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iftered; because, as it has been above observed, the efficacy of the service and facraments of the church does not depend upon the private character of the officiating minifter: and as there is no excufe for feparation under fuch circumftances, fo neither can there be any advantage derived from it. Piouflydifpofed perfons may certainly be as pious in the church as they can be out of it; and it is the defign of our church, that all its members fhould be fuch. It may be a fubject, therefore, well worth confideration, whether the practice fo frequently adopted by ferious perfons, of feparating from a church which furnishes the most effectual means of promoting the true spirit of Christianity, may not be traced to the artifice of that grand Deceiver, whose business it is at all times and by all means to prevent, as much as in him lies, the fuccefs of the Chriftian miniftry: and, under this head, whether the idea which is now taken up by Christians of a certain defcription, relative to a fuppofed diftinction between the church of CHRIST and church of England, be not employed by him, by way of prelude to their more eafy feparation from church communion. Upon thofe pious perfons who are on the point of being led captive by fuch a fatal delufion, the strong language of Bishop HALL will

produce more effects, at the fame time that it will be better received, than any thing I can hope to fay upon the subject. "The GOD of the church (fays this pious bishop) cannot abide either conventicles of feparation, or pluralities of profeffions. This flourishing church of Great-Britain (after all the fpiteful calumniations of malicious men) is one of the most confpicuous members of the Catholic church upon earth; fo we, in her communion, do make up one body with the holy patriarchs, prophets, apostles, martyrs, confeffors, and faithful Chriftians of all ages and times. We fucceed in their faith, we glory in their fucceffion, we triumph in this glory. Whither go ye, then, ye weak, ignorant, feduced fouls, that run to feek this dove in a foreign cote? She is here, if the have any reft under heaven." Serm. op Cant. vi. 9.

To the foregoing important confiderations, let it be added, that every reprefentation of the clergy of this church, which tends to leffen their influence upon the community, does injury to the general caufe. For this reafon, it becomes neceffary to feparate, as far as may be, the office from the man; and not to difregard the ordinance of GOD, because it has been occasionally difgraced. And this dif

tinction between the public and private character of the teacher, our SAVIOUR has taught us to make, in the direction given to his difciples respecting their conduct towards the Scribes and Pharifees, who were at that time notorious for moral depravity. "The Scribes and Pharisees (faid he) fit. in Mofes feat. All therefore whatsoever they bid you you obferve, that obferve and do; but do not ye after their works, for they fay and do not." MATT. xxiii. 2, 3. Though the ministers of the church, therefore, ought to be, and would to God they all were, burning and fhining lights to the world; yet it must be remembered, they are men. They have received this treasure in earthen veffels," as mcn of like paffions with those to whom they are fent. As men, therefore, they will have their perfonal defects. But as their perfonal defects do not, through Divine grace, vacate the object of their commiffion, " * any thing (according to the observation made by DIONYSIUS to NOVATIAN*) muft rather be borne, than that we should rend the church of GOD." A proper distinction, therefore, fhould always be made between the clergy and the church. For if well-meaning pious

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* "Oportebat quidem nihil non ferre, ne ecclefiam DEI scin deres." DION. Epift. ad NovAT. vide EUSEB. lib. viii. c. 44

Christians are to leave the church, because there are fome minifters who do no credit to their office in it ; it may be difficult to fay, when fuch a thing as unity could be found in it; fince there never was a time, from the days of the Apostles, when fuch a cause for feparation did not in a greater or less degree exist.

ST. CYPRIAN fets forth the corruption of an early age of the church in the following melancholy ftrain: "The difcipline (fays he) which the Apostles left us, was corrupted with idlenefs and a long reft. Every one's care was to increase his eftate; and quite forgetting either what the believers had done in the Apostles' days, or what it was always their duty to do, they gave themselves up to an infatiable covetoufness, and laboured for nothing but to get wealth. There was no devotion in their priests, no charity fhewed in good works, not so much as the form of godlinefs in their behaviour." Yet ST. CYPRIAN was fo far from thinking that this fhameful degeneracy of the clergy furnished an argument for feparation from the church, that he was one of the strongest advocates for the preservation of Christian unity.

When the prophet said, (MAL. ii. 7) "The lips of the priests should keep knowledge, and they

fhould feek the law at his mouth, for he is the meffenger of the LORD of Hosts;” it was at a time, when the Jewish church was in the most degenerate state; when the priests, as he afterwards tells them, "had departed out of the way, had caufed many to stumble at the law, and had corrupted the covenant of LEVI."

The reader will not fuppofe, that it is our wish to shelter the present degeneracy of the clergy under that of their predeceffors in any former stage of the church. The only conclufion meant to be drawn from the foregoing circumftances is fimply this; that the minifters of the church are to be regarded in their public character, as "the meffengers of the LORD of Hosts," "the ambaffadors for CHRIST;" as bearing a commiffion, which, though at times unworthily discharged, demands confideration from the refped due to the Being from whom it is derived; and that the caufe of the mafter ought not to be affected by the unworthiness of the fervant.*

*In the course of the great rebellion, when the people were deluded to believe they could not fet up the kingdom of CHRIST without pulling down that of their fovereign; among other tranfactions, we are told of an officer belonging to the rebels, who, after fome fkirmish, being taken prifoner with his party by the royalifts, was modeftly asked by one of them, "How it came to pafs, that a

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