ing in. The man of the house came home, and in- | hopeful guide was to conduct us out of the reach of stead of turning me out, as they expected, took part his fellows. Mr. Minton and I took horse in the with us, and stemmed the tide for some time. They face of our enemies, who began clamoring against now got a notion that I had made my escape, and us; the gentlemen were dispersed among the mob, ran down to the inn, and played the engine there. to bridle them. We rode a slow pace up the street, They forced the inn-keeper to turn out our horses, the whole multitude pouring along on both sides, which he immediately sent to Mr. Clark's, which and attending us with loud acclamations. Such drew the rabble and their engine thither. But the fierceness and diabolical malice I have not before resolute old man charged, and presented his gun seen in human faces. They ran up to our horses till they retreated. Upon their revisiting us, we as if they would swallow us, but did not know which stood in jeopardy every moment. Such threatenings, was Wesley. We felt great peace and acquiescurses and blasphemies, I have never heard. They cence in the honor done us, while the whole town seemed kept out by a continual miracle. I remem- were spectators of our march. When out of sight bered the Roman senators, sitting in the forum, we mended our pace, and about seven o'clock came when the Gauls broke in upon them, but thought to Wrexall. The news of our danger was got there was a fitter posture for Christians, and told thither before us; but we brought the welcome timy companions they should take us off of our knees. dings of our deliverance. We joined in hearty We were kept from all hurry and discomposure of prayer to our Deliverer, singing the hymn, 'Worship, and thanks, and blessing,' &c. spirit by a divine power resting upon us. We prayed and conversed as freely as if we had been in the "February 26. I preached at Bath, and we remidst of our brethren, and had great confidence that the Lord would either deliver us from the dan-joiced like men who take the spoil. We continued ger, or in it. In the height of the storm, just when our triumph at Bristol, and reaped the fruit of our we were falling into the hands of the drunken en- labors and sufferings." raged multitude, Mr. Minton was so little disturbed that he fell fast asleep. "They were now close to us on every side, and over our heads untiling the roof. A ruffian cried out, 'Here they are, behind the curtain.' At this time we fully expected their appearance, and retired to the furthermost corner of the room, and I said, 'This is the crisis.' In that moment Jesus rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. We heard not a breath without, and wondered what was become of them. The silence lasted for three quarters of an hour, before any one came near us; and we continued in mutual exhortation and prayer, looking for deliverance. I often told my companions, 'Now God is at work for us; he is contriving our escape; he can turn these leopards into lambs; can command the heathen to bring his children on their shoulders, and make our fiercest enemies the instruments of our deliverance." About three o'clock Mr. Clark knocked at the door, and brought with him the persecuting constable. He said, Sir, if you will promise never to preach here again, the gentlemen and I will engage to bring you safe out of town.' My answer was, 'I shall promise no such thing; setting aside my office, I will not give up my birth-right as an Englishman, of visiting what place I please of his majesty's dominions.' 'Sir, said the constable, we expect no such promise, that you will never come here again; only tell me that it is not your present intention, that I may tell the gentlemen, who will then secure your private departure.' I answered, 'I cannot come again at this time, because I must return to London a week hence. But, observe, I make no promise of not preaching here when the door is opened; and do not you say that I do." Mr. Whitefield, he tells us, had "a great longing to be persecuted," though the quotation from one of his letters, on which he justifies the aspersion, shows nothing more than a noble defiance of suffering, should it occur in the course of what he esteemed his duty. Similar sarcasms have been cast by infidels upon all who, in every age, have suffered for the sake of Christ; and like those in which Dr. Southey has indulged, theywere intended to darken the lustre of that patient courage which sprang out of love to the Saviour and the souls of men, by resolving it into spiritual pride, and a desire to render themselves conspicuous. Of John Nelson, one of Mr. Wesley's first lay coadjutors, who endured no ordinary share of oppression and suffering, as unprovoked and unmerited as the most modest and humble demeanor on his part could render it, Dr. Southey truly says, that "he had as high a spirit, and as brave a heart as ever Englishman was blessed with;" yet even the narration of his wrongs, so scandalous to the magistracy of the day, and which were sus"He went away with this answer, and we betook tained by him in the full spirit of Christian conourselves to prayer and thanksgiving. We per- stancy, is not dismissed without a sneer at this hoceived it was the Lord's doing, and it was marvel-nest and suffering man himself." To prison therelous in our eyes. The hearts of our adversaries fore Nelson was taken, to his heart's content." And were turned. Whether pity for us, or fear for them- so because he chose a prison rather than violate his selves, wrought strongest, God knoweth; probably conscience, and