the consent of the bishops, it may be looked on as valid, and those presbyters remain in their office in the church." So that by the consent, ex post facto, of the true bishops, those presbyters, thus ordained, were looked on as lawful presbyters, which could not be, unless their ordainers had an intrinsical power of ordination, which was only restrained by the laws of the church, for if they have no power of ordination, it is impossible they should confer anything by their ordination. If to this it be answered, that the validity of their ordination did depend upon the consent of the bishops, and that presbyters may ordain, if delegated thereto by bishops, as Paulinus might ordain on that account at Antioch; it is easily answered, that this very power of doing it by delegation, doth imply an intrinsical power in themselves of doing it. For if presbyters be forbidden ordaining others by Scripture, then they can neither do it in their own persons, nor by delegation from others. And if presbyters have power of conferring nothing by their ordination, how can an after consent of bishops make that act of theirs valid, for conferring right and power by it?" * 66 The Synod of Ancyra decreed, canon 13: It is not lawful for chorepiscopi to ordain presbyters or deacons; nor for the presbyters of the city, in another parish, without the bishop's letter." This shows that city presbyters might ordain anywhere, with the bishop's licence; and in their own parish, perhaps, without it. Having shown that anciently it was not disputed but that presbyters had a right to ordain, it will be proper to give some examples of their making bishops. But before I do this, I wish to make one observation. If the validity of presbyterian ordination be admitted, the dissenters cannot be out of the succession, suppose the clergy be in it. Wesley and Whitfield, the founders of two considerable sects, were both presbyters of the church of England; the founders of most of the other sects were either puritan or noncon*Irenicum, chap. vii., p. 380, 381. formist clergymen who left the establishment; and among them all the succession has been perpetuated. The presbyters of the church of Alexandria, according to Jerom, exercised the privilege of ordaining their own bishops, from the death of the evangelist Mark, to the time of Dionysius, a period of nearly two hundred years. Eutychius, patriarch of Alexandria, expressly affirms, "That the twelve presbyters, constituted by Mark, upon the vacancy of the see, did choose out of their number one to be head over the rest, and the other eleven did lay their hands upon him, and blessed him, and made him patriarch." It is scarcely credible that these presbyters would have had the temerity to make a bishop, had they not received instructions to that effect from Mark, previous to his decease. The apostle John is supposed to have lived about thirty-five years after the death of this evangelist. Mr. Baxter makes a pertinent obser vation upon this case: "Now I would leave it," says he," to any man's impartial consideration, whether it be credible that the holy apostles, and all the evangelists or assistants of them, then alive, would have suffered this innovation and corruption in the church, without a plain disowning it and reproving it? Would they silently see their newly established order violated in their own days, and not so much as tell the churches of the sin and danger? Or, if they had indeed done this, would none regard it, nor remember it, so much as to resist the sin? These things are incredible." + Here then we have an example of presbyters making a bishop, in the days of the apostles, and in an orthodox church, to be the immediate successor of an inspired evangelist. As these presbyters had been for years under the pupilage of Mark, they acted most probably, in this instance, in obedience to his commands; for it cannot be supposed that he would neglect to give them full directions in an affair of such * Stillingfleet's Iren., chap. vi., p. 273, 274. + Baxter's Disputat., p. 134. vast importance as the appointment of his successor. This example would no doubt be extensively influential; and the frequency of presbyterian ordination in the primitive churches must involve the episcopal succession in inextricable difficulties. If it were possible to trace the present race of bishops up to their originals, it would turn out, I believe, in most instances, that they are derived from presbyters. "If we believe Philostorgius," says Stillingfleet, "the Gothic churches were planted and governed by presbyters for above seventy years. And great probability there is, that where churches were planted by presbyters, as the church of France by Andochius and Inignus, that afterwards, upon the increase of churches and presbyters to rule them, they did from among themselves choose one to be as the bishop over them, as Photinus was at Lyons. For we nowhere read, in those first plantations of churches, that where there were presbyters already, they sent to other churches to derive episcopal ordination from them.”