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was still of one church, and denominated ecclesiasticæ ordinis consessus. He speaks of one order only.* The idea of the bishop was still that of a presiding presbyter, for he denominates him præsidens, antistes, and summus sacerdos; and mentions no ordination of such, but to make him a presbyter.

At no earlier a period than the first of the third century could the letters attributed to Ignatius have been written. They describe the bishop of an individual church as occupying the first seat, poxaenusπροκαθημε vou; and a presbytery of preachers, with deacons. But they discover no ordination, to remove a presbyter to the higher station of bishop. The "Apostolical Tradition," ascribed to the Hippolytus of the third century, being the same substantially with the eighth book of the supposititious "Apostolical Constitutions," represents a bishop and presbytery to have been in each particular church, and details minutely their respective investitures in office. The people, presbytery, and the neighbouring bishops, convene on a Lord's day, to set apart the person previously chosen by all the people. A bishop asks the presbytery and the people, if this is the person whom they desire for a President, ov alovlar si apxovla; and they consenting, it is again asked of his character. After the third consent, silence being made, "One of the first bishops, together with two others, standing near the altar, the rest of the bishops, and the presbyters, praying in silence, and the deacons holding the divine gospels opened, over the head of him, who is ordained, let him say to God." follows the prayer. The ordination of a presbyter is with imposition of hands, and is described in these words. "When thou, O bishop,

Then

"Differentiam inter ordinem et plebem" &c. Tertull. v. III. p. 119.

ordainest a presbyter, do you yourself put the hand upon the head, the presbytery standing near thee, and the deacons; and praying, say," &c. The prayer to consecrate the bishop, discovers, that he is to have the power of binding and loosing. The prayer, accompanied with the imposition of hands on a presbyter, expresses, that he is to edify the church by the word; and those for the deacon, deaconess, and subdeacons, which follow, speak only of service; and are also with the imposition of the hands of the bishop.

Presbyters having been from the first, ordained by imposition of hands; the appointment of one of these to preside, which was not by a second ordination, conferred on him neither a new order, nor office, and the ceremony of ordination was rightly excluded. It could not have been an omission, for it is supplied by neither Hippolytus, nor the Constitutions. It cannot be implied, as some have alleged, because the idea of imposing hands occcurs in neither, till they arrive at the Scriptural ordinations. As the bishop and presbyter was then known to be the same office, originating in one ordination, the innovation would have been offensive; also the holding the Scriptures over the head was sufficiently distinctive. The ceremony of conducting the bishop unto, and seating him on his chief seat, is minutely discribed in both; and that points us to the origin of this canonical ordination. From apostolic times some mode of designation of a presbyter to the first seat, pwloxadeopia, must have existed. That it was deemed an ordination before the third century, is supported by no proof, but excluded by the issolated condition of the individual churches, the subjugation of Christians to the Pagan establishment, the limited powers and actual services of the bishops or presidents, as well as by the in

troduction of the ordination without sat in the first annual councils, in

Asia Minor. "Every year, we, the elders and the presidents meet in one place, to dispose of the things committed to our care."* Even at Carthage, Novatus, whom Cyprian calls his co-presbyter,f ordained Felicissimus a deacon, without the permission or knowl edge of his bishop, which was neither declared void, nor immediately subjected to censure. Greg. ory Thaumaturgus, Phidimus, and Alexander, each ordained, and each had received but one ordination.§ Nor have we found prior to the Cyprianic age, the ordination of any one to be a bishop, who had been previously a presbyter.

imposition of hands. Thus although the powers of the primus presbyter had accumulated through all the second century, especially in the larger cities, it was not before the middle of the third, that the designation to such presidency over his fellow presbyters, denominated by Jerom," in gradu excelsiori collocatio," was considered as a second ordination. Then the influence of bishops, though parochial, became enlarged by consultations, and frequent communications, and the monopoly of the rite of ordination, under the pretext of preventing discordances among presbyters. Also the existence of one church only in a city, enhanced the authority of the bishops of the larger cities; where the presbyters, however numerous, constituting the presbytery of a single church, exercised their talents, except in Alexandria, under the direction of the presbytery, over which the bishop presided. The power of ordaining, and not his own commission, distinguished the parochial bishop. Had the canonical ordination commenced so early as the second century, bishops would have discovered their claims to the heritage, at a period prior to that assigned to the fact by veritable history. The division of ordinary grades into three, must have commenced with the re-ordination of presbyters to constitute them bishops; but the supposition, that this existed in the apostles' days, is not only entirely gratuitous, but perfectly chimerical. When ordinations by presbyters had been generally superseded, their original powers were not forgotten. "The elders," says Firmilian, "preside, who possess the power of baptizing, imposing the *" per singulos annos, seniores et hand, and ordaining."* They also præpositi in unum convenimus ad disponenda," &c. Ibid. + Epist. 15.