endured imprisonment and other the latter, for the mob were wrought up to such a injuries, with the unbending feeling of a high and pitch of fury, that their masters dreaded the conse-noble mind, corrected and controlled by "the meekquence, and therefore went about appeasing the multitude, and charging them not to touch us in our departure. "While the constable was gathering his posse, we got our things from Mr. Clark's, and prepared to go forth. The whole multitude were without, expecting us, and saluted us with a general shout. The man Mrs. Taylor had hired to ride before her was, as we now perceived, one of the rioters. This ness and gentleness of Christ, imprisonment was his desire, and the distinction which he is supposed to have derived from it, his motive! Before criticism so flippant and callous, no character, however sacred and revered, could stand. It might be applied with equal success to the persecutions of the apostles, and the first Christians themselves; to the confessors in the reign of Mary; and to the whole | if they had been the original and not the copy"noble army of martyrs." The real danger to which these excellent men were exposed is, however, concealed by Dr. Southey. Whitefield's fears, or rather hopes of persecution, he says, were suited to the days of Queen Mary, Bishop Gardiner, and Bishop Bonner; they were ridiculous or disgusting in the time of George the Second, Archbishop Potter, and Bishop Gibson." This is said because Mr. Whitefield thought that he might probably be called to "resist unto blood;" and our author would have it supposed, that all this was "safe boasting," in the reign of George the Second, and whilst the English church had its Archbishop Potter, and its Bishop Gibson. But not even in the early part of the reign of George the Third, and with other bishops in the church, as excellent as Potter and Gibson, was the anticipation groundless. The real danger was in fact, so great from the brutality of the populace, the ignorance and supineness of the magistrates, and the mob-exciting activity of the clergy, one of whom was usually the instigator of every tumult, that every man who went forth on the errand of mercy in that day took his life in his hand, and needed the spirit of a martyr, though he was not in danger of suffering a martyr's death by regular civil or ecclesiastical process. Dr. Southey has himself in part furnished the confutation of his own suggestion, that little danger was to be apprehended, by the brief statements he has given of the hair-breadth escapes of the Wesleys, and of the sufferings of John Nelson. But a volume might be filled with the accounts of outrages committed, from that day to our own, in different places, (for they now occasionally occur in obscure and unenlightened parts of the country,) upon the persons of Methodist preachers, for the sole fault of visiting neglected places, and preaching the gospel of salvation to those who, if Christianity be true, are in a state of spiritual darkness and danger. To be pelted with stones, dragged through ponds, beaten with bludgeons, rolled in mud, and to suffer other modes of ill-treatment, was the anticipation of all the first preachers when they entered upon their work; and this was also the lot of many of their hearers. Some lives were lost, and many shortened; the most singular escapes are on record; and if the tragedy was not deeper, that was owing at length to the explicit declarations of George III. on the subject of toleration, and the upright conduct of the judges in their circuits, and in the higher courts, when an appeal was made to the laws in some of the most atrocious cases. Assuredly, the country magistrates in general, and the clergy, were entitled to little share of the praise. Much of this is acknowledged by Dr. Southey; but he attempts to throw a part of the blame upon the Wesleys themselves. "Their doctrines of perfection and assurance" were, he thinks, among the causes of their persecution; and "their zeal was not tempered with discretion." With discretion, in his view of it, their zeal was not tempered. Such discretion would neither have put them in the way of persecution, nor brought it upon them; it would have disturbed no sinner and saved no soul; but they were not indiscreet in seeking danger, and provoking language never escaped lips, in which the law of meekness always triumphed: and as for doctrines, the mobs and their exciters, were then just as discriminating as mobs have ever been from the beginning of the world. They were usually stirred up by the clergy, and other persons of influence in the neighborhood, who were almost as ignorant as the ruffians they employed to assault the preachers and their peaceable congregations. The description of the mob at Ephesus, in the Acts of the Apostles, suited them as well as "Some cried one thing, and some another; for the assembly was confused; and the most part knew not wherefore they had come together." They generally, however, agreed to pull down the preacher, and to abuse both him and his hearers, men, women, and even children; and that because" they troubled them about religion." That immediate resort to God in prayer, which was practised, in cases of "peril and danger," by these persecuted ministers; and their ascription of deliverances to the divine interposition, as in the instances above given, have also been subjects of either grave rebuke, or semi-infidel ridicule. It is not necessary to contend that every particular instance which, in the Journals of the Wesleys, is referred to an immediate answer to prayer, was so in reality; because a