XXIII

THE CHURCH, AS TO EARTHLY RULE, A REPUBLIC, AND NOT A MONARCHY.

Observation of distinguished Civilians. Inseparable connection between doctrine and the genius of government. Prelacy incompatible with Christ's injunctions. Claim of Bishops to be irresponsible sovereigns. Republican principles recognized by the Apostles. Popular elections. Mistake with regard to the word Ordain.

Ir is remarkable how men of comprehensive views, and free from sectarian bias, have agreed with regard to THE REPUBLICANISM OF CHRISTIANITY. "Christianity," says Montesquieu, “is a stranger to despotic power." "The religion," says De Tocqueville, "which declares that all are equal in the sight of God, will not refuse to acknowledge that all citizens are equal in the eye of the law. Religion is the companion of liberty in all its battles and all its conflicts; the cradle of its infancy and the divine source of its claims." "The friends of liberty in France are accustomed to speak in enthusiastic commendation of the Republicanism of the Scriptures." The Abbé de la Mennais, acknowledged as one of the most powerful minds in Europe, little as he regards Christianity as a revelation from God, familiarly speaks of its Author as "The Great Republican." Our own De Witt Clinton said, "Christianity, in its essence, its doctrines, and its forms, is republican."*

In the view of Christianity all men are " of one blood." Christianity extends its laws over the rich and over the poor, the peasant and the prince, the bondman and the free alike. In its doctrines, its demands, and its eternal retributions, it is a leveller like the grave. There is one way of salvation for the Apostle and the publican. The most exalted in the Church is only "as he that doth serve;" he has no prerogative to come with any Priestly intervention" between the merest beggar and the Throne; the merest beggar may come and must come before the mercy seat for himself. So surely do these doctrines tend to republicanism, and to break up all spiritual despotisms, that no

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*These citations are from Dr. Spring's " Obligations of the World to the Bible."

Hierarchy, Protestant or Romish, dares hold fearlessly to the Bible alone as the rule of faith, and to the doctrine of justification by faith alone, to the renunciation of all priestly interventions for the forgiveness of sins. The sure tendency of Prelacy is through Puseyism to Popery: so essentially and inseparably are the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel connected, in the long run and on a broad scale, with the genius of the government adopted in the Church. Give people the Bible alone for their rule, and justification by faith alone, and they will neutralize or cast off the Hierarchy. Impose upon them the dogmas of priestly interventions through a successional priesthood, and they cannot remain free. If any one imagines this to be mere theory, we fearlessly challenge him to point us to any facts that contradict it in the whole history of Christianity. Low CHURCH AND EVANGELICAL DOCTRINE GO TOGETHER. HIGH CHURCH STANDS ASSOCIATED WITH PUSEYISM Or Popery the WORLD OVER; thus it has been, is now, and ever must be, till causes shall be disjoined from their effects, and the world turn once more to chaos.

The tendency of the true Gospel principles is to bring the most absolute despotism under the limits of law; to imbue limited monarchies more and more with the spirit of popular institutions; to prepare the people to govern themselves; and finally to establish everywhere the spirit and the reality, if not the very forms of a republic.

The great founder of Christianity seemed to have in view this elevation and ultimate freedom of the whole race, when he enjoined it upon his disciples to "call no man master;" thus binding the conscience to God's throne, and setting it free from all human domination. The great design seems to be, like that of Eden, to exalt and discipline the individual soul, and to prepare it for citizenship in God's free, but holy and everlasting kingdom. In the same manner he left his worship simple and free; forbidding all his disciples to judge their brethren in "meats" or "days" and by parity of reason, forbidding them to judge each other, in rites and forms; and forbidding all alike to be subject, in such matters, to the ordinances and commandments of men. In the same manner, pointing to "Lordship," and nobility, among the nations, he said to his Church, "It shall not be so among you." He carefully laid down such rules of discipline, as leave the authority in the hands of the Church; thus making it a republic. And surely, if any one maintains that a brotherhood of Christians, under the few simple rules, and for the simple ends of Church government, are imcompetent to govern themselves, he ought for ever to abandon the idea, that the indiscriminate people, of an extended state, with all the complication of interests and laws which come under the purview of civil gov

ernment, will ever be competent to manage the concerns of a republican government. If Christ's people, few and simple as are the ends of Church government, are not competent to govern themselves in Church estate, then the very idea of republican government ought to be abandoned in all the earth.

