world, what, individually, they either doubted or denied? These statements are extremely well fitted for circulation among men who have little acquaintance with, or have prejudices against, the Episcopal church; but they ill become men, who openly boast of their talents and learning; and they certainly are but bad specimens of "uncorrupt christianity."

The Reviewer considers it "very remarkable that in the very articles of that church which now asserts (as if it was a novelty!) this distinction of orders to be vital to its constitution, the distinction is entirely overlooked, in that part which treats of the institution of ministers to their office; so doubtful a thing was the existing organization thought to be." Now will it not be supposed, from this remark, either that the church in her public formularies has said nothing on the subject of orders, but what is contained in this article, or that the Reviewer was desirous, at least, it should be so considered? That the first is not the true case will now be shown; our readers will form their own opinion as to the last. The thirty-sixth article of the church says"The book of consecration of bishops, and ordering of priests and deacons, set forth by the General Convention of this church in 1792, doth contain all things necessary to such consecration and ordering; neither hath it any thing that of itself is superstitious and ungodly; and therefore whosoever are consecrated or ordered according to said form, we decree all such to be rightly, orderly and lawfully consecrated, and ordered.”*

* The 36th Article of the Church of England, from which the American is taken with such modifications as were rendered ne

From the ordinal, we have already given somé extracts which relate to this point, and we now give another ;→→→→ "To the intent that these orders may be continued, and reverently used and esteemed in this church, no man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful bishop, priest, or deacon in this church, or suffered to execute any of the said functions, except he be called, tried, examined, and admitted thereunto, according to the form hereafter following; or hath had Episcopal consecration or ordination." Preface. The twenty-third article, to which the Reviewer refers, simply declares, as will be apparent to those who peruse it, that no man ought to take on himself the ministry; on the contrary, those ought to be received as such who are appointed by men having authority therefor. Who has that authority? How are we to know when men are lawfully sent ?

cessary by the change of our political condition, runs thus :-"The Book of Consecration of [Archbishops and] Bishops, and ordering of priests and deacons, [lately] set forth [in the time of Edward the sixth, and confirmed at the same time by authority of Parliament] doth contain, &c.

"And therefore whosoever are consecrated [and] ordered ac cording to [the rites of that book since the second year of the aforenamed king Edward unto this time, or hereafter shall be consecrated or ordered according to the same rites,] we decree, &c.

We have subjoined the English Article, including in brackets the parts altered or omitted in ours, in order to give the Reviewer's argument all the force it can receive. Not even the Reviewer will suppose that the American Episcopal Church intended to overlook the distinction of orders, as a doubtful organization. His whole argument therefore rests upon the supposed inten tion of the original framers of the Articles, or of the Convocation in 1562.

When they are consecrated bishops, and ordained priests, or deacons,-according to the ordinal,-says the thirty-sixth article: and till that is done, or they have had Episcopal ordination, says the preface to the ordinal,-they shall not be suffered to execute the functions of the ministry in this church. Will it be said, that if this is the doctrine of the church it ought to be stated fully in the twenty-third, or any other article? Where is the necessity for this? Is not the ordi nal substantially a part of the thirty-sixth? Or is it not as fully the doctrine of the church? The Reviewer, however, would have it supposed that the church is studiously indistinct on this point, and yet, when the odious sin of Calvinism is to be fixed upon her, in defiance of the opinions of multitudes of her learned divines, oh then! her language is "studied precision,"

and if this is disallowed," it will be difficult to prove any thing by human testimony." How abundant is that liberality, which finds us forever in the wrong; which charges us "with shutting our eyes upon whatever learning and piety may do to illustrate certain obscurities in the religious system," and which will not allow us even to understand the principles to which we have solemnly promised to conform, but would hold uș up to the world as blind leaders of the blind,-as dẹ ceiving and being deceived.

The Reviewer in his zeal against Episcopacy forgets his prudence. He tells us on one page, that the divine right was first started by Bancroft in 1588, and yet on the next he quotes Henderson as saying in the name of the clergy of Britain, in 1646, fifty-eight years later, that it was not pleaded till of late by some few,"

Henderson,-if we are not mistaken,-was a presbyterian minister of Scotland, and utterly destitute, as we believe, of any authority to speak in the name of the clergy of Britain. Hume calls him a popular and intriguing preacher. He was one of the commissioners sent up from Scotland to Charles I. at Oxford, to press him to an admission of their principles. At this time he cautiously shunned a conference with the divines of Oxford on this same point.* Besides, the assertion does not appear to be true. We have shown that the reformers themselves held the doctrine, though, perhaps they did not publickly "plead" or defend it. In that same year (1646)—that MEMORABLE year—" the hierarchy," says the Reviewer,-" was abolished by act of Parliament, the same authority by which it is now upheld."-Here we must lay down our pen, and pause to recover our abused patience.

Is it for the purpose not merely of exciting against the church, the opposition of principle, but to render it odious, he so constantly exhibits to his readers the calumny that its ministry was, and is actually founded on the government of England ?-that he labours at every possible opportunity to show its dependence upon that government? Is his mind too dull to discriminate between the things which are Cæsar's, and the things which are God's? When he says "the hierarchy was abolished by act of Parliament," does he mean that the Parliament took away the spiritual power of the bishops?—that it took away from them their inherent right to ordain and govern in the church? He certain

*

Hume's History of England, Balt. ed. vol. vi. p. 38.

ly must know, that the Parliament never had, and never pretended to have, any such power; of course, that they never exercised, or pretended to exercise, such power; except, perhaps, when the "godly" and "well-affected" Independents formed its majority. The only power which it possessed, and from the nature of the case, the only power which it could possess, was that of depriving the bishops of their revenues, and of their temporal jurisdiction. That is, they threatened them with the power of the secular arm, (no trifling menace, when we consider what spirit nerved it,) if they dared to exercise it. But does the Reviewer believe that if the General Court of Massachusetts-(we allude not now to what has been should abolish Episcopacy from the state, and prohibit its ministers from officiating, that they would thereby be deprived of their ministerial character? The case is applicable, and if he does not see it so, it is from his habit of thinking that spiritual power is derived from the people, and not from Christ. Does he believe that either the English parliament, or the English church, deny the validity of the orders of the American bishops, and their ability to exercise the authority of those orders? And yet what have those bishops to do with the English parliament, church, or king? Has the Reviewer never heard of the Episcopal church of Scotland? Is he ignorant that though the bishops of that church, were, at the Revolution, deprived of every thing connected with their office, which the civil power could take from them, yet they continued to exercise their spiritual functions in the very face of penal laws made against them, in consequence of their adherence to the fallen house of Stuart ? "They