the Church of England, as now by law established is used, unless he shall have been lawfully ordained by some Bishop of the Church of England or of Ireland."

The Episcopal Clergy in Scotland object to this enactment on two grounds. They complain that they are thereby placed in a state of involuntary schism, inasmuch as they are prevented from holding communion with a Church of which they are an integral part, whether viewed on the broad grounds of Christian Institution which confers Catholicity on every regularly constituted portion of Christ's family, or regarded on the narrower principle of historical relation and affinity. The Episcopal Church in Scotland derived her orders and spiritual character from the English establishment, and cannot therefore be separated from the latter but by a species of violence equally unnatural and inconsistent with the spirit of the Gospel. By the Act of 1792, there was an actual schism created in Great Britain; for, by the provisions of that law, a large body of Christians, having one spiritual authority, one creed, one discipline, one ritual and mode of worship, one faith, one hope and one baptism, was separated into two parties so completely, that the Clergy of the one are not allowed to perform any ministerial duties in the Churches of the other. Such a measure makes the unity of the Church of Christ depend, not on having the same faith, the same apostolical power, the same worship and the same sacraments, but on the accidental circumstance of its being placed on the same side of a river, or under the same parallel of latitude. The "Holy Church throughout all the world" is cut down into an unlimited number of schismatical sections; incapable of holding communion with one another; disregarding the spiritual bond by which their Divine Founder united all his faithful followers; and looking for the warrant and sanction of their ministrations, not to the commission which was given to the Apostles, but to the secular legislation of a promiscuous body of laymen.

On this ground we are laid open to the jeers and arguments of the Roman Catholic, who takes pleasure in representing the most distinguished of the Protestant Churches as having no better a foundation than an Act of Parliament, and as bounding the Communion of Saints by the provisions of the statute book.

The Episcopalians in the North farther maintain, that the evils against which the legislature meant to guard the Church of England, would have been sufficiently obviated by enacting that no Clergyman, ordained by a Scottish Bishop, should be permitted to undertake a Cure, or discharge his ministerial duties, in any Church or Chapel south of the Tweed, until he had submitted to such an examination as would satisfy the Ordinary of the district that he was fully qualified in respect of learning, character, and orthodoxy. It is unquestionably proper that some such check should be opposed to the migration of Clergy from one Church into another, especially when placed in circumstances so very different as are those of our Establishment, as compared with the depressed condition of our brethren in Scotland.

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It is not denied, on any head, that there was an inconvenience likely to arise from the full toleration extended to Episcopacy in the northern division of the island; but it is asserted, that an ample remedy might have been secured without going all the length of creating a schism in the spiritual body of Christ, and without attacking the validity of Orders regularly and canonically conferred.

That the Church of England herself is essentially and exclusively Episcopal, and that no man can be accounted or taken to be a lawful Bishop, Priest, or Deacon in that Church, or suffered to execute any of the said functions, except he have had Episcopal consecration or ordination,' has always been the law of England, both civil and ecclesiastical, from the establishment of the Reformation. Nor was it till very lately that Holy Orders, wherever conferred by a Canonically Consecrated Bishop, were ever called in question or disallowed within this realm. That such Orders were perfectly valid, was certainly the doctrine of the Church of England in the reign of Queen Anne, as it was unquestionably the doctrine of the Primitive Church in all parts of the Christian world: and if it be not true doctrine, a reasonable doubt may be entertained, whether there be at the present moment a regularly ordained clergyman on the face of the earth.

The first part of the clause quoted from the Bill, as it merely res pects the taking of a Benefice, Curacy, or other spiritual promotion, does not, indeed, throw any imputation on Orders conferred by a Scottish Bishop; for as the establishment and temporal emoluments of the Church of England are derived from the State, the Legislature has an undoubted right to determine who, and who alone, are capable of enjoying those privileges: but the latter part of the clause does most assuredly appear to affect the spiritual character of the Clergy, which, if it be any thing at all, is undoubtedly something which, as it was not conferred by the State, cannot be taken away by a vote of either House of Parliament. If a Clergyman, ordained by a Scottish Bishop, cannot be admitted to officiate as a Clergyman in the Church of England, it follows, that no Scottish Bishop, Priest, or Deacon, can be admitted to more than lay-communion in that Church; but is it not obvious that, when two Churches stand in such a relative to one another, that the Clergy of the one are treated as mere Laymen in the other, the one of the two Churches must be in a state of schism? And is it not true that in the days of St. Cyprian, every Christian Society whether large or small, which was in a state of schism, was regarded as entirely severed from the One Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church? We must admit, therefore, that a very unseemly predica ment has been created by the Act in question; and that to avoid an imaginary evil, which might possibly have carried with it a suitable antidote and compensation, we have fallen into a real one, for which it is not easy now to discover either an apology or a remedy.

