view of accommodating the word to thofe multifarious feparations from the Church, which they appear interested to fupport)" confifts not in the visible union of members in one community, but in that great unity of the members of Chrift's body, difperfed over all parts of the earth, vifibly united to communities of different perfuafions."* Now, though we do not take upon ourselves to explain, how the members of CHRIST's body, the Church, which is described as a city that is at unity in itself," can be vifibly united to "communities of different perfuafions," and ftill remain members of a community united in itself; because we have always regarded the union and divifion of the fame body as conditions impoffible, in the nature of things, to co-exist; yet we may be confidered as difcharging a part of our duty to the reader, in thus furnishing him with a fpecimen of that confufion of ideas, and mifconftruction of meaning, by which fo many fincere tho' unfufpecting Christians are continually led away from the plain unfophisticated language of their bibles, which, if fuffered to fpeak for itself, would rarely fail to preserve them found members of the Church. Impreffed by a deep and repeated attention to the principles of the prefent times, and looking almost with an eye of defpondency to that destruction of establishments, which fuch principles, if not timely counteracted, must ultimately effect, I feel myself, as

Critical Review, March 1799, on the " Guide to the Church."

a Minister of the Church, justified in bringing forward to the confideration of every serious and thinking man the important fubject of the following work.

1

In this mind, oppofing patient investigation, Chriftian firmness and, charity, to haftiness of decifion, to ignorance and flander; I have taken the ground on which a Minister of the Church of England ought to ftand; and on which, provided he be not wanting to himself, he may ever ftand firm; by defending our Ecclefiaftical government on the high ground of Apoftolical Inftitution. The language made ufe of for the purpose has been that, which I have for the most part learned from my mother, the Church; a language, which were I, in times like the present, to withhold from fear of giving offence, I fhould be unworthy the character in which I glory, that of being her dutiful fon. In ftating the authority derived from the Apostles to thofe facred perfons to whom the ministry of reconciliation has been committed, my object has been to prefs on the minds of my readers the importance of the enquiry heretofore fuggested by the judicious HOOKER: "Whether, as we are to believe for ever the articles of Evangelical Doctrine, fo the precepts of Difcipline we are not in like fort bound for ever to obferve?"

It is not, I will venture to fay, from an improper prejudice in favour of names and diftinctions, nor from a narrow notion that the affairs of CHRIST'S. kingdom may not be administered under any govern

Exli

ment different from that which has been actually eftablished, that my conclufion on this fubject has been drawn; but from the fettled conviction, that what Divine Wisdom ordains muft, in this as in every other cafe, be best calculated to promote the object which Divine Goodness has in view. It being therefore, in our judgment at least, a matter capable of demonftration, that the Apoftolic conftitution of the Church was the provision made, under the Christian difpenfation, for the preservation of true religion in the world; for this reafon it is, that we look up to the circumftantials of order and government, as they exift in the Epifcopal Church of this country, (confidered as a branch of the Catholic Church of Christ) as to means divinely appointed for the purpose of conducing to that important end. And it is to be deeply lamented, that Chriftians of the present day feem, for the most part, not to be acquainted with the fundamental conftitution of the Church, nor fufficiently to have attended to the confequences of rebellion against it, to be duly fenfible of its value. It is, however, incumbent on us to remark, what the testimony of almost three centuries has now proved; that to the Establishment of the Apoftolic conftitution of the Church in this country, we are, under Providence, indebted for the maintenance of primitive truth among us, affailed as it has been by every mode of attack, and by every diversity of fect. And it is to the poffeffion of this Establishment, provided the

Clergy of it be faithful to their important' trust, and the members of it manifeft a due regard for that Christian unity, which the Apoftles fo folemnly enjoined, that this country will be indebted for the prefervation of that character, which the general voice of Europe once conferred upon it, of being the Eye. of the Reformation; and our excellent Church continue, what at that period it was deservedly confidered to be, the glory of all churches.

My Preface might here conclude; fufficient, it is prefumed, having been faid in it to demonftrate the importance of the fubject, which it is intended to introduce. But, as there are fome words frequently employed in a perverted fenfe, which, by creating an undue impreffion on the mind, thereby prevent that fair enquiry into certain fubjects, which might ultimately establish truth; I crave indulgence, whilst I detain my reader a few moments longer.

It is common with the world to pay more attention to names than to things; and writers are never wanting to take advantage of this too general weakness, by making the language of popular impreffion their substitute for that of found reafoning and legitimate proof; a fpecious kind of writing, perfectly well fuited to the indolence of the prefent readers, who, generally speaking, have neither time, patience, nor candour of mind, fairly to examine received opinions to the bottom. In confequence of this degradation of the mental powers, fhould a Divine in these days venture

to write on profeffional fubjects; as a found member of the Church may be expected to write, he must make his account to have his character stamped with the titles of bigot and high-churchman; titles, which, whatever be their proper meaning, in the sense in which they are on fuch occafions to be taken, are certainly intended to difgrace the party to whom they are applied. But when, on turning to my dictionary, I find, that under the article bigot, I am to under ftand, on the authority of Dr. WATTS, "a man unreasonably devoted to a certain party or to certain opinions," I am at a lofs to conceive with what propriety that title can attach to a Divine, whofe opinions have been formed, not by any blind and un-, reasonable attachment to certain prejudices, but by the deliberate established judgment of the Church, of which he is a member; a judgment, which itself stands on the broad and firm ground of Scripture and primitive antiquity. And if the title of high-churchman conveys any meaning, beyond that of a decided and principled attachment to the Apoftolic government of the Church, as originally established under, the direction of the Holy Spirit by its divine Founder, (from whom alone a commiffion to minifter in holy things can properly be derived;) it is a meaning, for which thofe muft be anfwerable, who understand and maintain it; the fense annexed to that title, in my mind, containing in it nothing, but in what every found minifter of the Church of England ought to