few cases may reasonably appear doubtful. These, however, only prove that they cultivated the habit of regarding God in all things, and of gratefully acknowledging his hand in all the events of life; and if there was at any time any over application of these excellent views and feelings, yet in minds so sober as to make the word of God, diligently studied, their only guide in all matters of practice, no injurious result could follow. But we must reject the Bible altogether, if we shut out a particular providence; and we reduce prayer to a real absurdity, unless we allow that its very ground and reason is special interposition. Why, for instance, should a collect teach us to pray that "this day we may fall into no sin, neither run into any kind of danger," if we do not thereby place ourselves under a special protection of God, and if our interests must necessarily be dragged after the wheel of some general system of government? Divine interposition is indeed ordinarily invisible, and can be known only from general results; it impresses no mark of interruption or of quickened activity upon the general course of things, with which we may be surrounded; it works often unconsciously through our own faculties, and through the wills and purposes of others, as unconscious of it as we ourselves; yet even in this case, where the indevout see man only, the better instructed acknowledge God who "worketh all in all." But to say that the hand of God is never specially marked in its operations; that his servants who are raised up by him for important services, shall never receive proofs of his particular care; that an entire trust in him in the most critical circumstances, shall have no visible honor put upon it; that when we are "in all things" commanded to make our requests known unto God, the prayers which, in obedience to that command, we offer to him in the time of trouble shall never have a special answer, is to maintain notions wholly subversive of piety, and which cannot be held without rejecting, or reducing to unmeaningness, many of the most explicit and important declarations of holy Scripture, These were not the views entertained by the Wesleys; and in their higher belief they coincided with good men in all ages. They felt that they were about their master's business, and they trusted in their master's care, so long as it might be for his glory that they should be permitted to live. Nor for that were they anxious; desiring only, that whilst they lived they should "live unto the Lord," and that when they died "they should die to him;" and that so "Christ might be magnified in their body whether by life, or by death." The labors of Mr. John Wesley, during the same period of two years, may be abridged from his Journal. In the first month of the year 1745, we find him at London, and at Bristol, and its neighborhood. In February, he made a journey, in the stormy and wintry weather of that season, to New castle, preaching at various intermediate places. I speak against us, either in conversation or in The following extract shows the cheerful and public. buoyant spirit with which he encountered these 10. On this encouragement several of the clergy difficulties:stirred up the people to treat us as outlaws or mad dogs. "Many a rough journey have I had before; but one like this I never had, between wind and hail, and rain, and ice, and snow, and driving sleet, and piercing cold. But it is past. Those days will return no more, and are therefore as though they had never been. "Pain, disappointment, sickness, strife, As a specimen of that cool and self-possessed manner which gave him so great a power over rude minds, we may take the following anecdote. A man at Newcastle had signalized himself by personal insults offered to him in the streets; and, upon inquiry, he found him an old offender in persecuting the members of the society, by abusing and throwing stones at them. Upon this he sent him the following note: "ROBERT YOUNG, "2. For preaching this doctrine we were forbidden to preach in the churches. "3. We then preached in private houses, as occasion offered; and when the houses could not contain the people, in the open air. "4. For this many of the clergy preached or printed against us, as both heretics and schismatics. "5. Persons who were convinced of sin, begged us to advise them more particularly, how to flee from the wrath to come. We replied, if they would all come at one time (for they were numerous) we would endeavor it. "6. For this we were represented, both from the pulpit and the press, (we have heard it with our ears, and seen it with our eyes,) as introducing popery, raising sedition, practising both against church and state: and all manner of evil was publicly said both of us, and those who were accustomed to meet with us. "7. Finding some truth herein, viz., that some of those who so met together, walked disorderly, we immediately desired them not to come to us any 11. The people did so, both in Staffordshire, Cornwall, and many other places. "12. And they do so still, wherever they are not restrained by their fear of the secular magistrate. "Thus the case stands at present. Now what. can we do, or what can you our brethren do toward healing this breach? which is highly desirable; that we may withstand, with joint force, the still increasing flood of popery, deism, and immorality. "Desire of us any thing we can do with a safe conscience, and we will do it immediately. Will you meet us here? Will you do what we desire of you, so far as you can with a safe conscience? 