legislation of the State and the judicial | wide-spread reception of principles so poweradministration of the country may be so ful to mould the characters of the people to conducted as to do honour to religion, and virtue. Though this is the case, it need through it give homage to God. The indif- not interfere with the supplementary efforts ference of the civil ruler towards religion, if of Congregationalism, which may gather to it were not impossible, would be sinful, be- itself everlasting honour by the erection of cause, if a thorough and consistent believer, places of worship, the appointment of pastors, he is morally bound to do everything in his and employment of the various other agencies power to advance the interests of religion in to bring men under the influence of gospel all the diverse situations of life to which he truth. may be called. The instrumentalities or channels through which christian knowledge is diffused are of this world, though the impulse comes from a higher; and the State, from the extent of its power and influence, suggests itself as a favourable means for the extension of the gospel through all the ramifications of society. To provide a gospel ministration for the millions who live in a state of alienation from God, and who, if left to themselves, would never support a church, is, in our opinion, a work worthy of the highest efforts of philanthropy and patriotism. It is not a question of discipline or doctrine, and where can these be had in their least exceptionable forms; but it is whether whole peoples should be left to the bent of their own inclinations to accept or reject the truth of God, or whether, by the establishment of churches and missions, they should, through the agency of pastors and teachers set apart and appointed to the work, be brought to the saving knowledge of the faith; for we contend that, in beginning with any new country, the choice is only between a paid or established, and an unsuccessful mission-that Congregationalism is of a later development, and succeeds only in proportion to the success of the paid ministry which preceded it; and even when its existence has become a fact, it is inadequate to the charge of an entire population. It is good as an auxiliary, as supplementing the efforts of the Establishment, but can never be more without proving itself a failure. We view it then as the act enlightened legislature to make a sure legal provision for the clergy. Surely the destitute and the indifferent should be reclaimed from their spiritual ignorance and irreligion; and if so, should the scheme be ventured upon the casual charities of private individuals in preference to the certainty of a State provision. The State sees it to be both its duty and its interest to make this provision, for the purpose of securing the of an The Christian Church is a spiritual society, the qualifications for admission to which are purely moral. It is capable of developing itself under every form of civil government, and can we suppose that for such a sacred society, in which the truths to be believed, the worship to be observed, and the laws to be obeyed, are all most clearly indicated and prescribed by its Divine Founder, there should have been no provisions made by him respecting its polity or church government, on the nature and administration of which so materially depends the order and interests of society? These considerations forbid the supposition that the government of the Church should have been left to the conflicting devices of the human mind. Accordingly, when we turn to God's own word, we find, if not express and authoritative instructions on the subject, what we think ample indications of the Divine mind and will to warrant us in preferring and defending the Presbyterian form of church government. The hierarchy of the Anglican Church is, we believe, unable to sustain its claim to Divine sanction by an appeal to the language or spirit of the sacred writings. According to its defenders, there are differences of rank among those who minister in the Church: they assert the superiority of the bishop to the presbyter; while the Presbyterian, in direct antagonism to this, holds the essential equality and authority of those who minister in things holy. On this point the language of the Scottish Church has always been clear and emphatic; the pastors of the flock, who are to give themselves to the ministry of the word, and to conduct the ordinances of religion, are of one order, acknowledge no spiritual supremacy in the Sovereign, and are as brethren, equal amongst themselves in rank and power. In addition to the pastors, or teaching elders of the Church, there are ruling elders and deacons: called Rabbi, for one is your Master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren," Matt. xxiii. 8-12. We further refer to Jas. iii. 1; 2 Cor. i. 24; 1 Pet. v. 3. Numerous passages of scripture might be cited, proving that Episcopos and Presbuteros are used synonymously; but even were it granted that the Episcopi were of a higher rank, it by no means follows that they are either the representatives or the successors of the apostles; nor is there any reason for rior to both of these is recognised in scripture," for, as Towgood well observes (page 424), "From the very nature of the apostolic office, they could obviously have no successors." We may, therefore, without the slightest hesitation, reject both of the hypotheses proposed by F. J. L., and did space permit, we might multiply instances in proof. We must, however, content ourselves with that of Acts xiii. 1—3, where we find presbyters ordaining Paul and Barnabas, at Antioch. Timothy, so far from being-as is asserted by F. J. L.