spects; and if we are but so civil as to take him for an oracle, against all the remonstrances of private judgment, the consequences would be very favourable to himself, and save him a great deal of trouble. If any reader should be curious to know how this Bishop succeeded in discussing and clearing up every thing, I would advise him to read over Mr. Law's Third Letter to the Bishop of Bangor; and if he is a lover of truth, reason, Christianity, and a clear style, I can promise him much instruction, not without the mixture of a little diversion. Some friends of the church have defended the right of establishing Confessions upon the principles of utility and expedience; which bring us back again to the principle of self-preservation, with which we began. For if a lawless liberty to pervert the word of God is attended with any danger to religious society, a right to provide against it by lawful means may be inferred naturally enough. Our Author represents the matter thus: "But, say some men, if there be an expedience in Confessions of Faith, we may infer a right to establish them, though concerning such right the Scripture should be silent." This plea he endeavours to confute, by blackening the Clergy, as a set of men upon whom this test of orthodoxy is not found to answer so well as might be wished; many things being written and uttered, with all freedom, by different persons, equally irreconcileable to each other, as well as to the Orthodox Confession †. Many such things are written in the Confessional, with as much freedom, and heat too, as we shall generally meet with; therefore, if the writer of that book is a subscribing member of the Church, I hope he will be pleased to take his own share of his own accusation. But he cannot seriously argue, that a regulation ceases to be expedient, only because men have the assurance to break through their own engagements. At this rate there ought to be no regulation at all; and his objection will conclude as strongly against the Bible as against the Articles. Many things are written and uttered by different persons, equally irreconcileable to each other, as well as to the orthodox Confession; and, by consequence, equally irreconcileable to the orthodox Scripture itself, unless it hath revealed to us contradictory propositions. Christians of different denominations, who have all received the same Scripture in common, are as irreconcileable in their treatment of the Scripture, as it is possible for the members of this establishment to be in the liberties they take with the orthodox Confession; and the scandal is as great upon one of these as the other. Yet he exclaims, as if our Confession was quite overset by this vain objection: "What now is the utility or expedience in this affair of subscription, which will atone for the scandal brought upon Christianity by this unscriptural article of Church discipline?" When the laws of any society are broken, a scandal is thereby brought upon its profession; but no society ever hit upon the expedient of removing that scandal by setting their laws aside. A while ago he represented the test as an inducement to break through the test: so here, instead of charging the scandal upon the transgressors of the law, whose proper business it is to find some atonement for it, he casts upon it the law itself. Our blessed Saviour saith, Woe unto the world because of offences: but by our Author's rule he ought to have said, Woe unto the Gospel because of offences; it being as equitable and proper to impute D VOL. II. all the scandal of worldly wickedness to the Gospel, which forbids it, as to father all the scandal of heterodoxy upon the orthodox Confession. That this article of our discipline is unseriptural, doth not appear. We are not, indeed, commanded in so many words to subscribe the Articles of the Church of England: but the ministers of the Church having received the Christian faith, are commanded in the Scripture to keep that which is committed to their trust*; therefore, if our Confession comprehends that faith which the Apostles delivered to the Church, it ought to be kept: so far as it varies from that faith, it ought to be corrected; but to drop it in form would be to declare in fact, that its doctrines are not true; and, consequently, that the members of this Church (whatsoever might be advanced to the contrary in a preamble) are released from their obligation to the word of God, out of which those doctrines are extracted; which would be a very unscriptural proceeding, and have consequences fatal to Christianity, though it may appear very promising to this gentleman, and the whole Socinian fraternity. The present method of preserving our faith by a subscription, is no more contrary to any precept of the Scripture, than the repeating of an amen at the end of the Creed, or the Lord's Prayer. This act may indeed be rendered even sinful, by the sinfulness of the matter subscribed; but if the matter subscribed is scriptural, the subscription by which we assent to it will be so too; unless it is wrong for a man to declare that assent with his pen, which it is his duty to declare with his lips. This part of his objection then will be something or nothing, as the doctrine of our Confession shall appear to be true or false.. * 1 Tim. vi. 20. Our Author's next attempt is to render all Confessions of faith impracticable and ridiculous, by setting the rights and proceedings of Protestant Churches against one another: and thus he argues; "Let us suppose that Protestant Churches have such a right, each within its own confines; the question is, how shall one Church exercise this right, without encroaching on the right of another*?" Here he lays down a supposition, and departs from it immediately, without having patience to make a single period consistent. His supposition and question, if compared together, will make just as good sense as if I should say, "Let us suppose that every master of a family hath a right to walk about his own house; the question is, how he shall do this, without breaking into the house of his next neighbour?" He begins with supposing their rights to be separate, and circumscribed by their own confines; then raises a question, which is no question at all, unless their rights extend beyond their confines. There is the same perplexity in what follows: "All particular Churches are co-ordinate; they have all the same right in an equal degree. This, we must observe, according to the state of his argument, is within their own confines; and, in the next paragraph, he grants, as explicitly as need be, that their powers are limited by their situation, and extend not beyond their own departments. Yet he raises difficulties, as before, by supposing their rights to interfere with one another; and declares, he "does not see how it is possible for any Church to exercise this right, where she establishes doctrines inconsistent with those of other Churches, without abridging those Churches of their right to establish their own. دو * P. 33. doctrines." If these latter doctrines are false doctrines, their right to establish them is already abridged upon other principles: if they are true, co-ordinate powers can be under no common obligations to one another, but by common consent; otherwise they are not co-ordinate. He hath here confounded two cases, which ought to have been carefully distinguished; and in this confusion lies the whole merit of his argument. For Protestant Churches may either act separately for themselves, within their own confines, as he pretended at first to suppose; or they may act for the whole body of Protestants at large. If they act in this latter capacity, they cannot act authoritatively, unless they act jointly, or, as he expresses it, without the unanimous consent of all the rest: but the Author must have known that this was not the case he had before him. Did the Church of England ever pretend that preachers in France or Denmark are bound to qualify themselves by subscribing the English Confession, and confining themselves to the use of the English Liturgy? The contrary is expressly declared in the Preface to the book of Common Prayer-" In these our doings we condemn no other nations, nor. prescribe any thing but to our own people only." Such an extent of power is indeed assumed by the Church of Rome; but it is an absurd usurpation, and was never claimed by any community of Protestants; who well know that they cannot act for other Churches, but so far only as they can assist in a general council. One national Church, then, cannot act for another, upon this very principle, that they are co-ordinate: but it cannot hence be inferred, that national Churches have no power to act separately for themselves. The |