from time to time: at least the Bishop of Quebec hath no small influence in a very important new settlement of ours. May not, then, the neglect of having bishops of our own, expose us to far greater dangers than the appointment of them can ?"

The Bishop next argues, that the circumstance of the Americans not having petitioned for bishops was no reason why they should not be supplied with them. Surely," he says, "their omitting it may well be ascribed in part to the thoughtlessness of mankind about their religious concerns; which hath been so peculiarly great in those countries, that some of them did not petition for help when they had no one office of Christianity administered to them; and partly also to this, that probably too many of their clergy think they may both live more negligently, and have a better chance for preferment, now, than if a bishop were to inspect them, and ordain natives to be their rivals. But the chief reason, I doubt not, is, that the inhabitants of the colonies, living at such a distance, and not knowing when an application to the Government might be seasonable; and being assured that the bishops here, especially the Bishop of London, and the Society for propagating the Gospel, would always be attentive to this point, have left it to them." The first of these reasons involves one of the most weighty arguments in favour of a National Church Establishment.

The Bishop states, that he had learned, from some papers of Bishop Gibson, that there was a design in Charles the Second's time to place a bishop in Virginia; that letters patents for that purpose were still extant; and that no other reason appears why the design failed, but that the whole endowment was to have been out of the customs. Pecuniary obstacles, it seems, were allowed then, as well as now, to interpose to prevent this act of national duty.

The latter part of Dr. Secker's argument is so important in itself, and so strikingly applicable to the circumstances of the present day, that we shall quote it at some length.

A further objection against it is, that, however it may be received there, it will immediately raise animosities here; produce declamations in pulpits, controversies in pamphlets, debates in Parliament; revive the distinction of High and Low among Churchmen; and terrify or provoke the Dissenters. Now, amongst the clergy, I conceive it can make no dispute; for every man of character amongst them doth and must wish it success. If indeed it were to be brought upon the carpet, and the Administration were to oppose it, some clergymen might be tempted to say indecent things of them. But the present question is not, whether this affair ought to be attempted, if, after being fully weighed, it be disapproved by the Ministry— that undoubtedly would be very wrong-but whether there be reason for them to disapprove it. And certainly there is no reason to fear inflaming and exasperating any of the clergy, by declaring for it: on the contrary, scarce any thing would please them more universally. Nor, I presume, is the danger from pamphlets to be thought very great: for most virulent ones are published daily, both against church and state, which yet give the government no terror at all. Contests in Parliament indeed would be a matter of more serious concern: but there seems no necessity that this affair should ever come into Parliament: for, as the law now stands, suffragan bishops may be ordained, with the King's approbation; and the Bishop of London may send those, instead of presbyters, for his commissaries; and they may confirm and ordain, as well as exercise the jurisdiction which hath been usual there. But even if the scheme should be brought into Parliament, it can be opposed only on these two principles: that episcopal power is a great grievance in this nation, and, that it must rise to an equal height wherever bishops are: of which two propositions,

plain experience proves the former to be false; and I hope I have proved the latter to be so. Still, some members may be blinded by ill-will to the ecclesiastical part of our constitution. But surely these are not very many : besides, the Administration will easily quiet such of them as are their friends. Then the Tories must be for bishops, if it be only to preserve their own credit. And the remainder will probably find themselves too inconsiderable to stir." The Bishop adds:

"Therefore the only danger left, is that of alarming and provoking the body of the Dissenters. Now, a few busy warm men are not the body of the Dissenters: and though they may affect to speak in the name of the whole, yet the whole will neither think it right nor prudent to do all that these gentlemen are pleased to intimate: some of whom also, after arguing properly with them, have owned that they had little or nothing to object against appointing bishops in plantations of the Episcopal communion. Dr. Avery, if I am rightly informed, hath acknowledged this to the Archbishop, as Mr. Chandler hath to me. And, indeed, there is no modesty in saying, We, who are not of the Established Church, demand, as a matter of strict justice, the full exercise of our religion here; but at the same time insist that the King's Episcopal subjects in America, with whom we have nothing at all to do, shall not, even in those provinces where they are the established church, have the full exercise of theirs. Suppose the Presbyterians or Independents in America thought as well of Confirmation as we do, and had not amongst them a proper officer to administer it; would not they think it insufferable to be denied such a one, and put under a necessity of sending their children hither for it, if they would have it? Supposing they were obliged only to send their candidates for the ministry hither to be ordained; would they have been patient under it as long as we have been? would they not have cried out loudly and incessantly for relief? For my part, I should have thought them so well entitled to it, as to have been a most hearty and zealous advocate for them. It is not merely from my attachment to the Church of England, that I am a favourer of the scheme in question; but from my love of religious liberty; which, in this point, the members of the Church of England in our colonies do not enjoy. And I cannot imagine how the Dissenters can pretend to be lovers of it, and wish it to be withheld from their fellow-subjects. God forbid that we should ever be moved, by this or any other provocation, to wish it withheld in any instance whatever from the Dissenters and I believe there never was a time when the clergy of this land were in so mild a disposition towards them. Whatever they may plead therefore, it is not fear that induces them to oppose us on this occasion; for they well know that we have neither power nor wish to oppress them or their brethren, in any way but it is a wantonness of spirit, which we have not deserved from them: it is an ostentatious fondness of using their influence with great persons, to grieve us, without serving themselves. And, instead of

being stirred up by their friends abroad to what they do, their friends abroad have been stirred up by them. Now this is a sort of behaviour which an Administration had much better check by due admonitions, than encourage its growth: for how far it may grow, they cannot foresee. The Dissenters are sincere well-wishers to the civil part of our present happy establishment; and they are to be esteemed and loved for it; but not to be gratified at the expense of those who sincerely wish well to both parts. I am heartily sorry that all the members of our Church are not loyal and dutiful subjects to the King: but much the greater part of them are; the bishops and upper clergy in particular: and surely their desires merit as kind a regard in this case, as those of the Dissenters and their leaders." Difficulties and objections such as those alluded to by Archbishop Secker

continue to be made to the extension of the episcopate to our foreign possessions; as if by a bishop were meant a pope, and the members of the Church of England had no notion of episcopacy but as lifting its mitred head in courts and parliaments. It were well if every Churchman would abstract his mind from such adventitious and often cumbersome splendour, to view the office in its primitive and holy dignity, as a function divinely appointed, and of great practical utility in the church of Christ. Then we should not hear of cutting off decades of bishops, instead of rather increasing their number, so as to make each one an efficient officer within a manageable district of pastoral jurisdiction. We have no objection to bishops being barons in England: at least, if there be evil in the junction there is good also: but we strongly protest against the identification of two things so utterly distinct as temporal splendour and spiritual authority; the popular mistakes upon which are the chief cause of the non-extension of the blessings of Episcopacy to every corner of the British dominions. We are daily told that a bishop could not "keep up his dignity" in a poor colony, or with only half a dozen clergymen and a few widely scattered locations under his controul; and that, therefore, there is to be no Confirmation, no Ordination, no church discipline, lest a defect in the essential articles of maces and liveries, caparisons and purple, should render religious ordinances too trite and vulgar to produce any spiritual benefit.

But it is time that we should return to the discourse immediately before us. Bishop Wilson, with his characteristic zeal and activity, lost no time, after his arrival in his diocese, in proceeding to the discharge of his arduous duties. The sermon now in our hands was preached at an ordination of deacons and priests, chiefly for the missionary office; which accounts for a large part of it being directed rather to the case of Christian missions, than to the ordinary ministry of the Gospel among professed Christians. A considerable portion, however, both of the sermon and the notes appended to it, consists of observations upon the ecclesiastical polity of our Church, and the duty of her members to adhere to her communion. But it is mild and conciliatory as respects other branches of Christ's universal church and glad we are that it should be so, for most injurious to the cause of Christianity in heathen lands is the too common spectacle of the professed followers of Christ biting and devouring each other.

