Yet, since Bishop Lightfoot's statement is in the former shape, and not the latter, I would prefer to suggest that, not having the distinction before his mind, he passes (at most), by imperceptible and unconscious transition, from his actual statement, which thus far is tenable, to an untenable meaning, which appears to be, but is not, practically identical with his statement. Moreover, he does not altogether so pass. It may well be that he would not actually have used the word non-essential. But if so, the ambiguity which remains between the two forms of thought is not otherwise than characteristic of an essay which has notoriously been open to so much doubtful and mistaken interpretation.

Now, having drawn this distinction, and insisted that ordinances, whether asserted or denied to be of the essence' of the Church's Life (either of which methods of speech is tenable), are at all events essential,' in the sense of being God's own appointed and imperative conditions and methods of the essence, it becomes necessary for us still to ask in what sense this 'essential' necessity is asserted. Is the necessity, in every conceivable case, self-acting and absolute? Is it incapable of exception? The question is enough to carry the answer; and the answer is thoroughly familiar. They are essential in the sense that, in so far as we are commanded by God to use them, we have no power of dispensing with the use of them, or of obtaining, otherwise than by the use of them, the gifts which God has bidden us find in and through their use. So far, at least, the old instance of Naaman's leprosy is strictly applicable. If God prescribed the use of Jordan water, the use of Jordan water became by God's command, as, on the one hand, efficacious with the efficacy of almightiness, so, on the other, indispensable with the necessity of God. If God has ordained Christian ordinances, then Christian ordinances have become-just in proportion as He has laid them upon us-both 'essential,' and (though in a secondary sense) even 'intrinsically '

efficacious. As it would have been obviously futile for Naaman to have drawn a distinction, either, in respect of his own duty, between bathing in Jordan on the one side, and obeying God on the other, or, in respect of his own blessing, between bathing in Jordan on the one side, and recovery from leprosy on the other, for in either case, when God had spoken, the distinction had absolutely ceased to be, so, in respect of Christian ordinances, if or in so far as they are divinely ordained, it would be futile, and even meaningless, for a Christian to try, as it were, to cut in either between such ordinances, spiritually used, on the one hand, and, on the other, Christian homage of faith, or obedience, or love; or between such ordinances, spiritually used, on the one hand, and, on the other, the very richness of the presence and life of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It is the old distinction. If God is not in any way bound to His own appointed methods of grace, yet we are. Outside His appointed 'media' of whatever kind-ministries, sacraments, ordinances - He can work, if He will, as divinely as within them. He can cleanse with Abana, or with Pharpar, or with nothing, as effectually as with Jordan. But that is nothing to us, if He has bidden us to wash in Jordan. So, if there are, in His Church, divinely prescribed ministries and ordinances, the consideration that He is not bound to ministries and ordinances, even though it be true, becomes nothing-but a snare - to us. It may serve indeed somewhat to the lowliness of our thoughts; it may abash us from the presumption of even imagining, at any time, anything like a judgement of others, whose case before God is known to Him, not to us. But used as a guide to our own conception or conduct, it could have no effect, expect to mislead.

The necessity, then, which is asserted (contingently upon there being Divine ministries, &c., at all) is a necessity not simply self-acting, like the operations of

a physical quality; it is a necessity, not of a material but of a moral kind; a necessity which, by its inherent character as moral, cannot but have real relations to varying conditions of understanding and of opportunity; a necessity which appeals alike to our belief and our obedience, with a moral power indefinitely the greater, just because it is not either in all cases literally universal, or in any case visibly demonstrable.

The gradations, the exceptions, are not for us to define. The fact that they exist modifies the sharp logic of our abstract theory of necessity: it holds us back, even in thought, from the concrete judgement of individuals. But it does not alter, in the least, the moral obligation which rests upon us who understand, to make clear to ourselves, and to those to whom we can make clear, what belief and obedience require-of them and of us. To those who have eyes to see and hearts to understand, the dutiful use of Divine 'methods' (if any such there be) is a necessity 'essential' to obedience, and to faith. It is a necessity, like all moral necessities, not stupidly inexorable, but characterized and informed by the inherent attribute of equity.1 It is a necessity which itself is part of the revelation of God-so far as God is revealed. It is a necessity therefore, not of blind law, as the order to Naaman first seemed to be, but of the Supreme perfection of Wisdom and Equity, as the order to Naaman was. It is part of the wisdom of the Spirit to understand the necessity -what it is, and what it is not. It is a necessity, in so far, at least, as there is insight to discern its necessity, not

1 It is interesting in this reference to contrast the position of Hooker and his opponents in reference to the necessity of Baptism. Both were dealing with the fact of the existence of 'equitable' exceptions. The opponents said, Because equity requires the admission of exceptions, therefore the necessity of Baptism is an untenable doctrine. Hooker, reversing the argument, replied, Because equity is inherent, as of course, in the 'necessity' of a Divine command to intellect or character, therefore the only objection to the doctrine of the necessity of Baptism falls to the ground. Equitable interpretation, in his view, is not a qualification, far less the negation, but rather an inalienable attribute or element, of a moral necessity.

to enable God, but to authorize and to enable us. Το discern and to characterize the necessity aright, is to determine the question, not so much of Divine possibility as of Divine revelation, and therefore of human validity and obedience. We want to know, not within what limits God can work, but by what methods He has revealed that He does; and therefore wherein and whereby we ourselves may, dutifully and securely, meet and find Him, and live and grow into Him, in Spirit and in Truth.

NOTE, p. 32.

THE visible exclusion none the less expresses the invisible-and finds its whole meaning and terror in expressing it—even though it is not only distinct from it, but in ultimate motive even contrasted with it. It is inflicted in order that the invisible (which it immediately expresses) may not be incurred.

CHAPTER III

THE RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY

THE discussion in the last chapter was quite general in kind. It referred to 'media' as such. It was only hypothetically assumed that there are such things as divinely ordered 'media' in the Church of Christ. To any specific method or ordinance there was no reference at all. An attempt was made, however, to vindicate the idea of such divinely ordered media; to maintain their necessity as essential to the valid security - of the rendering of human faith and service upon the one hand-of the receiving of Divine grace upon the other; and to relate this doctrine of 'essential means' with the unmeasured freedom of the goodness of God. Such means in truth are no limiting of the goodness of God: they are a defining to man, in terms humanly intelligible, of the methods by which his access, and his blessing, may securely be realized, while they emphasize, in this defining, the reality of man's corporate life, as brotherhood. At no point, at no moment, are they a substitute for service spiritual and personal: but they say, Combine to render your spiritual service thus: thus believe thus do, individually alike and corporately for thus God is pledged to receive you, and to enrich. They are a reaching out of infiniteness to finiteness, an accommodation of the invisible to the visible; they are (since to our senses the invisible and the infinite mean the indefinite and the uncertain) a condescension of heaven to conditions

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and