was the appointment of any such officer as Titus was in Crete, but a command to him to enter upon the duties of the Episcopate, and a command to the people to receive the Episcopal form of government? What are the Epistles addressed to him and to Timothy, but directions or injunctions that are properly COMMANDS? What then becomes of the assertion that Episcopacy rests on precedent alone?

So far from this being true, our warrant does not stand solely on either the words or acts of the Apostles. Our author never refers to the existence of any system, or to the establishing of any office previous to the time of the Apostles' authority. We will not spend much time in supplying this omission, but simply state, what otherwise his readers might not know, that Episcopalians find in the arrangement of the ministry under the Mosaic dispensation (1) a clear proof that the system of "parity" is not what God favors, and (2) a very strong presumption in favor of a ministry having three degrees.* But this presumption is made yet stronger by the fact that our Lord Jesus Christ, himself the great High Priest, appointed two separate orders of Evangelists,—the twelve and the seventy. Those of the latter class were sent forth to do a certain work, and they had the powers proper for it; but perpetuating their order was no part of their duty; no promise was given to them extending into the remote future. How dif ferent was it with the twelve! To them, as the higher order, full powers were granted. Their ordinary com

*St. Jerome, letter to Evagrius: "Quod Aaron, et filii ejus atque Levitæ in templo fuerunt, hoc sibi Episcopi, Presbyteri et Diaconi vindicant in ecclesiâ."--(Sinclair's Dissertations, page 97; and elsewhere.)

mission was necessarily to be handed down, and the promise would of course accompany it. Many find in this action of our Lord the true foundation of Episcopacy.

But suppose they claim too much (which we are far from granting), is there to be no regard paid to our Lord's course when we are considering this subject. We contend that it must be followed; but let it only be considered, and we will be satisfied with the result. By just so much as this authority, from which there is no appeal, discountenances Presbyterian equality, it favors some other system of a dif ferent character, some one that is more in accordance with the model He furnished. If ours be such a system, and if it be conceded that it has Apostolical precedent beside, what is wanting to place Episcopacy upon an immovable basis, and prove that it is binding upon all men to the end of time?

CHAPTER V.

THE PROPER SOURCES OF INFORMATION.

OUR

UR author thus states the question, and the sources to which he thinks we ought to apply for an authoritative answer to it:

"The present question is simply this-whether it is a doctrine of the Church of England that Episcopal ordination is a sine qua non to constitute a valid Christian ministry? In order to a true answer we must examine

I. "The Articles and other formularies which relate to it, taken in their literal sense.

II. "The opinions of those who drew up these standards, as ascertained by their other writings, to be taken as guides to the sense in which they intended those standards to be received, as also the opinions of the leading divines of the Church onward for a hundred years.

III. The PRACTICE of the Church FOR A SIMILAR PERIOD, as a further guide to the true interpretation of the standards,"

Now, these are not the sources from which a true and authoritative answer can be elicited. We should like to know on what pretence the opinion of a man who lived a hundred years after Cranmer could be offered in evidence of Cranmer's meaning in the formularies, or why those who lived a little more than a hundred years after the Reformation should not be equally authentic exponents. Still more, we should like to know on what pretence the PRACTICE

THE PROPER SOURCES OF INFORMATION. 113

of the Church for its first hundred years should be a rule to us, and its practice to-day and for two hundred years past ignored.

The true sources from which we are to gather the judgment of our Church upon this or any other point are:

1st. ITS DOCTRINAL AND DEVOTIONAL STANDARDS the Liturgy Articles and Ordinal.

. These are to be taken in the plain sense of their words; and if there be room for any doubt as to their meaning, reference may be made to the other writings of those who were the actual compilers of them.

2nd. ITS LAWS and PRINCIPLES as set forth in canons, injunctions, declarations, endorsements, censures, etc.

.. These are of the most importance when they come from the Church in its corporate capacity, that is in Convocation.

3rd. ITS PRACTICE (or administration of its own laws) ever since the Reformation.

.. Of course this can only be referred to when the Church had full liberty of action.

4th. Those works which having been specially endorsed by the Church or enjoined by lawful authority, may be looked upon in the light of SECONDARY STANDARDS.

5th. And, least valuable of all, the OPINIONS OF DIVINES of the Church of England, from its foundation to the present time; and also of divines of our own Church since its separate organization.

. The reader will mark well that these opinions can be of use only as corroborative proofs of what the standards teach. Strong concurrent testimony from many writers is valuable corrobo

114 THE PROPER SOURCES OF INFORMATION.

ration, but even the strongest could establish nothing as the doctrine of the Church unless it be first found in the formularies or laws. Opinions of individuals, however correct they may be, are still only mere opinions, for which no one but the writer is responsible; and in this discussion they are valuable in proportion to the eminence (ecclesiastical and literary) of the authors.

Of course the writings of partisans of the present generation are not to be quoted as authority on their own side.

These are the sources then to which we shall look for the Church's answer to the questions, What is the true and scriptural mode of Church government, and what constitutes a true and proper ordination?

We prefer this mode of putting the case to that of our author. It is pretty much the same, yet not precisely. No one can reasonably expect to find in our formularies definite statements as to "sine qua non" qualifications, validity, etc., etc. The Church of England is not given to anathematizing, and still less to refining unnecessarily, especially as regards the affairs of others. She simply states her own faith, and leaves that statement to condemn whomsoever it will condemn. Thus her second article contains her declaration of doctrine as regards the eternal Son of God; it says not a word of Arian heretics, but it does virtually condemn them. As it is in this instance so it is in many others. The mere declaration suffices. Even the Augsburg Confession has its condemnatory clauses at the end of each article, but the English Church has generally in her formularies contented herself with affirming her own doctrine; and that is amply sufficient.