Dr. Wilson's discourse is an excellent summary of Scriptural doctrine, grounded upon the commission given to the Apostle Paul, Acts xxvi. 17-20. His Lordship sets forth the great end which the Apostle had to keep in view in executing it; the primary instructions which he delivered in order to that end; and the spirit and manner in which he discharged the whole office: the first point regarding the Gospel itself; the second, the repentance which prepares for it; the last, the state of mind of the preacher. We should gladly accompany the Right Reverend author in his pious and edifying investigation of these several particulars; but as it may be expected of us, as reviewers, rather to notice those parts which are peculiar to this particular discourse, than those which form the general basis of scriptural preaching-and which are, in the best sense, the common-places of sound divinity-we pass on to the third head of the sermon; in which the author, after some general remarks upon the spirit and manner of the minister of Christ in the discharge of his office, proceeds to "the question of the authority of our Apostolical Reformed Church in sending out ministers into the field of evangelical labour." Hence arises a discussion of the Divine authority of the episcopal office, and its practical benefits in the Christian church. It may perhaps be asked, whether, in choosing such a topic for such an occasion, and under the peculiar circumstances of the case, there was not danger, lest, in magnifying his office, the preacher

:

should seem to magnify, if not himself, at least his own claims and authority. Our first view of the matter, we confess, was, that the topic was unadvisedly chosen but when we recollect that it was an ordination sermon, and that the ordination was public; that some of the candidates themselves might not have sufficiently considered the subject; and that the mass of the congregation were probably wholly unacquainted with it, and might never have another opportunity of hearing its merits discussed; we are inclined to defer to the honest boldness with which the preacher overcame the scruples of false modesty, and ventured upon a subject of great importance to be far better understood than it at present is by the majority of the professed members of the Church of England. The able manner in which he has conducted his argument renders us grateful that he ventured upon it; and, in order that our readers may partake of our gratitude, we shall lay it before them. The passage is long, but, considering the mass of matter which it contains, it is succinct and well condensed.

"1. That the Apostles had a full authority over all the ministers and teachers of the primitive church has never been disputed.

"2. That during their lives certain ministers,-Timothy and Titus-had an authority committed to them by the Apostles for presiding over the other ministers of Ephesus and Crete-for ordaining presbyters or elders in every city, as he had appointed them-for charging some that they should preach no other doctrine than that of the Apostles-for setting in order the things that were wanting-for deciding matters of controversy for receiving accusations and exercising jurisdiction--for rebuking heretics for apportioning maintenance-for regulating the public prayers of the church-for repressing the intrusion of women as teachers-and for watching and overseeing generally the flocks and the ministers of them-are facts as little to be doubted as any which are to be deduced from the Apostolic writings.

"3. Further, that at the close of the sacred canon the surviving Apostle, St. John, thirty years after the death of most of the Apostles, and when the churches had been long in a settled state, addressed the chief pastor in each of the seven Asiatic churches, as the overseer or superintendent presiding over the presbyters and people, so that on him the faults of the churches reflected disgrace and their good conduct praise that is, that the same authority which St. Paul had committed to Timothy was possessed by his successor, the angel of the church who resided at Ephesus when St. John wrote, and so of the rest of the seven churches--cannot be reasonably questioned.

4. Nor can it be doubted whether this order of ecclesiastical government was designed, in its general features, to continue as the Apostles left it. For to suppose that an order of things enjoined by men inspired to regulate the church of Christ is not binding upon us (unless indeed it be abrogated by an authority equal to that by which it was enacted-which is not pretended in the present instance) goes to sap the whole foundation of faith. A regulation made by divinely authorized persons in a society that was designed to be perpetual, is of course perpetual, unless it be otherwise expressed.

"5. Accordingly, it is confessed, that, in point of fact, for fifteen centuries after the time of the Apostles, no government of the church obtained but that which was administered by ministers who received in direct succession from them the exclusive rights of superintendence and ordination, who were called, in the age immediately following that of the Apostles, by the same name as that which distinguishes them from presbyters at present, that of Episcopi or Bishops. To mention only the case of the Apocalyptic churches, the Bishops of Smyrna, Ephesus, Philadelphia, &c. are familiarly spoken of, during the persecution of the second and third centuries, as possessing the same diocesan authority as at the time of St. John. Ignatius, again, the contemporary of that Apostle, who suffered martyrdom about A. D. 107, speaks of the three orders as essential to a Christian church. Irenæus, who flourished in the second century, informs us that his master Polycarp was made Bishop of the church of Smyrna by the Apostles. I need not speak of Tertullian, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Jerom, Augustine, and the series of witnesses in later ages, because the fact has never been seriously denied.

"6. In the sixteenth century, indeed, Calvin, Beza, Luther, Melancthon, with our Cranmer and Ridley, and all the leaders of the Reformation, though some of them from circumstances afterwards adopted a presbyterian discipline, yet admitted the superior authority of the episcopal. And it is quite obvious that in the contests of the succeeding centuries (as in those of later times in our own) political feuds, and not the religious question alone, have been, and are, the real source of the unhappy divisions.

