LECTURE III.

ROMISH AND TRACTARIAN CLAIMS AND PRETENSIONS

(Continued.)

THE APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, AND THE UNITY OF

THE CHURCH.

"Neither give heed to fables, and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying, which is in faith."—1 Timothy, i. 4.

It will be obvious to every one in this assembly who was present last week, when I had the privilege of addressing you, that the "fables and endless genealogies," to which I intend to allude, and to which, unquestionably, the apostle, with something of a prophetic spirit, alludes also, are just such as have been prominently paraded in the present age, by Romish and Tractarian disputants, as the very germs, the essence, and the core of all Christian Churches, and of all Christian ordinances.

1 stated upon that occasion, that I would this evening direct your attention

I. In the first place, to what is called the apostolical succession; or, what may, perhaps, be more strictly called the mechanical and material succession.

Before entering on this genealogical doctrine, let me observe, that I do not mean to impugn or advocate any one form of ecclesiastical polity whatever. This would be wholly foreign to the great object which I have in view, and equally inconsistent with the promises and pledges I made at the commencement of these Lectures. It is enough to observe, that there is nothing in Episcopacy, or Independency, or Presbytery, per se (of themselves), essentially Popish. They may all exist without Popery; and they may all be turned, by the corrupt and contaminating heart of man, to Popish, or Arian, or any purposes. In the next place, let me observe, that this doctrine, called the apostolical succession, may or may not be a good thing. If those who are its advocates in the present day, had restricted themselves to the assertion of the claim that their ministry has this apostolical succession, we might have assented; we should at least have made no objection to their assumption of it; they might have laid it up in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, or they might have exhibited it as antiquarians do by some ancient and curious thing, to be looked at and admired, and they might, in some measure, have congratulated themselves upon possessing it. If all that is meant by it is the necessity of a regular ministry, transferred in ordinary circumstances from minister to minister, we should be silent, because satisfied. But the objection we have is, not that it may or may not be true, not that it may or may not be important, not that one man asserts it and another repudiates it, but that it is substantially made "the article of a standing or a falling Church."

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Let there be no apostolical succession (in the sense to which I am referring), and then, as we are told, there may be the loftiest spirituality in the minister, there may be the sublimest piety in the hearers, there may be the most clear and conclusive evidences that the God of the universe bows the heavens to own the ministrations of his servant, yet all is void; there are no Christianity, no sacraments, nơ ministry, no Church, no heaven, no hope. Uncovenanted mercies are the only refuge. And vice versa, so greatly is this doctrine prized, that if this succession be present, then, according to Tridentine and Tractarian views, it matters not that there may be idolatry in the desk, that there be superstition in the pulpit, and blasphemy upon the altar; if the succession be there in its integrity, there must be a true Church of Christ, a true ministry, and valid sacraments. The Church of Rome, because she possesses, or is supposed to possess, the apostolical succession, is "our dear sister," and "Christ's holy home;" the Church of Scotland, because she is supposed to have it not, is "Samaria," that is, not far from the promised land, but still out of and the Dissenters are consigned, without exception, to 66 the uncovenanted mercies of God;" not because they do not preach the Saviour, not because their ministry is not owned of God, but because they cannot trace (as we in the Church of Scotland cannot, and, as I will prove to you by and bye, they in the Church of England cannot,) -because they cannot trace their genealogy, link by link, until at last they land at the throne of Peter, or the footstool of Paul.

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You will observe, further, that in the remarks I may make upon this occasion, I do not place the strength of my position on the fact, that diocesan Episcopacy is unscriptural, or the reverse. It may be scriptural, or it may not; on that point I state nothing; my simple position is, that apostolical succession, in the sense in which it is explained by those who are its advocates, cannot be proved to be a reality, even if Episcopacy can be shown to be a divine institution, and deducible from the sacred volume.

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I may just notice here, that the Tractarian section of the Church of England is not solely to blame for asserting apostolical succession for, it is a fact, that many of the Scottish Covenanters assumed the same thing, and held that Presbytery was so truly jure divino, that Episcopacy was fatally wrong upon the one hand, and Independency as much so upon the other. This is just the apostolical succession in a lower degree, and made to dovetail with a more popular form of Church polity. I must say, however, that if there be such a thing as apostolical succession, I suspect that the presbyters of the Church of Scotland, if not also the ministers of most of the dissenting communions in England, have it as truly through presbyters, as the Church of England has it through bishops. The Tractarian argument against this position which I once in print took up against them is, that presbyters cannot give what they never were appointed to give, and that as they were never appointed to ordain they cannot ordain, and so they cannot keep up the succession. This proceeds on an hypothesis no Presbyterian concedes; and the argument, besides, proves too much, and what proves too much is not sufficient to prove the point for which it is quoted. For, a bishop is not consecrated (according to any terms of consecration that I have ever read,) to consecrate other bishops; and,

therefore, the very same argument that would prove presbyters incapable of ordaining other presbyters, because it is not expressed in their commission and appointment, would prove bishops incapable of consecrating other bishops. But the truth is, and it is a law laid down by Jerome, a father of the Latin Church, that what a man has, that he can give; and, upon this ground, Jerome held, that the laity could preach and baptise, and that bishops could consecrate, (for in his day bishops began to consecrate,) because they had themselves been consecrated; and in the same way could presbyters ordain, because they had been ordained themselves.