1. To preach another, or to desist from preaching "Let us come to particulars. Do you desire us, this doctrine? cannot do this with a safe conscience. "We think you do not desire it, as knowing we in private houses, or in the open air? As things Do you desire us, 2. To desist from preaching are now circumstanced, this would be the same as desiring us not to preach at all. those who now meet together for that purpose? or, "Do you desire us, 3. To desist from advising in other words, to dissolve our societies? "We cannot do this with a safe conscience; for we apprehend many souls would be lost thereby, and that God would require their blood at our hands. "Do you desire us, 4. To advise them only one by one? "This is impossible, because of their number. "Do you desire us, 5. To suffer those who walk disorderly still to mix with the rest? "Neither can we do this with a safe conscience; because evil communications corrupt good manners. "Do you desire us, 6. To discharge those leaders of bands or classes (as we term them) who overlook the rest? "This is, in effect, to suffer the disorderly walkers still to mix with the rest, which we dare not do. "Do you desire us, lastly, to behave with reverence toward those who are overseers of the church of God? and with tenderness, both to the character and persons of our brethren, the inferior clergy? "By the grace of God, we can and will do this. Yea, our conscience beareth us witness, that we have already labored so to do; and that, at all times and in all places. "If you ask what we desire of you to do, we answer, 1. We do not desire any of you to let us preach in your churches, either if you believe us to preach false doctrine, or if you have upon any other ground, the least scruple concerning it. But we desire that any who believes us to preach true doctrine, and has no scruple at all in this matter, may not be either publicly or privately discouraged from inviting us to preach in his church. 2. We do not desire that any one who thinks that we are heretics or schismatics, and that it is his duty to preach or print against us as such, should refrain therefrom, so long as he thinks it his duty, (although in this case, the breach can never be healed.) "But we desire, that none will pass such a sentence, until he has calmly considered both sides of the question; that he would not condemn us unheard, but first read what we have written, and pray earnestly that God may direct him in the right way. "3. We do not desire any favor, if either popery, sedition, or immorality be proved against us. "But we desire, you will not credit without proof, any of those senseless tales that pass current with | wall." On this Mr. Wesley contents himself with the vulgar; that, if you do not credit them yourselves, you will not relate them to others; (which we have known done;) yea, that you will confute them, so far as ye have opportunity, and discountenance those who still retail them abroad. "4. We do not desire any preferment, favor, or recommendation from those that are in authority, either in church or state. But we desire, "1. That if any thing material be laid to our charge, we may be permitted to answer for ourselves. 2. That you would hinder your dependants from stirring up the rabble against us, who are certainly not the proper judges of these matters; and, 3. That you would effectually suppress, and thoroughly discountenance, all riots and popular insurrections, which evidently strike at the foundation of all government, whether of church or state. coolly remarking, “We will not, if we can help it.” He now proceeded northward; and at Northampton called on Dr. Doddridge, from whom he had previously received several letters, breathing the most catholic spirit. At Leeds, the mob pelted him and the congregation with dirt and stones; and the next evening, being "in higher excitement, they were ready," says he, "to knock out our brains for joy that the duke of Tuscany was emperor." On his arrival at Newcastle, the town was in the utmost consternation, news having arrived that the Pretender had entered Edinburgh. By the most earnest preaching, he endeavored to turn this season of alarm to the spiritual profit of the people, and the large congregations whom he addressed in the streets heard with solemn attention. He then visited Epworth, but speedily returned to Newcastle, judging probably, that the place of anxiety and danger was his post of duty. Here he made an offer to the general, through one of the aldermen, to preach to the troops encamped near the town, whose dissoIt is evident from this paper, that Mr. Wesley's lute language and manners greatly affected him; difficulties, arising from his having raised up a dis- but he seems to have received no favorable answer: tinct people, within the national church, pressed so, after preaching a few times near the camp, he upon him. He desired union and co-operation with returned southwards, endeavoring, at Leeds, Birthe clergy, but his hope was disappointed; and per-mingham, and other places, to turn the public agihaps it was much more than he could reasonably indulge. It shows, however, his own sincerity, and that he was not only led into his course of irregularity, but impelled forward in it, by circumstances which his zeal and piety had created, and which all his prejudices in favor of the church could not "Now these things you certainly can do, and that with a safe conscience; therefore, until these things are done, the continuance of the breach is chargeable on you and you only."