made flesh," in sacrifice for sin. Moreover, our Lord Jesus Christ was indubitably the head of the church under her Jewish form. She was, with her whole system of worship, his property. He came unto his own.* He was in the temple, the lord of the temple, and acted as such. Now if his personal presence as the head of the church made him an order in her evangelical ministry, that same presence in the Jewish church made him one of the orders of the Jewish priesthood. Admit this, and we are troubled with an additional order in that priesthood; deny it, and we have lost one of the Christian orders. The former compels us to take four, the latter allows us but two. Scylla and Charybdis over again for the history of the three orders! Our third difficulty relates to the principle upon which, in the present case, the triple order is founded. The Layman and Cyprian, as a shoal of other writers had done before them, work up the apostles and seventy disciples into two orders of priesthood; and that their canonical number might not be wanting, they complete it by adding the Redeemer himself! Now, we had always thought, with the apostle Paul, that Christ was faithful as a son over his own house: that the church itself is the house; and that all the ministers of the church are his servants. It was really a stroke worthy of "giants in theology," * Εις τα ΙΔΙΑ ηλθε. John i. 11. to make the Lord himself one of the orders among his own servants! And seeing that his assent into heaven never stript him of any relation to his church, and that he actually exercises the priestly office at this moment before the throne of God, the consequence is, either that there are now four orders of the priesthood, or that there were but two in the days of his flesh. The same perplexity stares the hierarchy once more in the face; and if she will have three orders, neither more nor less, she must depose her master in order to make way for her bishops! Our fourth difficulty relates to the nature of the succession. Christ transmitted to the twelve, says Cyprian, "the same authority which he himself had retained during his continuance among them; and the twelve commissioned their presbyters and deacons to aid them in the administration of ecclesiastical government," and "before their death, constituted an order of ministers to whom they conveyed" their own "supreme authority." Some how or other, we have lost the seventy disciples in this arrangement. Probably they were promoted to bishopricks. However that be, the descent of "power" is very distinctly stated. Christ conveyed the same authority which he himself exercised to the apostles; and the apostles conveyed the same authority which they exercised to the order which they constituted before their death; that is, the order of bishops. So, then, the order of bishops have now the very same authority which Christ himself had when he was upon earth! But Christ was the "lord and master" of the church; so are the Bishops; and for that reason are very properly styled, in some places, Lords bishops! Christ was the proprietor of the churchso are the bishops, no doubt! Christ had authority to appoint sacraments and to mould the government of his church according to his pleasure: so have the bishops, beyond controversy! It seems, then, that they are the successours not so much of the apostles, as of the Lord Jesus Christ himself: that he is gone away to heaven, and has deputed to them in solidum, by the lump, the whole authority which he himself possessed! A fair inheritance we own; and very goodly heirs! Having established this point, we wonder that they put themselves to any further trouble in making out their title to "the pre-eminence!" There is a short cut to the resolution of every difficulty about the affairs of the church, and every thing else. Go to the bishops! Christ had unlimited authority over the conscience, and they have succeeded him. Ecclesiastical history is not barren of instances wherein they have acted up to the spirit of their trust. England can witness, that, in one day, they threw upon the mercy of the persecutor, and the comforts of famine, two thousand of the best men and the most glorious ministers of the gospel, that ever blessed a nation or adorned a church: and a great proportion of them for not submitting to impositions upon conscience for which the warrant of the divine word was not so much as pretended. But the Episcopal warrant was perfectly clear: and the Puritans were righteously deprived for not bowing to the successours of Jesus Christ! "Come set us the five mile act to music."* Let us compensate the fast of the 30th January for the martyrdom of Charles,† with the festival of St. Bartholomew's,‡ for the judgment of the Presbyterians! * An act of 17th Charles II. by which non-conformist ministers were prohibited, unless in crossing the road, to come or be, on any pretence whatever, after March 24th, 1665, within five miles of any city, town corporate, or borough that sent burgesses to parliament; or within five miles of any parish, town, or place, wherein they had, since the act of oblivion, been parson, vicar, or lecturer, &c.; or where they had preached in any conventicle. † Charles I. of tyrannical memory, was beheaded on the 30th January, 1649. He called himself, and was called by some others, a martyr. The anniversary of his martyrdom has afforded the High church clergy many fine opportunities for displaying their zeal for "the church," and mourning over her calamities. The famous "Act for the uniformity of public prayers and administration of sacraments, and other rites and ceremonies, &c., in the church of England;" which received the royal assent on the 19th May, 1662, and took effect on the 24th of August following, being St. Bartholomew's day. Assent and consent to its provisions were to be declared by that day, on pain of deprivation of their livings, if the offenders were in the ministry; and if schoolmasters or tutors, three months imprisonment and a fine of five pounds sterling. About two thousand ministers could not, with a good conscience, comply; and they were deprived accordingly. They who can persuade themselves that the Episcopal prelates enjoy the same power, which was vested in our Lord Jesus Christ, are welcome to their consolation. We are, as yet, a great ways off from the line of converts. Our fifth difficulty relates to the question, whether the twelve were really a superiour order to the seventy? We cannot perceive in the New Testament any characters of such superiority. On comparing the history of their appointment, we find their commission was the same both in form and in substance; that they had the same powers, the same instructions, the same cautions, the same support; in short, that their whole mission was the same. Let any man of common candour read the account of it in Matthew and Luke; and let him discover, if he can, any thing that bears the semblance of a superiour and inferiour order. To facilitate his inquiry we subjoin the passages alluded to The TWELVE : "Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few. Pray ye therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest. And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them power The SEVENTY : Luke x. 1-16. "After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place whither he himself would come. Therefore said he unto them, The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore, the |