*"Ubi præsidunt majores natu, qui et baptizandi, et manum imponendi, et ordinandi possident potestatem." Cyprian, epist. 75.

Ambrose the metropolitan of Milan, Nectarius of Constantinople, Eusebius the successor of Bazil, Eucherius bishop of Lions, Cyprian of Carthage, and Philogonius bishop of Antioch, are thought to have been laymen when ordained to be bishops. Athanasius bishop of Alexandria, Cæcilianus of Carthage; Agapitus, Vigilius and Felix, bishops of Rome, and Heraclides bishop of Ephesus, were never presbyters, except as bishops, having passed from the order of deacons to that of bishops. These and such examples, accruing soon after bishops and presbyters had been established by canon law to be distinct orders, accord with the fact that there had been from the first no ordination, except of the deacon and presbyter.

Constantine could not, as a Christian, receive with the purple, the Pagan supremacy of Pontifex Maximus ; but he established, instead of idolatry, the Christian

"diaconum nec permittente me, nec sciente constituit." Epist. 52. Vide a later instance, Cassian 267.

Gregor, Nyss. 2 vol. 979. idem. 995

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church, by adopting the canons of the council of Nice as the supreme law of the Roman empire. Thus the ordinations of presbyters and deacons, according to the usages adopted in the different provinces and kingdoms, were legalized; and in imitation of the idolatrous priesthood, a metropolitan was erected over each province, and his approbation was thenceforth necessary to every ordination of a bishop, within his territories. The system of ecclesiastical government thus established, was somewhat multiform, because it had been removed from the apostolical plan in different degrees, and various particulars, in the remote provinces and countries. But subsequent councils devised numerous canons, to reduce the different customs of distant churches more nearly to a common standard. Thus ecclesiastical authority, substituted by the laws of the empire in the place of the Pagan, though at first excusable as a defence against persecution, has, by worldly policy and priestcraft, grown into a hierarchy, which at different periods has proved an engine, even surpassing the former, in violence and blood.

nothing; the order and the honor were one; the bishop imposes hands, and so does the presbyter.* Basil an aspiring metropolitan, acknowledged, that the things written by Paul to Timothy, and Titus, were spoken conjunctly to bishops and presbyters. Also his friend Gregory, who for a time was archbishop of Constantinople, "wished there had been no first seat, priority of place, or tyrannical dictatorship;" The tatorship;" showing that he esteemed the precedence adventitious. It is probable, that the peculiar disposition of Aerius, and the disappointed views of the pious bishop of Nazianzum, may have occasioned such expressions; yet were they not the less founded in truth. Chrysostom observed, † that bishops were superior to presbyters only in ordination. And Jerom asks; "what does a bishop, ordination excepted, which a presbyter does not." They both speak of ordination, as it was in their own day, resting upon custom, and can. ons, established as laws of the empire, and not of ordination, as it had been left by the apostles. The former, in his flourishes, often accommodated the Scriptures to the usages of his own day; whilst the latter, equally favourable to ecclesiastical power, but of more extensive learning, and knowledge of history, has disclosed the same view of these things, which the truth still exhibits; "that a presbyter was the same as a bishop, and that the churches were governed by a common council of presbyters, but afterwards it was decreed throughout the world, that one, chosen from the presbyters, should

The ascendency gained by the presiding presbyters in the churches, furnished, to civil and ecclesiastical policy, a ready expedient for the substitution of a Christian, in the place of the Pagan priesthood. Yet was it well known, that the ordination of the bishop and of the presbyter was originally one and the same. Hilary the deacon, observed on 1 Tim. iii, "After the bishop, he, Paul, subjoins the ordination of the deacon. Why, unless because the ordination of the bishop and presbyter is the same ?" * Aerius affirmed they differed in

*Post episcopum diaconi ordinationem subjicit. Quare, nisi quia episcopi et presbyteri una ordinatio est? Ambros. fom. iii. 272.

* ουδεν διαλλαΐζει ουτος του λον μια Jap εστιν τάξις, και μια τιμη, χειροθετει —επίσκοπος, αλλα και ο πρεσβύτερος. Epiphan. lib. iii. Vol. 1. p. 906. + Hom. 1 Tim. iii. 8. ‡Epist. 85. ad Evagrium. ·

be placed over the rest."* The evidence of these things has survived to this day; the numerous efforts to destroy it, and establish the contrary, notwithstanding. If the offices were one, they requel but one ordination.