Prior to the enactment of 1792, the Episcopal Clergy of Scotland were admissible into the Church of England, capable of discharging all professional duties within her pale, and even of holding preferment, on

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the same footing as her indigenous ministers. The number who availed themselves of this privilege was not indeed at any time considerable; for the want of interest in the South, and the disadvantage of a provincial accent could not fail to prove a bar to the advancement of a Clergyman, born and educated in Scotland. Still there was no brand affixed to their Church, or to their spiritual character as ministers of Christ; and whenever they had occasion to cross the Tweed and come amongst us, they found themselves received as Clergymen, and unimpeded by all disqualifications, civil or ecclesiastical. It therefore appears somewhat doubtful, whether the Act which repealed the penal laws did or did not confer a boon on the Episcopal Clergy of the North; for though it gave them security against fine and imprisonment, which the spirit of the age was no longer disposed to inflict, it loaded them with a species of disability more painful to a sound Churchman, than the loss of goods, or even of personal liberty when sustained in agood cause.

It appears, from a work written expressly on this subject *, that during the pending of the Bill, none of the friends of the Episcopal Clergy in Scotland considered any part of this restraining clause as militating against Orders granted by a Scottish Bishop. One of the speakers is there represented as comparing the validity of such Orders with that of Orders conferred by a Popish Bishop, resident in Great Britain or Ireland, which no man ever called in question, though Orders granted by a Romish Bishop in England are not considered as legal, -whilst orders granted by a Foreign Popish Bishop, are not, and cannot be refused. The reason of this distinction, is there said to be the peculiar relation in which the Church of England stands to the King as its head, without whose order no Bishop in that part of the kingdom can be legally consecrated.

But this reason is not regarded as either applicable or conclusive. In Roman Catholic countries abroad, our King is certainly not the head of the Church: nor is the temporal sovereign of any Roman Ca tholic kingdom considered as the head of the Church established in his country, in the same sense as that in which the King of Great Britain is considered as the head of the United Church of England and Ireland. We cannot, therefore, perceive the slightest foundation for this distinction between Orders granted by Popish Bishops consecrated in foreign countries, and Orders granted by Popish Bishops consecrated in Great Britain and Ireland. All such Bishops have been consecrated, not in virtue of the mandates of their civil sovereigns, but by the bulls of the Pope; and if a Clergyman ordained by a Foreign Catholic Bishop is, on his renunciation of the errors of Popery, admissible to a benefice in the Church of England, why, in the name of common sense, should not a Clergyman, ordained by a Roman Catholic Bishop consecrated at home, be admitted to the same privileges on re nouncing the same errors,―among which, surely, is the usurped supre

*See Annals of Scottish Episcopacy, by the Rev. John Skinner.

macy of the Pope over Churches beyond the limits of the Ecclesiastical States? Besides, we would ask, what civil sovereign, before the conversion of Constantine, ever issued his mandate for the Consecration of any Bishop? And if the Bishops, with their Clergy, who had all been persecuted, under the reign of Paganism, were taken by Constantine under the Imperial protection, on giving him sufficient security for their allegiance, why may not the Scottish Episcopal Clergy be rendered capable, at least of officiating in the Church of England, especially as at their ordinations, they all now regularly take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, and we doubt not, are ready in the promotion of their Bishops, to allow to the sovereign that veto which was refused by the Irish Roman Catholics, on whom Statesmen of all parties appear so desirous to confer all the privileges of British subjects?