"7. So plain is the case for Episcopacy when candidly stated. To which the only objection that I know of is drawn from the term Bishop or Overseer being sometimes employed in the New Testament for those who had any oversight in the church, and not for chief pastors, as Timothy and Titus, only.

"But it is not for a name that we chiefly contend, but for the spiritual superintendence and authority which Christ has ordained. If we were to yield the term, which we are far from doing, it would still be true, that the office first discharged by the Apostles, then committed by them to Timothy and Titus, and afterwards exercised by the angels or messengers of the Asiatic churches, was of perpetual authority in the church. But with regard to the mere title, which is simply descriptive of the duty of superintendence, it was natural that it should only gradually be appropriated, as the thing designated by it became prominent and distinct before the eyes of men. Things usually exist long before their names, which become attached to them in process of time. The episcopal or superintending office was less complete during the lives of the Apostles, because the superior power rested with them, and the functions of Timothy and Titus were delegated. After their death, however, as these functions and this authority appeared in unrestrained action, the definite and appropriate title would follow. At the close of the sacred canon, the name Angel (or delegate, whether of God or of men) was the term employed by our Lord in the epistles to the seven Apocalyptic churches as the appellation then commonly given to the presiding pastor. When the whole apostolic college were dead, the highest order in the church would soon receive, by general consent, the title of The Overseers or The Bishops, as their principal duty, that of overseeing and providing for the church, then rested fully in them.

"Nothing is more common than for terms to be used, at different times and under altered circumstances, in two senses; the one general, the other more definite and peculiar. The words Disciple, Apostle, Deacon, Overseer or Bishop, and a multitude of others, occur in a restrained and also in an unrestrained sense. They designated at first any learner, any messenger, any minister, any overseer; but they have long, by a well-established usage, come to signify, A learner taught by Christ, A messenger sent immediately by Christ, One of a particular order of men in Christ's church, One having oversight of a number of presbyters and flocks in a certain district. We need not therefore even concede the point of the title, but may safely assert, that whilst the chief authority was in the hands of the Apostles the word was naturally applied to all who had any charge or superintendence in the church, whether over the clergy or of a separate flock; but that, after their death, those who succeeded to their functions of government and ordination began to be called, by way of distinction, The Overseers or Bishops. Thus, when this designation became permanently appropriated, the word Apostle was left to denote the immediate messengers sent forth by Christ; the word Angel was disused, as in its ordinary sense too high and as no longer necessary; and the term Presbyter remained for those who presided over particular congregations. But we dwell not upon a mere name. The Bishop may still be called, as indeed he is, a presbyter, with respect to the general administration of God's word and sacraments; and the Presbyter may still be termed an overseer or bishop, as it regards the superintendence of his peculiar charge. Let only him who bears chief authority in the church be considered of a distinct order, and be now known, as he has been from the apostolic times, by the word Bishop in its emphatic and distinctive sense. It is enough that the office is clearly of Divine institution, though the name be of human, so far as the appropriation of the term extends, and no further; for in the age next the apostolic it was in established use.

"The objection raised therefore from the general employment of the title before the office in its specific form was completely in action, rather confirms than weakens the main argument; concerning which, upon the whole, I must be allowed to say that moral demonstration hardly admits of more satisfactory proof." pp. 18-23.

The above comprises, we presume, nearly all that can be gathered from Scripture respecting the episcopal office; and more we need not, to convince us of its Divine authority, and its beneficial relation to the church of Christ. We are not, however, so fully satisfied as to the entire conclusiveness of the argument in the next paragraph.

"8. But, indeed, the infirmity of the church and the corruption of man have always seemed to me so strongly to recommend an episcopal polity, and the manifest evils of other disciplines have pressed themselves on my mind with such force, that even if the argument from Scripture and from antiquity were less complete, the general directions of the Apostles would suffice to satisfy my own mind. Let all things be done decently and in order,' is a canon sufficient to recommend to the common understanding of men a well-regulated diocesan episcopacy, with a jurisdiction duly moderated by the voice of its presbyters. A similar government prevails in families, in societies, in states, in kingdoms. Supreme controul must, under God, be lodged