-" evidently one of a class superior to presbyters in general" was ordained “by the laying on of the hands of the presbytery." the former share in all the duties of the pastor, except in that of preaching; the latter see that the temporal necessities of the poor are alleviated. The Church of England, on the other hand, maintains that there are distinct orders of clergy-bishops, priests, and deacons; these differ in eminence, and are subordinate the one to the other: this error has been aggravated by the addition of a long gradation of ecclesiastical ranks, extending from the archbishop, or rather primate, down to the humblest curate." the supposition that an order of men supeNow, to say nothing of these other degrees of dignity, the defenders of Prelacy are unable to substantiate by reference to scripture the three orders already named; in short, this gradation of rank, for aught that we can see to the contrary, seems to be a merely human invention, fitted only to gratify the weak ambition of erring mortals. Our Lord, while on earth, as if in anticipation of the Anglican institution, the offspring of a bad ambition, has left us an instance on record in the rebuke administered to two of his apostles, James and John, who, like some of the "reverend fathers in God" of our own day, thinking he was about to establish a glorious temporal empire, were quick to bespeak for themselves situations of ease and dignity, where they might bask in the favour of our Lord, and enjoy official pre-eminence over their brethren: their request was, "that they might sit, the one on the right hand, and the other on the left, in his kingdom." In this request may be seen the very dawnings of prelacy: had they attained their wish then had the other ten been their subordinates indeed. It is instructive, however, to mark the peremptory check given to these aspirations after preferment; aspirations which moved our Lord to say,-"Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you." Nothing could be more graphic, forcible, and to the point, than this condemnation by our Lord of the endeavour to introduce a gradation of rank amongst his servants. We submit this to our opponents as the testimony of Christ himself, against the system of dignities which obtains in the Anglican Church. Higher authority than this there is none; we may, however, strengthen the position by adducing another passage: "But be not “The simple principle of Congregationalism" does not appear to us to differ so widely from the tenets of that body "which holds its legislative councils and doctrinal synods in the Presbyterian North" as B. S. supposes. Suppose some free inquirer should express his belief in Congregationalism as understood and advocated by B. S., be admitted to membership, pursue his investigations, arrive at views rather "protean" in the judgment of B. S., would he still be continued in his membership? assuredly not, because he could no longer continue conscientiously to promote the objects of Congregationalism, and (if need be) his expulsion would neither be ecclesiastical tyranny nor spiritual bondage; it would merely be the result of nonconformity-the ultimate expression of that spiritual independence which B. S. admires as a feature of Congre gationalism. It is therefore the merest trifling with words to say that the Congre gationalist alone is guiltless of schism. It is not to be supposed that by the taking away of church government, the possibility of schisms will be removed. J. N. CONGREGATIONALISM.-ARTICLE II. "In society, there are tyrannies more deeply rooted than oaks, denser than rocks, stronger than granite citadels; cruel abuses more fierce and savage than the beasts of the wilderness, and against them we must use 'thoughts that breathe, and words that burn;' we must cry aloud, and spare not; we must, in short, imitate Christ, the lover of men, the blesser of babes, the weeper over the wayward and the wicked, but the most terrible denouncer of oppressors, assailing them with the most awful and annihilating terms." " HOWITT ON PRIESTCRAFT. COMING forth again, in another momentous debate, to cast the broad guage of human reason across existing institutions, we deem it necessary to state, that divine philosophy is our basis, the New Testament our text-book, Christ our guide, and the attainment and accurate enunciation of religious truth our highest ambition. We take our stand as an impartial judge with these three vast systems of religion, their origin, their history, and everyday workings; their good and evil tendencies; their beauties, enormities, or defects before us in marked prominence and bold relief! We would measure and estimate them on the one and only safe, because true, principle, made so palpably manifest in the sublime philosophy of Christianity by its great Founder and present Sustainer-"By their fruits shall ye know them," associated at the same time with the grand distinction of his own dominion-"My kingdom is not of this world." We feel fully confident that so long as we avail ourselves of the philosophy of the New Testament, and abide by the profound axioms and precepts of the great Teacher, we shall not fail to see the truth aright, and to cast light into the regions of the most deadly darkness-religious error. We would judge of these three systems of religion as we do of Christianity, "by their fruits," and if they cannot abide the test of Christ we must pronounce them false, and seek their reformation or absolute extinction, on the principle expressed in the words of one of England's mightiest geniuses, speaking of one of these institutions," If it were shown that though there is a considerable measure of good in it, yet there is, and in all reasonable probability