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will be great among you shall be your minister, and whomsoever among you will be the chiefest shall be servant of all."* Applied to the Apostles only, this memorable scripture is destructive of the supremacy ascribed to St. Peterapplied, as it certainly was meant to be, to the Christian ministry in general, it is equally fatal to the scheme of prelacy. Glancing at the gradations of authority in the church of Rome, and in some other churches, we should suppose the instructions of the Saviour to have been precisely the reverse of what we find them to be.

But while we look in vain to the New Testament, or to the earliest ecclesiastical writers, for the proofs of any hierarchial power to be perpetuated in the church-while indeed the proofs that do occur are of an opposite class, it is nevertheless unquestionable that before the close of the second century, a nominal precedence, which was occasionally conceded to some one presbyter, by his brother presbyters, began to acquire an official and a permanent character, It is moreover true, that as the necessary appointment of a chairman, in the smaller meetings of presbyters, served thus to create the new order of ecclesiastics, afterwards known exclusively by the name of bishops-so the appointment of a moderator, in the synods or councils which began to be convened, in certain districts, about the same period, produced the first of those dignitaries who are subsequently honoured under

* Mark x. 40, &c,

the name of metropolitans, primates, or archbishops. Nothing was Nothing was now wanting to give existence to the entire platform which was ere long completed, but the introduction of the patriarchal power, to extend itself in its turn over that of the archbishops; and that among these exalted personages, vieing as they did with the authorities nearest to the purple, there should be some one, possessing the means and the inclination, to attempt a division of the world's government with its chief ruler!

As these marvellous innovations arose from the various workings of a worldly ambition, they would naturally be attended by circumstances, and lead to results worthy of their origin. As the primitive equality of Christian pastors disappeared, much of their humility and their spirituality—matters which constituted their true dignity-passed away. Every new gradation of power admitted among them, created new jealousies, debates, and litigations; and called loudly for more splendour, and larger emolument. To speak of each other as brethren, was a mockery, as the relation thus induced, was rather that of the servant and the master, the vassal and his lord. And if the inferior clergy were found submissive, it was generally from necessity, or from the hope of being some day permitted to play the "great one" in their turn. Thus the precedence to which learning, experience, and sanctity, are ever entitled, was superseded by one, having no necessary, and rarely any actual connexion with these honourable claims to distinction.

The high places of the Christian church, were accordingly sought, as the high places of a pagan commonwealth would have been sought-the chief object of the aspirant being, to rise in the scale of opulence and power. The office of the primitive bishop, from being every where connected with a single parish, and with a single charge, and often in the humble form of co-pastorship, was to swell forth thus into the flattering importance of a diocesan jurisdiction; and the line of equality once broken, no halting place was found until the successors of fishermen were allowed to tread on the neck of Cæsars! Now it was, that whatever the world had contained "of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, or the pride of life," might be found in the church; ; and now, as a consequence, it was, that whatever of luxurious indulgence, whatever of official pride, whatever of cruelty or oppression, had at any time disgraced a secular magistracy, was equalled or surpassed by an order of men, claiming to be revered as the Christian priesthood. While the inferior clergy occupied the place, always appropriate to their order, as a sort of link between the higher and lower classes of society; bishops claimed equality with lords, and metropolitans took their place beside the sons of princes. And when cardinals began to affirm their rank to be the same with that of monarchs, it was but fitting that the pontiff himself should be announced as the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords-the head, indeed, of an empire, as far transcending all earthly rule, as eternity is more

momentous than time, and the body nothing in comparison with the soul.*

Now, could we regard these distinctions, and this opulence, as having been generously allotted to Christian ministers, from a veneration for the faith which that ministry is instituted to defend, and to propagate, we should still protest against a zeal so exercised. This we should do, because it includes a violation of the instructions left to us by the Head of the Church, and because it necessarily conduces to evils which the same authority has most solemnly condemned. But when we know that these momentous changes were

* In this rapid sketch of the progress of the hierarchy, it is the origin of bishops only that is liable to debate. That their superiors were the creations of custom or of human authority is unquestionable, and the same is true of their inferiors with the exception of the offices of priest and deacon. The former class include the archbishop, the patriarch, and the supreme pontiff; the latter the dean, sub-dean, archdeacon, and many more. The strict equality of the primitive pastors of the Church is demonstrated with much learning and acuteness by Professor Campbell, in his Lectures on Ecclesiastical History. But on this point the testimony of such men as Mosheim and Gibbon may be considered as still more unbiassed. The former observes, "That the first churches had no bishops may, I think, very clearly be proved from the writings of the New Testament." The same writer however assigns his reasons for supposing that the order so named was instituted soon after the birth of Christianity. (Commentaries on the Affairs of the Christians, I. 224-229. See also his Ecclesiastical History, I. 105.) As Gibbon remarks, "The societies (churches) which were instituted in the cities of the Roman Empire, were united only by the ties of faith and charity. Independence and equality formed the basis of their internal constitution. The public functions of religion were solely entrusted to the established ministers of the Church, bishops and presbyters, two appellations which in their origin appear to have distinguished the same office and the same order of persons."-Decline and Fall, II. 325.

the result of usurpation rather than concessionwhen we find them every where connected with a falling away from the spiritual to the worldlyand when we find that every attempt to restore the primitive order of things calls forth opposition and wrath, and every form of cruelty and oppression, we are at no loss to determine whether the advances of the papal hierarchy may be regarded as indications of apostacy or not.

We must observe, also, that the causes which thus widened the distance between the teacher and the taught, and which again distinguished the teachers so variously from each other, would necessarily lead to the destruction of popular influence in ecclesiastical affairs. It is certain, that in the primitive church, the "congregation of faithful men" composing it, was empowered to choose the persons who should be ordained to take the oversight of them in the Lord, and also to decide as an ultimate authority on every question of discipline. So generally had this practice been recognized, that in ecclesiastical history the right of the people to choose their own spiritual guides will be found to have been more slowly invaded than almost any other branch of polity. In the lapse of centuries, however, what with the encroachments of lay patronage on the one hand, and what with those of clerical power on the other, every thing like popular suffrage in church matters gradually disappeared. A few vestiges, indeed, of what was the ancient custom still remained; but they bore about the same relation to the practice of primitive times, as do certain

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