* There is very strong evidence that our English bishops, in particular, are derived from presbyters of the church of Scotland. From the time of their conversion in the year 263, to the coming of Palladius in the year 430, the Scotch were governed by presbyters (called Culdees) and monks. Bishops were never much in vogue with our northern neighbours. Austin revived their dying episcopacy; but it became extinct in about a century afterwards. "Mr. Jones has undertaken to prove at large, that the ordination of our English bishops cannot be traced up to the church of Rome as its original; that in the year 668, the successors of Austin, the monk, who came over A.D. 596, being almost entirely extinct, by far the greatest part of the bishops were of Scottish ordination, by Aidan and Finan, who came out of the Culdee monastery of Columbanus, and were no more than presbyters; though, when the princes of the northern nations were converted by them, they made them bishops; that is, gave them authority over the clergy, and took other bishops from among their converts. So that, denying the validity of presbyterian ordination, shakes the foundation of the episcopal church of England."* If we try to trace the succession downwards, we are surrounded with difficulties, at the very beginning. It must first be proved that Peter visited Rome, and then that he acted as bishop there, which is no easy task. But when we have fairly seated him on the episcopal throne of the imperial city, I am afraid we must stop short. successor. The learned are not agreed who was his immediate "Some," says Bingham, "reckon Linus first, then Anacletus, then Clemens; others begin with Clemens, and reckon him the first in order from St. Peter." † Stillingfleet observes, that the Romish succession "is as muddy as the Tyber itself. For here," says he, "Tertullian, Ruffinus, and several others, place Clement next to Peter. Ireneus and Eusebius set Anacletus before him; Epiphanius and Optatus, both Anacletus and Cletus; Augustinus and Damasus, with others, make Anacletus, Cletus, and Linus, all to precede him. What way shall we find to extricate ourselves out of the labyrinth, so as to reconcile it with the certainty of the form of government in the apostles' times? Certainly, if the line of succession fail us here, where we most need it, we have little cause to pin our faith upon it, as to the certainty of any particular form of church government settled in the apostles' times, which can be drawn from the help of the records of the primitive church, which must be first cleared of all defectiveness, ambiguity, partiality, and confusion, before the thing we inquire for, can be extracted out of them." + * Doddridge's Lect. on Div. Lect., 197. Iren., p. ii., ch. vi., p. 322. E The same writer remarks: " In none of the churches most spoken of, is the succession so clear as is necessary. For at Jerusalem, it seems somewhat strange, how fifteen bishops of the circumcision should be crowded into so narrow a room as they are, so that many of them could not have above two years to rule in the church. And it would bear an inquiry, where the seat of the bishops of Jerusalem was, from the time of the destruction of the city by Titus, (when the walls were laid even with the ground by Musonius,) till the time of Adrian; for till that time, the succession of the bishops of the circumcision continues. For Antioch, it is far from being agreed, whether Evodius or Ignatius succeeded Peter or Paul, or the one Peter and the other Paul. At Alexandria, where the succession runs clearest, the original of the power is imputed to the choice of presbyters, and to no divine institution. But at Ephesus, the succession of bishops from Timothy, is pleaded with the greatest confidence, and the testimony brought for it is from Leontius, bishop of Magnesia, in the council of Chalcedon, who says, 'From Timothy to this day, there hath been a succession of seven and twenty bishops, all of them ordained in Ephesus.' Two members of the council proved, however, that several of the bishops of Ephesus were not ordained in that city; and my author goes on to remark upon it, that "if he were out in his allegation, no wonder if he were deceived in his tradition. If then, the certainty of succession relies upon the credit of this Leontius, let them thank the council of Chalcedon, who have sufficiently blasted it, by determining the cause against him in the main evidence produced by him. So much to show how far the clearest evidence for succession of bishops, from apostolical times, is from being convincing to any rational man.' The truth of the matter appears to be this: When bishops lost the humble, unassuming spirit of their divine Master, and began to thirst for power and domi Iren., p. ii., ch. vi., p. 301-303. |