* control. After spending some time in Newcastle and the neighboring places, he visited Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Lancashire, and Cheshire. On his return southward, he called at Wednesbury, long the scene of riot, and preached in peace. At Birmingham he had to abide the pelting of stones and dirt; and on his return to London, he found some of the society inclined to Quakerism; but by reading" Barclay's Apology" over with them, and commenting upon it, they were recovered. Antinomianism, both of mystic and Calvinistic origin, also gave him trouble; but his testimony against it was unsparing. To erroneous opinions, when innocent, no man was more tender; but when they infected the conduct, they met from him the sternest resistance. "I would wish all to observe, that the points in question between us and either the German or English Antinomians, are not points of opinion, but of practice. We break with no man for his opinion. We think and let think."t In the summer he proceeded to Cornwall, where Dr. Borlase, the historian of that county, in the plenitude of his magisterial authority, still carried on a systematic persecution against the Methodists. He had made out an order for Mr. Maxfield, who had been preaching in various places, to be sent on board a man-of-war, but the captain would not take him. A pious and peaceable miner, with a wife and seven children, was also apprehended under the Doctor's warrant, because he had said "that he knew his sins forgiven;" and this zealous anti-heretic finally made out a warrant against Mr. Wesley himself, but could find no one to execute it. From Cornwall, where his ministry had been attended with great effect, Mr. Wesley proceeded to Wales, and thence to Bristol. Count Zinzendorf about this time directed the publication of an advertisement, declaring that he and his people had no connection with John and Charles Wesley; and concluded with a prophecy, that they would “ soon run their heads against a tation, arising from the apprehension of civil war, to the best account, by enforcing "repentance towards God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ." Mr. Wesley had occasionally employed himself in writing and getting printed small religious tracts, many thousands of which were distributed. This was revived with vigor on his return to London this year; and he thus, by his example, was probably the first to apply, on any large scale, this important means of usefulness to the reformation of the people. In the form of those excellent institutions called "Tract Societies," the same plan has now long been carried on systematically, to the great spiritual advantage of many thousands. At this period he observes, adverting to the numerous small tracts he had written and distributed, "It pleased God hereby to provoke others to jealousy; insomuch that the lord mayor had ordered a large quantity of papers, dissuading from cursing and swearing, to be printed, and distributed to the train-bands. And this day, an 'Earnest Exhortation to Serious Repentance' was given at every church-door in or near London, to every person who came out, and one left at the house of every householder who was absent from church. I doubt not but God gave a blessing therewith."* In the early part of 1746, we find the following entry in Mr. Wesley's journal :-"I set out for Bristol. On the road I read over Lord King's account of the primitive church. In spite of the vehement * Journal. Previous to this, we find him a tract writer and distributor; for he observes in the year 1742, "I set out for Brentford with Robert Swindels. The next day we reached Marlborough. When one in the dels stepped down, and put into his hand the paper enroom beneath us was swearing desperately, Mr. Swintitled Swear not at all.' He thanked him, and promised to swear no more. And he did not while he was in the house." Mr. Wesley had already written tracts entitled, "A Word to a Smuggler," "A Word to a Sabbath-breaker," "A Word to a Swearer," "A Word to a to a Malefactor," and several others. He published A Word to a Street-walker," "A Word these that his preachers and people might have them to give away to those who were guilty of these crimes, or in danger of falling into them. He considered this as one great means of spreading the knowledge of God. He also early gave his influence to the Sunday-school system. Mr. Raikes began his Sunday-school in Gloucester in 1784; and in January, 1785, Mr. Wesley published an account of it in his magazine, and exhorted his societies to imitate that laudable example. Drunkard," prejudice of my education, I was ready to believe that this was a fair and impartial draught. But if so, it would follow, that bishops and presbyters are (essentially) of one order; and that originally every Christian congregation was a church independent on all others !" The truth is, that Lord King came in only to confirm him in views which he had for some time begun to entertain; and they were such as show, that though he was a church-of-England man as to affection, which was strong and sincere as far as its doctrines and its liturgy were concerned, and though he regarded it with deference as a legal institution, yet in respect of its ecclesiastical polity he was even then very free in his opinions. At the second conference in 1745, it was asked, “Is Episcopal, Presbyterian, or Independent church government, most agreeable to reason?" The answer is as follows:"The plain origin of church-government seems to be this:-Christ sends forth a person to preach the gospel: some of those who hear him, repent and believe in Christ: they then desire him to watch over them, to build them up in faith, and to guide their souls into paths of righteousness. Here