But the very elements of popular rights in the discipline and government of the Church, Prelacy has taken quite away.*

She has subverted the very genius and spirit of the polity of the Christian Church; making it a MONARCHY instead of a REPUBLIC. There are indeed some popular elements interwoven

* Is it the genius of Prelacy to invert all the fundamentals of Church polity laid down in the Word of God? Christ gathers only professed and apparent believers into his Church. Prelacy gathers her Churches in indiscriminate masses, by parishes and nations; thus confounding the Church and the world. Christ enjoins the duty of private judgment; Prelacy denies even the right. Christ enjoins us to call no man master, but to search the Scriptures; Prelacy denies that the Bible alone is a safe or sufficient guide; it binds us to the traditions and interpretations of men. Christ forbids his disciples to be brought under the yoke of bondage, by subjecting themselves to the ordinances and commandments of men; Prelacy frames her canons, prescribes her ceremonies, garments, and postures; issues her ordinances, and if any man will not be subject to these, he shall have no part nor lot in the Church. Christ says, "Tell it to the Church." No, says Prelacy, "Tell it to the Bishop." Christ bids us depart from an apostle or an angel from Heaven when they preach another Gospel; Prelacy forbids us to depart from the Bishop, though he be a limb of Antichrist; nay, she draws her life-blood from such a succession, and counts it her virtue and her glory. Christ is jealous over his people, and fears "lest by any means, as the Serpent beguiled Eve," so their minds should be "corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." Christ's Gospel is jealous over them who are tempted to rely on forms, and holy days; "I am afraid of you; you observe days, and months, and times, and years;" Prelacy disfigures the whole calendar with Saints' days, Angels' days, Lent, Ember days, and other arrangements of "voluntary will worship;" she prepares her forms, and canons, and rituals, and robes, and thinks the simplicity that is in Christ, too simple and bald; and betters it much, she supposes, by ceremonials and observances of her own devising.

Suppose a company of the primitive disciples could come back, and by some means stumble upon the LITURGY of the Episcopal Church; turning over its pages they read such titles as these: "The Circumcision," "Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, "Fourth Sunday in Advent," Septuagesima Sunday," Fifth Sunday in Lent," Monday before Easter," "Good Friday," "Easter Even," " Tuesday in Baster week," Whitsunday," "Trinity Sunday," "St. Stephen's day," "The Innocents' day," "Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary," "St. Peter's day," "ST. MICHAEL AND ALL ANGELS," "'" St. Simon and St. Jude," "All Saints' day," and so on, and so on.

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What a strange spectacle would all this be to these old disciples! Well might they inquire, "What does this mean? Where, in the name of wonder, did you get all these? Lent, Saints' days, Angels' days?" Why, this is what Paul meant when he said to some of our neighbors of old, "I am afraid of you; you observe days, and seasons, and months, and years." Who could wonder, if these ancient disciples, reading here about "St. Michael's day, and all angels," should call for the old epistle which they used to hear read at Colosse; and laying their finger on the 16th verse should read thus: "Let no man, therefore, judge you in meat or drink, or in respect of a holy day," "Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels!" "Wherefore, if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as living in the world, are ye SUBJECT TO ORDI NANCES, * * after the COMMANDMENTS OF MEN, (touch not, taste not, handle not), Which things have indeed a show of wisdom, in will-worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body, not in any honor, to the satisfying of the flesh." How strange, too, it would appear to these ancient Christians, to turn to the table in the front of the Prayer-Book, and see the "Church" gravely giving out "Lesfrom the APOCRYPHA, to be read as portions of the Word of God.

sons

into the organization both of the state and general conventions in this country; but they are unlike the same system anywhere else in the world, and inconsistent with its fundamental principles. They arose from the necessity of making the system, in some degree, conformable to the popular sentiments and institutions of the American people; and they were unwillingly adopted by the staunch Prelatists of the day.