is likely to be, for an indefinite time to come, more harm than good, we should not hesitate to say it had better be abolished, even at the cost of losing that good." Before descending to the particulars of the present debate, we would, that we may the better judge of the actual merits of the institutions in hand, briefly as possible set before the reader the religious system revealed to us in the New Testament, as we hold that system is false, and worthy only of rejection and scorn, which is contrary to the truth there made known,-that if it, either in its foundation, organization, tendency, or general results, stands opposed to Christianity, it is, in so far as that opposition really exists, a system of destructive error, and in so far the pure fabrication of the wicked one, raised through the instrumentality of wicked men! What then is the sum total of Christianity? How readest thou? We pretend not to the luminous grandeur and literary power of expression and condensation displayed in the response of a modern author to this momentous question, and therefore give it as preferable to anything we can offer the anxious reader. It runs thus:-"Unlike all other founders of a religious faith, Christ had no selfishness, no desire of dominance; and his system, unlike all other systems of worship, was bloodless, boundlessly beneficent, inexpressibly pure, and, most marvellous of all, went to break all bonds of body and soul, and to cast down every temporal and every spiritual tyranny. It was a system calculated for the whole wide universe; adapted to embrace men of all climes, all ages, all ranks of life, or intellect; for the rich and for the poor; for the savage and the civilized; for the fool and the philosopher; for man, woman, and child;-which, recognising the grand doctrine that God made of one blood all the nations of the earth,' represented the Almighty as the Father, and all men as brethren born to one universal love, to the same inalienable rights, to the same eternal hope. He himself was the living personification of his principles. Demolishing the most inveterate prejudices of men, by appearing a poor man amongst the poor; by tearing from aristocratic pride and priestly insolence their masks of most orthodox assurance; by proclaiming that the truth which he taught should make all men free; by declaring that the Gentiles lorded it over, and oppressed one another, but that it should not be so with his followers; by pulling down with indignation spiritual pride in high places, and calling the poor and afflicted his brethren, and the objects of his tenderest regard, he laid the foundations of civil and religious freedom, of mental power growing out of unrestrained mental energies, and of love and knowledge co-equal in extension with the world. This perfect freedom of universal man he guarded by leaving no DECREES, but merely great and everlasting principles, intelligible to the mind and conscience of the whole human race, and on which men in all countries might found institutions most consonant to their wants. By declaring that 'wherever two or three met together in his name, he would be in the midst of them,' he cut off, for ever, every claim-the most specious-of priestly dominance; and by expressing his unqualified and indignant abhorrence of every desire of his disciples 'to call down fire from heaven upon his enemies,' or to forbid those to preach and work miracles in his name, who did not immediately follow and conform to their notions, he left to his church a light more resplendent than that of the sun, on the subject of non-interference with the sacred liberty and prerogatives of conscience." We need offer no comment here, gentle reader; it would be literary profanity so to do! Keep these words in all their truthful and evangelical radiance before thy mental vision; yea, enshrine them in the spiritual depths of thy immortal self-hood-in purest emotion-in fondest love-in deepest thoughtfulness-in omnipotent prayer, and thou shalt be blest in divine life, and light, and love! But we haste to the examination of these institutions on the principles stated, by the sacred model before us, and with a burning and sorrow-stricken soul within us for the moral, religious, and spiritual welfare of our countrymen, the great mass of whom do either nominally or virtually belong to a religious system altogether alien to the holy principles of Christianity. Having thus anticipated our first task, it remains for us to take these institutions separately, according to the propositional order of the debate, and first to substantiate our position already taken concerning the first of them-Episcopacy, or our State Church Establishmentviz., that it is an institution contrary to the simple though divine principles of the New Testament;-that it stands opposed to Christianity in its most essential and vital aspects;—that it is a system of this world, wearing the mask of holiness and truth, while it is morally corrupt and founded in error;-that its fruits are like itself corrupt, and its tendency invariably pernicious. That this is the case is evident from the origin, history, workings, and present condition of Episcopacy. What are they? Episcopacy, whence came it? We are sometimes told that Episcopacy is the glorious result of the Lutheran Reformation. But we take such information to be an insult of our common sense! The Reformation in England, in the reign of that regal monster Henry VIII., was not a contest for religious liberty, nor in reality a question of national good. True, Luther and others did pour the shutout light of Christianity into the bosom of our countrymen in that and previous reigns. True it is, the nation was aroused to shake off