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pofed ground of Church government being a fubject of" doubtful opinion," at the fame time that they are to be taken as no judges in the cafe, pronounce, by their conduct, the feverest sentence on their own negligence, and must be answerable for the confe quences to which it may lead.

As this is both a ferious and important fubject, it fhould be confidered feriously; and, as far as poffible, abstractedly from all perfonal confiderations and prejudices. In fact, this fubject is to be determined only by the word of GOD, and the practice of the Church originally built upon it. For next to the Divine inftitution, Catholic practice conftitutes the basis of the power and order of Epifcopacy. What government was therefore instituted by the Apostles, delivered to their immediate fucceffors, and universally established in the Church, fuppofing that capable of being afcertained, must constitute the standard, to which all future judgment on this head ought in reafon to conform: on the confideration, that no judgment of the present members of the Church can come in competition with it; because no prefent members of the Church stand on the fame ground with the Apostles, and their im mediate fucceffors, with refpect to the data, from which alone a judgment on this fubject is decidedly to be formed.

The reasoning which latitudinarianifm has by degrees introduced into this fubject, however plaufibly it may found to uninformed minds, is certainly replete with

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dangerous fallacy. Provided, we are told, the effentials of religion are fecured, what are deemed the circumStantials of it are no longer confidered worthy attention. From which general premifes it is concluded, that, provided Chriftians hear the Gofpel, and become pious perfons, it is a matter of no importance on what ministry they attend. With truly pious perfons, of whatever denomination, every faithful minister of CHRIST's Church must cordially wish to be united; for true piety is that gracious quality of the human heart, which at all times challenges refpect. But it may be asked, we truft without offence, whether it can be any recommendation even of true piety, that it fhould be eccentric: or, whether true put become lefs fo than it really is, or in any degree fink in the scale of estimation, by being accompanied with a due regard to order and obedience? To us it appears, that of two fuppofed equal degrees of piety, that of the party who lives in communion with the Church is to be preferred to that of the perfon who separates from it; on the ground of his piety being accompa❤ nied with that humility, which, in conformity with the Apoftolic injunction, has preferved its poffeffor in fubmiffion to the authority appointed to rule over him. We know that the first open rebellion against eftablished order in the Jewish Church, though grounded on the holiness of the parties, was followed with the most fignal mark of the Divine difpleafure." And there is no paffage in Scripture from which it

can be concluded, that fimilar rebellion in the Christian Church, is not equally offenfive to its Divine Founder; though the crime be not attended with confequences equally prompt and decifive.

But it may be further afked of those Christians, who thus discriminate between the effentials and the circumftantials of religion, where they draw the line between what is to be regarded of effential obligation to Christians, and what is not? or by what criterion their judgment on this head is determined? Should the government of the Church be reckoned among their non-effentials, and confequently a matter of indifference, as from the practice of the day we have too much reason to conclude, we muft fay, that we are at a loss to understand, how a government that has received the fanction of Divine appointment, (" divinâ lege fundatum," fays CYPRIAN) can be feen in this light. But exclufive of this confideration, which fhould of itself, it might be supposed, preclude every feeming objection on this head; the great object which the government of the Church was defigned to fecure, proclaims the wifdom of its eftablishment. The Apoftle calls the Church "the pillar and ground of the truth:" 1 Tim. iii. 15. * Στυλος και εδραιωμα;” a pillar, and the bafis of that pillar: in other words, a pillar upon its bafis, firmly fuftaining that which was built upon it. The fimilitude is taken from ancient houfes, built on pillars placed firmly on their bafes, for the fupport of the

incumbent building. Thus the Church is confidered as a pillar erected on the bafis or foundation of JESUS CHRIST and his Apoftles; for the purpose of fuftaining and upholding the truth, which, as a fuperstructure, has been raised upon it. In conformity to this idea is the following defcription of the Church at Ephefus: "Now, then, (fays the Apoftle writing to his Ephefian disciples) ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the faints, and of the houfhold of GOD; and are built upon the foundation of the Apoftles and Prophets, JESUS CHRIST himself being the chief corner-ftone. In whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth unto an holy temple in the LORD."* "If (fays the learned HAMMOND) the truth of the Gospel had been fcattered abroad by preaching to fingle men, and thofe men never compacted together into a society, under the government of bishops or stewards, &c. fuch as Timothy was, to whom was delivered by St. Paul that aρaxalanиn, that depofitum, or body of found doctrine, 1 Tim. vi. 20, to be kept as a standard in the Church, by which all other doctrines were to be measured and judged; if, I fay, fuch a fummary of faith had not been delivered to all Christians that came in, in any place, to the Apoftles preaching; and if there had not been fome fteward to keep it; then had there wanted an eminent means to fuftain and uphold this truth of the Gofpel, thus preached Ephes, ii. 20.

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But by the gathering of fingle converted Christians into affemblies or churches, and appointing governors in those churches, and entrusting this depofitum, or form of wholefome doctrine, to their keeping, it comes to pass, that the Christian truth is fuftained and held up; and fo this house of God is affirmed to be" the pillar and basis of the truth;" or "the pillar on that divine basis by which truth is supported.

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And hence it is that St. IGNATIUS, (who, St. CHRYSOSTOM informs us, received his ordination from the hands of the Apostles themselves, and confequently must have been inftructed by them) infists fo much on the indifpenfible neceffity of communion with the bishop; because he confidered that form of doctrine depofited with, and kept by the bishop in the Church, as the only fure means to fupport and preserve the truth. And fuch, in the early days of the Church, was confidered to be that established mode of proof, by which the truth was to be effectually ascertained against heretics; namely, by tracing the form of found doctrine, through its feveral fucceffive depofitaries, the governors of the Church, up to its original Apoftolic fource. On this established principle IRENEUS built his argument against the heretics of his day. "We can reckon up (faid he) those who were by the Apostles ordained bishops in the churches, and those who were their fucceffors, even to our own time. They never taught nor knew any of the wild opinions of these men; and had the Apostles known

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