibald Maclaine... Texts Signatures...... EVIDENCE IN FAVOUR OF THE EXISTENCE OF EPISCOPACY, AS A DISTINCT ORDER, FTER attentively considering Athearg attentively considering in my way against the existence of primitive episcopacy, they have always struck me as leading to two conclusions not altogether consistent with each other, i. e. as tending in some instances to establish the doctrine of absolute parity, in others to allow a presidency, yet inter pares. For the first opinion, after having stated all that I have heard in its behalf, and perhaps something more, I hope to shew that it is not entitled to any great degree of attention. The second will require a longer and more elaborate refutation. First.-The address prefixed to the Epistle of Clemens Romanus is as follows, Η εκκλησία το Θες, η παροικεσα Ρώμην την έκκληση σε θεα τη παροίκωση Kopov, upon which Blondell, one of the champions of ecclesiastical parity, has this strange remark-“Ubi cum nulla peculiaris vel scribentis mentio, vel cleri Romani prærogativa, vel Co rinthiaci Presbyterii a plebe discriminatio sed omnes ad omnes confertim scripsisse compertum sit, luce clarius elucescit tunc temporis ecclesias communi præpositorum consilio non unius regimini subjacuisse." To shew the futility of this conclusion, let us suppose a foreign Protestant Episcopal Church, that of Sweden for example, in some matter of general concern to the interests of the reformed religion, addressing a monitory Epistle to ourselves with the following direction-"The Church of Sweden to the Church of England." Now should some critic, like Blondell, light upon a copy of this Epistle in the corner of some ancient library a thousand years hence, and from the terms of the address discover it to be clearer than daylight, that in the beginning of the nineteenth century the CHRIST. OBSERV. No 25. Churches of England and Sweden were Presbyterian, and that their concerns were managed by a council of elders, he would reason exactly in the same way with this zealous advocate of equality; yet who but must be struck with the absurdity of his inference? par But the argument of Blondell, if it prove any thing, will prove a great deal more than he intended, and ticularly these two things-First, That the Epistle universally assigned to Clemens was in truth a joint composition of the whole college of Presbyters at Rome. Yet secondly, (it is for himself to reconcile the contradiction) that these two Churches were not only without bishops, but that they had neither presbyters, deacons, nor government of any kind. For observe, his argument is drawn from the silence of the address with respect to a particular order, but that silence equally extends to the other orders; he is, therefore, bound to infer from it the non-existence of all or none. The following objection, however, which has occurred to me in the course of this inquiry, and which, so far as I know, has not been urged before, may seem to be not altogether unattended with real difficulty. The Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians may be considered almost as a collection of texts from the Epistles of St. Paul, St. Peter, and St. John; of these a considerable part is made up of directions for the conduct of presbyters and deacons, without a hint at the existence of another order in the Church. The exercise of church dicipline is also in the clearest terms ascribed to presbyters, as they are required "to abstain from unjust judgments; to be slow in adB. mitting and believing an accusation against any one, and not to be hasty and headstrong in their sentences." In this omission there is something at first sight which will startle and perplex the reader. But whether we suppose the bishop of Smyrna to have foreborne, in pure modesty, the use of the same freedom towards an equal which he assumed towards his inferiors, or whether he thought that the same injunctions which were directly addressed to the presbyters (and it is allowed that they had at this time a share in discipline) would, through their intervention, find a way to the bishop, his silence as to the constitution of the Church of Philippi is merely negative. Neither does the style he assumes to himself, Ioλuxap πος Κωι οι συν αυτω Πρεσβύτεροι, prove any thing. From the arrangement of the words it may, with equal probability, be inferred, that he was and that he was not included in the number of presbyters. Yet it must be allowed, that the mention of the name of Polycarp alone will prove nothing more than a presidency inter pares. Every chairman of a committee subscribes his own name to an address, and no one considers it as a mark of any thing else than a temporary superiority produced by the single occasion. Hitherto, therefore, the difficulty as to this particular Epistle remains as we found it; a difficulty, though negative, very different indeed from that of Blondell, inasmuch as it proceeds upon the omission of episcopacy in a passage where the other orders are distinctly referred to. But when in addition to the fact that Polycarp did singly by name superscribe the Epistle in question, we find him styled in the authentic acts of his martyrdom, eminently and in the singular number "Bishop of the Church which is in Syria;" when we meet with him in the works of Irenæus who knew his person, and therefore could scarcely be ignorant of his office, distinguished by the same appropriate appellation, we must at least be compelled to allow, that the language of this Epistle concludes nothing against the Episcopal character of the writer; and with respect to the receivers the utmost which can be extracted from it is a surmise, that at this time there was no bishop in that particular Church, which if it could be advanced to certainty would fall far short of proving that the constitution of that Church was not episcopal, as the office might possibly be vacant at the time when Polycarp wrote. The see of Ely was once void for twenty-seven years together, during which time many subordinate parts of the episcopal jurisdiction were probably exercised by the dean and