The sum is, that when the extraordinary officers, the apostles and evangelists, passed away, they left only presbyters and deacons in the churches: the duties and powers of whom were perspicuously detailed in the New Testament. Ordinations were consequently of those two kinds only, both of which were to be performed by the pres byters of the churches respectively. Ordination communicated no gift virtue, or right; but merely desig. nated the person, as solemnly appointed to the work attached to such office in the sacred word: neither the truth nor the efficacy of the gospel, nor the validity nor utility of its ordinances, depending upon either the internal call, or the external commission. But although the ordination, which now adds the episcopal authority to the office of a presbyter, and is supposed to confer on the bishop the sole right to ordain, is merely founded on custom, and supported by ecclesi. astical canons, and imperial decrees; and not by scriptural authority; and notwithstanding the ordination of lay elders is a still more modern invention, and wholly unknown to ancient Christians, yet may salvation be obtained, and the

Idem est ergo presbyter, qui et episcopus-communi presbyterorum concilio ecclesiæ gubernabantur. Postquam vero in toto orbe decretum est, ut unus de presbyteris electus superponeretur cæteris."-Hieron. op. Tom. vi. 198. The dicretum est" he explains by "consuetudine."-p. 199. Augustine refers the superiority also to custom-" ecclesia" usus obtinuit, episcopatus pres

byteris major sit. Tom. i. Epist. ad

Hier. He also asks "Quid est enim episcopus, nisi primus presbyter?" Tom. iv. 780.

gospel faithfully preached under any form of church government. J. P. W.

To the Editor of the Christian Spectator.

I WISH to occupy a column or how far it is right for a preacher of two in your journal with the inquiry the gospel to make himself, as such, a subject of prayer in public. No man, who has the least measure of preparation of heart for the ministry of the word, will come before his fellow sinners in the discharge of that office, without earnest prayer for himself. He will pray that he may be enabled to preach so as to approve himself to his divine Master, and save those that hear him. He will do this with a deep feeling of his weakness and unworthiness, and with frequent supplication for guidance and strength from on high. My inquiry is, how far it is right to do this in the public devotions, in which all praying people are supposed to join. It has been done to a very great extent; and the pracof all preceding ages, perhaps, in tice is sanctioned by the example the religious history of New England; and, doubtless, to a much greater extent. How far it may have been consonant to the public taste, and recommended by its intrinsic propriety in former times, I will not undertake to say. But, in the plain and honest times of our fathers, the public taste was less fastidious than now, at least, it was not the same as now,-in religious things as well as in other matters. The circumstances of the preacher are changed in many particulars. For instance. it was then the practice, much more than now, to preach without full notes; and there was so much more propriety in the preacher's asking for divine assistance ;-for gracious influences on his heart, and for all

needful helps to his understanding, his memory, and his judgment,to be "enriched in all utterance and in all knowledge." But the suitableness of such petitions is less apparent when the speaker has already written down what he intends to say. They might now, indeed, have some application to the preacher, insomuch as he has also to conduct the devotions of the congregation, and does that, to some extent at least, extemporaneously. But they are still shaped with prin cipal or sole reference to the sermon, while they might, in a majority of cases, with as much propriety, be referred to the psalms and hymns selected and read to be performed by the choir.

In the times from which this usage is handed down, there were also prevalent, some undefined but extravagant and unwarranted opinions on the subject of divine impressions and interferences, amounting to something very like inspiration. Sounder views on this subject are now generally received, with which some of the forms of expression still in use are not well accordant.

With the habit of praying for divine aid, is almost necessarily, and in most cases very properly, connected declarations of our need of it, of our weakness and unworthiness. If this is done in the case under consideration, and it very commonly is, the speaker is immediately placed in a situation of great difficulty. If his confessions are not full and ample, they do not satisfy his own feelings, nor correspond with the truth of the case. If he uses strong and comprehensive expressions, he is liable to the imputation of insincerity and ostentation; and many will imagine this language is inconsistent with his general conduct and manners. And it will be well if there is not some ground for such an imputation. If Le speaks of himself at all, in this VOL. I.-No. X.

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respect, he must speak humbly; and in considering what it becomes him to say, he will be sometimes tempted to utter what he does not sufficiently feel. It is always a difficult matter to speak with delicacy and propriety in public of our own religious character, or our fitness for our duties. Especially it is so, when what is said is to be embodied in a solemn address to the Deity. I doubt not that many men, especially many young men, would find great relief in being excused from this public profession of their incompetency and their humility. If any are so weak and so wicked, as really to be pleased with thus humbling themselves before men in the expectation they shall, therefore, be exalted, it is very desirable that a stop should be put to their hypocrisy. And if the thing of which I am speaking, holds out any temptation, or furnishes any facility to this profane impertinence, and lends any countenance to this parade of humiliation, a strong motive is thus supplied for discontinuing altogether the practice of thus disparaging one's self. Such as do feel oppressed with a sense of their unworthiness, and the humbleness of their capacities-of such there are very many, and I wish there may be yet more,-such may find other more fit opportunities for speaking of it, both to God and

men.

In the Scriptures, indeed, we find the prophets and apostles using language of the deepest self-abasement. But I do not remember that they ever do it on such occasions as to furnish a warrant for the use of such language by one employed in conducting the devotions of a public assembly. There appears to be a great intrinsic impropriety in this practice. The congregation is to join in that part of the prayer, or is not. But how can an audience join in confessing the deficiencies of the speaker? or, with

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