then is an independent congregation, subject to no pastor, but their own; neither liable to be controlled, in things spiritual, by any other man, or body of men whatsoever. But soon after, some from other parts, who were occasionally present, he was speaking in the name of the Lord, beseech him to come over and help them also. He complies, yet not till he confers with the wisest and holiest of his congregation; and with their consent appoints one who has gifts and grace to watch over his flock in his absence. If it please God to raise another flock, in the new place, before he leaves them, he does the same thing, appointing one whom God hath fitted for the work to watch over these souls also. In like manner, in every place where it pleases God to gather a little flock by his word, he appoints one in his absence, to take the oversight of the rest, to assist them as of the ability which God giveth. whilst "These are deacons, or servants of the church, and they look upon their first pastor, as the common father of all these congregations, and regard him in the same light, and esteem him still as the shepherd of their souls. These congregations are not strictly independent, as they depend upon one pastor, though not upon each other. "As these congregations increase, and the deacons grow in years and grace, they need other subordinate deacons, or helpers, in respect of whom they may be called presbyters, or elders, as their father in the Lord may be called the bishop or overseer of them all." This passage is important as it shows that from the first he regarded his preachers, when called out and devoted to the work, as, in respect of primitive antiquity and the universal church, parallel to deacons and presbyters. He also then thought himself a scriptural bishop. Lord King's researches into antiquity, served to confirm these sentiments, and corrected his former notion as to a distinction of orders. It should here be stated, that, at these early conferences one sitting appears to have been devoted to conversation on matters of discipline, in which the propriety of Mr. Wesley's proceedings in former societies, calling out preachers, and originating a distinct religious community, governed by its own laws, were considered; and this necessarily led to the examination of general questions of church government and order. This will explain the reason why in the conferences which Mr. Wesley, his brother, two or three clergymen, and a few preachers, held in the years 1744, 1745, 1746, and 1747, | such subjects were discussed as are contained in the above extract and in those which follow. On these as on all others, they set out with the principle of examining every thing "to the foundation. Q. Can he be a spiritual governor of the church who is not a believer, not a member of it? "A. It seems not: though he may be a governor in outward things, by a power derived from the king. Q. What are properly the laws of the church of England? "A. The rubrics: and to these we submit, as the ordinance of men, for the Lord's sake. "Q. But is not the will of our governors a law? "A. No; not of any governor, temporal or spiritual; therefore if any bishop wills that I should not preach the gospel, his will is no law to me. "Q. But if he produce a law against your preaching? "A. I am to obey God rather than man." "Q. Is mutual consent absolutely necessary between the pastor and his flock? "A. No question. I cannot guide any soul, unless he consent to be guided by me; neither can any soul force me to guide him, if I consent not. "Q. Does the ceasing of this consent on either side dissolve this relation? "A. It must in the very nature of things. If a man no longer consent to be guided by me, I am no longer his guide; I am free. If one will not guide me any longer, I am free to seek one who will.” "Q. Does a church in the New Testament always mean a single congregation? (8 A. We believe it does; we do not recollect any instance to the contrary. "Q.What instance or ground is there in the New Testament for a national church. “A. We know none at all; we apprehend it to be a merely political institution. "Q. Are the three orders of bishops, priests and deacons plainly described in the New Testament? "A. We think they are, and believe they generally obtained in the church of he apostolic age. Q. But are you assured that God designed the same plan should obtain in all churches, throughout all ages? "A. We are not assured of it, because we do not know it is asserted in holy writ. "Q. If the plan were essestial to a Christian church, what must become of all foreign reformed churches? "A. It would follow they are no part of the church of Christ: a consequence full of shocking absurdity. "Q. In what age was the divine right of episcopacy first asserted in England? A. About the middle of Queen Elizabeth's reign: till then all the bishops and clergy in England continually allowed and joined in the ministrations of those who were not episcopally ordained. "Q. Must there not be numberless accidental variations in the government of various churches? "A. There must, in the nature of things. As God variously dispenses his gifts of nature, providence, and grace, both the offices themselves, and the officers in each, ought to be varied from time to time. "Q. Why is it that there is no determinate plan of church-government appointed in Scripture? "A. Without doubt because the wisdom of God had a regard to that necessary variety." "Q. Was there any thought of uniformity in the government of all churches, until the time of Constantine? "A. It is certain there was not, nor would there |