chapter; would then a person, who happened to meet with a single letter addressed to this body alone on Church business during that interval, be justified in concluding that the permanent government of that diocese was in a dean and chapter? I have now stated fairly, though concisely, the little that can be urged of contemporary authority for the existence of parity in its strictest sense during this early period of the Church. It now remains that we consider the opinion of those who, reasoning for the most part from passages adduced in favour of a proper episcopacy, can discover nothing in them beyond a presidency among equals. Now if, either by direct proof or fair induction, it can be made appear that this presidency was of a rotatory nature, and passed at shorter or longer intervals from presbyter to presbyter, it must be allowed that our adversaries have proved their point. But if what these persons assert be this, that granting one presbyter to have presided over a college of his brethren for life, he nevertheless remained equal and co-ordinate with those over whom he presided, the assertion is not only untrue but the fact impossible. The chair, indeed, of such an officer might not yet be exalted into a throne, he might be distinguished by no peculiar habit, be addressed by no titles of honour, yet from this circumstance and this alone that he held his function for life, I contend that he became a superior in order. The point of difference here is precisely that which distinguishes the first magistrate of a republic from an elective monarch. Republican jealousy, aware that monarchy and even tyranny creep in by means of perpetuity in office, always provides that the functions of government shall be rotatory and of no long duration. Indeed the very essence of equality, whether ecclesiastical or civil, consists in this single circumstance, that as the obligation to be governed at all is a necessary evil resulting from the present constitution of the world, it must at least be palliated by affording to the sufferers a prospect of retaliating by turns; and that, as in the scale of society, a perfect equilibrium is impossible, there may be at least an alternate and regular preponderancy; or, in other words, that every citizen may one day have his chance of exercising authority mediately or immediately over those who now exercise it over him. Thus in the successive changes of the constitution at Athens, a decennial as well as annual archon was a primus inter pares only; and such a presidency, though certainly tending, towards monarchy, might yet consist with the equality of a republic; but Pisistratus, though constituted by the suffrages of the people, though he ruled perhaps with a gentler hand than many of the periodical magistrates, yet, because he held his office for life, became a sovereign over subiects. To illustrate this idea a little farther, let it be asked, what it was that constitated the specific difference, as a magistrate, between Cæsar the Consul and Cæsar the perpetual Dictator? It was not merely that the former of fice was legally constituted and the latter of usurped assumption; nor, to come a little nearer to the point, did it consist in this, that, under the consulate, Cotta, Lentulus, or Cato, might themselves govern in their turn, of which, under the dictatorship, the probability was very small; but that under the former and legitimate constitution alone they could hope to exercise the same jurisdiction which Cæsar now exercised over them, not only over their fellow-citizens in general but over Cæsar himself. This illustration will, I think, place in a strong and clear point of view our position, that the essence of equality, whether civil or ecclesiastic, consists in a possibility at least that subjects, for the time being, may exercise authority in succession, mediately or immediately, over their present ruler; and, consequently, that an office with jurisdiction for life necessarily infers a superiority of order, because, by the very supposition, a sinking back of the magistrate into the mass of the people becomes impossible. Henceforward, therefore, the question becomes a question of fact, whether it can be collected from any ear. ly and well authenticated catalogue of these ecclesiastics which yet remains, that their functions continued for life or were limited to some shorter duration. Now, in the first place, allowing the office to have been originally limited to any period short of life, one circumstance will necessarily appear, that the succession is more rapid during the continuance of this order of things than afterwards, when episcopacy is certainly known to have been held till the death of the functionary. Another may possibly be expected, which is, that the names of the same persons will now and then appear a second or third time as re-elected, after some interval, to the presidency. Were any catalogue extant of the whole body of presbyters in any one Church, the dispute might nearly be settled by the re-appearance, or the contrary, of those names which had already appeared as presidents among the mass of the clergy. But for this criterion we have no materials. 66 The following catalogue, however, of the first bishops of Rome extracted from Irenæus, b. iii. c. iii, together with the annexed chronology, will enable the reader to form his own judgment of the case; only he must be admonished in fairness to form no prejudication from the name of bishop only, in the present instance: Linus, died A. C. Anacletus, died* Clemens, abdicated* Euaristus, died Alexander Sixtus.... Telesphorus, a martyr. Hyginus...... Pius....... Anicetus Soter 83 77 108 118 128 138 142 143 Eleutherius, living in................ 178 When Irenæus framed the catalogue, though the order of names in the earlier part of this obscure period may not be perfectly well arranged, or the chronology, with respect to each individual, not quite exact, the entire number of years to be divided among the first six must be nearly right. The whole period now before us * These two names are reversed by Vendelin. |