If there be any just ground for complaint in regard to the theoretical views of Government and Religion, on which the bill of 1792 was founded, there is, we are sorry to find, a still greater cause for dissatisfaction in the practical state of things which has resulted from its operation. While the Scottish Episcopal Clergy are excluded from this part of the kingdom, their little Church is open to the inroad of competitors from every Diocese of England and Ireland; and it is found in fact that, whenever a charge falls vacant in any of the large towns north of the Tweed, the legitimate claims of the native pastors, are almost constantly opposed by a number of candidates from the south or west.

Another grievance, which adds not a little to the practical evils ori ginating in the repeal of the penal laws, presents itself in the great facility, with which, it is said, Presbyterian. Ministers are admitted into the Church of England, while men of Episcopal education, principles, and predilections, are most rigorously prohibited from entering a place of worship in the south, in the character of Clergymen.

Our brethren on the other side of the border, blame our facility and condemn our inconsistency. They accuse us of receiving men whose opinions and feelings are hostile to our interests, while we exclude those whose hearts are with us, who are conscientious in supporting our principles, and who have long suffered, and still continue to suffer, many disabilities, because they will not abandon them. They say that we shut out the men who are our own flesh and bone, who boast that they are a part of our spiritual body, and take pride in their affinity to us as fathers and brethren-men who revere our Constitution, partake in our Apostolical commission, use our Liturgy, subscribe our Articles, wear our vestments, and, in short, are in all things as we are, except that they are not established-and in the mean time, that we take into our bosom persons who, as churchmen, have hardly any thing in common with us, who have been accustomed to abjure Prelacy, to contemn all stated forms of worship, and to load our Communion with the foulest aspersions as retaining the most offensive corruptions of the Church of Rome. To what extent this may be the case, we do not know. We have said so much on the Act of 1792, not solely because it

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affects in a very unfavourable manner the interests of the Episcopalians in Scotland, but also because we are convinced that the spirit from which such laws proceed, is decidedly inimical to the strength and respectability of every Christian Church. It may in time, and in no long time, prove highly injurious to the Church of England herself, which has many enemies who would rejoice to see her stripped of her legal establishment: and for attaining that object, those laws furnish them with more plausible arguments than without them they were likely to find. The Protestant Episcopal Clergy in the United States of North America are all, as well as the Episcopal Clergy in Scotland, rendered, by a British Act of Parliament, incapable of holding any preferment or even of officiating in the Church of England, though the American Episcopacy was derived immediately from our Church. By an Act of Parliament too, passed in 1819, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, with the Bishop of London, or any other Bishop appointed by them, are authorized to ordain men specially for the Colonies the specialty stated in the letters of ordination: and no person so ordained is capable of holding a living, or even of officiating in Great Britain or Ireland, without the consent of the Bishop of the Diocese where he is to officiate, and, while to procure such consent, certain certificates from the Colonies must be produced. Persons ordained by the Bishops of Quebec, Nova Scotia, Calcutta, Jamaica, and Barbadoes, although the Consecration of these Prelates was certainly ordered by the King, are equally restrained: all persons ordained by a Colonial Bishop, not possessing or residing in a Diocese, are rendered incapable of holding preferment, or acting as a Minister of the Established Church, in any way, or on any pretence whatever.

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In consequence of some abuses of the Archiepiscopal dispensing power in Ireland, a bill to regulate the ages of persons to be admitted into holy Orders was introduced into the Imperial Parliament, and passed into a law in April, 1804. In that bill there is a clause which enacts, "That in case any person shall, from and after the passing of this Act, be admitted a Deacon before he has attained the age of three-and-twenty years complete, or a Priest, before he has attained the age of four-and-twenty years complete, such admission shall be thereby void in law as if it had never been made, and the person so admitted shall be incapable of holding, and disabled from taking any ecclesiastical preferment whatever, in virtue of such his admission."

Now, if an Act of the British Parliament, or if any other power whatever, be capable of restraining the validity of orders conferred by a Canonically Consecrated Bishop to any particular place or places; if it be capable of authorizing such a Bishop to confer orders specially for any particular place and for no other; and much more if it be capable of rendering null and void, as if they had never been given, orders conferred through some mistake or misinformation of the Bishop, one day before the person ordained had attained the twenty-third or twenty-fourth year of his age: it would seem, that such a civil power may, by its own act, and without any interposition at all, confer the