The Prelatical principles are truly set forth by Mr. Chapin in his recent work on the Primitive Church. Whoever will consult that work (which, in Connecticut at least, is regarded as a standard work on Episcopacy), will find (p. 175) that he gives to Bishops "exclusively," "the power to judge in the Church." (p. 175, and p. 32.) He makes them not only Christ's ministers but Christ's "representatives" (p. 33), maintaining that Christ has "made over, or committed to them, as by devise or bequest, the kingdom which the Father had appointed or committed to him," "that they might sit on thrones," *** “judging (in a judicial sense) ** the Church." (pp. 173, 174.) All this he builds upon what he calls the Apostolic commission (in the sense of commission to the rank and office of Apostle), viz. " As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you." A plain Christian would find here no commission to an official rank, but a commission to execute an important work, to act as Christ's servants, to carry his Gospel, and proclaim his grace. But in the transforming hands of Prelacy, this rises into a Prelatical commission, creating an order of viceroys and vicegerents! Our author argues at length that the even so" refers (not to the sending) but to the official rank and headship of Christ; that the Bishops are vested with the RANK and PREROGATIVES WHICH CHRIST HELD as head and sovereign of the Church! This he draws out into formal particulars of "powers granted in this commission." 1. Of preaching. 2. Of baptizing. 3. The power" of admitting to, or rejecting from the Church." 4. Of ordaining. 5. Of kingly authority like that of Christ. 6. (In his own words), "CHRIST had power to forgive sins, and he gave authority to his Apostles to absolve and remit the sins of repenting sinners." 7. Sovereign power of judging the Church, in a judicial sense. The sum of the whole view is, THAT WHATEVER POWER, PREROGATIVE, OR SOVEREIGNTY, CHRIST HAD OVER THE CHURCH, HE TRANSFERRED IT, DEVISED IT, MADE IT OVER BY BEQUEST, CONFERRED IT BY COMMISSION, upon the Apostles; and that sovereignty the Bishops NOW HOLD. The EVEN SO send I you," he holds, conveys all. "The commission as it here reads," says he (p. 171), "is one of the most important things of which we can conceive, yet the rule of construction furnished by the Scriptures, tends rather to enlarge than to limit the powers granted in it." Surely if ever the Pope claimed

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more than this, or made himself more the "Vicar and Vicegerent of Jesus Christ," than is here claimed for a Protestant Diocesan Bishop, I know not where to find that more extravagant claim. Surely our Diocesans are not chargeable with making claims too modest or moderate!

Thus, the Church is made no more a republic, but a sovereignty, tied to an exclusive and indefeasible succession. The world has recently seen how these claims are carried out in practice. Bishop Onderdonk of New York claims as Bishop, sovereign and divine right to control and overrule the action of a deliberative assembly, whose whole constitution and organization and functions are a matter of conventual arrangement. By virtue of this divine right he shouts, "Sit down, sir; not a word, sir;" and the assembly reverently obey their master! Sixty clergymen go in procession to congratulate him and to thank him for his manful vindication of his divine prerogatives; and then kneel down and receive his Apostolical benediction in return! In his address to his convention, every inch a Bishop, he denies that the clergy, and pre-eminently that the Bishop, owes "any responsibility to the Church as a body." In the Church, he maintains that "Responsibility ** unlike that of human organizations, is toward concentration, not diffusion." "Power and prerogative in the Church came from Christ to the first order in the ministry; THENCE to the lower orders, and to the brethren and laity of the Church. As the last gave no power nor prerogative, it is difficult to conceive how they can demand responsibility to them as a right."**"The primary powers of the Church, then, are not diffused, but concentrated; they are NOT IN THE MEMBERS, but the HEAD.' This is not merely the statement of Prelatical principles, by the head of the first Diocese in these United States; but it is a correct statement of the principle, held and avowed by the universal Prelacy of the world. That is, The Church is no republic, but a monarchy; a monarchy not of the people, nor by the people, but of Divine right, indefeasible, and with no responsibility to the people; but only a mutual responsibility of the several sovereigns of the "one body," to the sovereigns in

conclave.

"A popular election to the ministry," says the Bishop of Connecticut, "derives not the least support from the Scriptures. * * There is no other Scriptural foundation for the sacred ministry, than that which is contained in the divine commission of the Apostles. From them the authority is derived through the succession of Apostolic Bishops down to the present time."

From these dreary principles of spiritual despotism let us turn once more to the republican features of the churches organized by the Apostles. These churches had officers, which were to be