the fetters of the most awful spiritual feudalism and tyranny ever known among men, and to rise, as if at the omnipotent inspiration of the Almighty, to roll back the overwhelming and encroaching power of the Papal hierarchy. But, nevertheless, this so-called Lutheran Reformation was made the scape-goat of a quarrel between two despots-the Pope abroad and Henry VIII. at home; two men who did indeed terrible battle, not for the religious liberty of the people, but to sustain and increase their flagrant despotisms over the people; not for liberty of conscience, but who should hold that conscience enthralled in all things touching law and religion; not whether Christ should be recognised the true spiritual Head of the Church, but whether Henry VIII. or the Pope should usurp the divine and eternal prerogative of Christ! Thus it was an event which might, had a mysterious Providence seen fit to frustrate the ends of one of the vilest men that ever sat on our great throne,-an event which might have so influenced the religious welfare of our nation, as to have delivered us from nearly 400 years of medieval priestcraft and spiritual despotism; but as it was, this socalled Reformation resulted in a transition 66 from Papal domination to Prelatic tyranny, | years? Did one single Dissenter so act? -a change which all our history since that No; the clergy. Who were the most time clearly shows to be but a passing from generally hostile to the Catholic emancipaone monstrous system of hierarchical and tion, undeterred by the prospect of prolonged impious religious usurpation of the inalien- tumult, and ultimate civil war, ravage, and able rights of man and prerogatives of desolation in Ireland? The clergy. What Divinity to another! It was then that is, at this very hour, the most fatal and Papacy in one form lost its standing in our withering blight on the interests and hopes country only to assume it in another. For of the Protestant religion in that country? Episcopacy is as Popish in spirit and conduct The Established Church." as Papacy itself, and, consequently, Antichristian as Antichrist;" for in a few years after, we find the Act of Uniformity itself passed, than which Papacy itself never struck a more fatal blow at true religious liberty, and Episcopacy, with all her crying abominations, sitting enthroned upon an English Inquisition, and reacting the Great Harlot by making herself "drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus." as Well might that far-seeing and truthrevealing genius, John Milton, exclaim in his day:-"Yet thus is the Church, for all this noise of Reformation, left still unreformed!" Episcopacy is in the nineteenth century essentially what she was in the sixteenth. The only difference being one of circumstances, her vigour having declined, her reign having lost its power, her dominion destroyed by Dissent and vital Christianity! But what has been her subsequent history down to the present period? We will give Foster's brief but accurate summary of her history from the reign of Queen Anne. He asks of Episcopacy: : - -"What did it do for the people of England? There was one wide, settled, Egyptian darkness; the blind leading the blind, all but universally; an utter estrangement from genuine Christianity; 10,000 Christian ministers misleading the people in respect to religious notions, and a vast proportion of them setting them a bad practical example. When, at length, something of the true light began to dawn,when Whitfield and Wesley came forth, who were their most virulent opposers, ever instigating and abetting the miserable people to riot, fury, and violence against them? The Established Clergy. At a later time, who were the most constant, systematic opposers of an improved education of the people? The Established Clergy. Who formed the main mass of the opposition to the Bible Society for so many common What a tale does history unfold concerning this Episcopal Church! Talk not of Papacy and its abominations; raise not the cry "No Popery," while its rival is found in Episcopacy rampant among us. or But it may be urged by our opponents that this is only Dissenting declamation: but this is a poor subterfuge, and at best but a futile argumentum ad ignorantiam, which we might expose, did space permit, by quoting from hundreds of the best men Episcopacy has produced. We might set that great man Dr. Arnold by the side of Foster, whose words we have just quoted. We might even set Lord Clarendon, that High-churchman, beside W. J. Fox, of Nottingham; or Lord Chatham beside Milton; yea, further, "Blackwood's Magazine" beside the "Westminster" "Edinburgh" Reviews: and, to complete the circle in its unbroken harmony of thought and sentiment concerning this Episcopal hierarchy, we might summons B. Noel, who has left the Church, and Bickersteth, who did not; and what would be the result? Each and all of them tell us that the Church of England stands opposed to scripture in her spirit, constitution, and tendency that she is the church of the State and not of God. But our opponents may say, give us something more tangible, which would mean, appal us not with the whole monster-fact; but divide it into so many minute portions that we may the better deny or misrepresent them and so surmount them one by one till the difficulty is at length swept away, and the scriptural character of our Holy Episcopal Church vindicated. We object not to put our statement, that Episcopacy is opposed to scripture, into as many propositions capable of logical demonstration as there are articles, or logical contradictions in the Church Prayer-book. This, however, is not now practical, but we will divide our propositions into two classes: those which |