It may also be discovered that Patristic references may prove Independency more clearly than Episcopacy. If we are to refer to the ancient fathers, and he guided by the very books quoted by Tractarians, it will be found, that some of the chief notions promulgated from Oxford, will not only be wholly overthrown, but the opposite views which they hate, vindicated by the very standards to which they appeal. They have referred to the ancient fathers for the doctrine, that the clergy are so completely elevated above, and separate from, the people; that they are invested with awful, and mysterious, and inapproachable functions, and that they are (to use the language of an old Popish schoolman,) as "the mountain," and the laity as "the beasts that might not touch the mountain lest they be consumed." Now, instead of this doctrine being supported by the fathers, I am prepared to prove, by extracts from the fathers, that not only were bishops and presbyters allowed to preach, but the laity also. Not that I approve of this; not that I would sanction it in a duly constituted Church; but it is the fact, asserted by many of the ancient fathers, that the laity were allowed to preach and baptise, and that these sacred functions were not restricted to the clergy. I might easily prove from the word of God, that many of the laity preached, for it is clearly asserted (Acts viii. 4.) of all the Christians that were scattered abroad by persecution, that "they went every where preaching the word;" but confining myself now to the fathers, it is a very striking fact, carefully concealed by the Tractarians, that so far from condemning the discharge of these functions by the laity, the fathers approved of it. For we read, that the bishop of Jerusalem and the bishop of Cæsarea allowed Origen to preach, before he had been ordained at all; and that upon another bishop writing to them, and complaining of this, these two bishops replied as follows::-" You write, that you never before heard that laymen should preach in presence of bishops; in this you have widely and strangely wandered from the truth; when there are found such as are able to profit the brethren, the bishops exhort them to preach." Now here is the assertion of a fact; and though the fathers as expositors of doctrine are to be repudiated, they are invaluable as witnesses to facts. So also Hilary, the deacon, in his Comment on Ephesians, says "It was granted to all at first, the laity as well as the clergy, both to preach the gospel and to baptise." The Tractarians say, Go to the fathers for the lofty assumptions and claims of the clergy; I go to the fathers, and it turns out that they prove the very reverse of that, for which they are quoted. And perhaps, after all, it may turn out, that there is in the fathers more of Independent Church government, (though I

am no advocate for it,) than there is either of the Tractarian or Romish views of Episcopacy.

Let me now proceed to show you, by two simple statements, what is really understood by apostolical succession. It is, in the first place, that each bishop has been consecrated by his contemporary bishops on the death of his predecessor, and that no one link in the long line of successive consecrators or consecrations is wanting between Dr. Howley, the present Archbishop of Canterbury, and St. Peter, St. Timothy, or St. Paul. The second position is, that ordination performed by succession bishops only, is valid, and that the party obtaining this ordination, thereby receives all the gifts and graces of the Spirit, and gives vitality and virtue to every sacrament and ordinance he administers. These are the two great positions of those who advocate what is called the apostolical succession. The simplest illustration of it that I can give you, would be a long magnetic, galvanic, or electric chain, starting at the foot of an apostle, and extending downwards to the present primate of all England; and, it is supposed, that there was given to the first link a mysterious and subtle element or virtue, which has been transmitted, by successive consecrations, from link to link, parallel with the earth, until it has reached the bishops of the present day.

Now, you will see at once, that if the first link in a long chain is wanting, the whole falls to the ground. Or if twenty links in the middle of a chain are wanting, the whole falls to the ground. Or if, in this electric chain, of which I have been speaking, some links in the middle, instead of being suitable conductors of its mysterious virtue, are incapable of transmitting it—are so vitiated that the current must fly off by a centrifugal force; then, again, the transmission is arrested, all post hoc is vitiated. In all these respects I am ready to prove that the apostolical succession belongs to those things called "endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying."

My first statement will, I think, satisfactorily prove that the apostolical succession never began. If it never began, in the sense in which they assume it, it can be of no use to prove that there is the remainder of it for the last two or three hundred years. If there were a chain stretching from one side of the Thames to the other, consisting of a thousand links, it would be useless if nine hundred and ninety-nine adhered to each other, if the first link were wanting-the very link that must connect it with the Surrey side, as the chain must instantly fall down; and it would be of no service, were a person to stand on the Middlesex side of the river, and hold one end of the chain, and say "This is an entire communication,' and because it descends into the bed of the river, and is lost in the mud, and you cannot trace it, to endeavour to make you believe, that there is no doubt it reaches to the opposite side, is duly fixed, and is a real communication with Lambeth. Before you can trust to it, you must see the whole chain; and if it wants one link, it is worth nothing for the purpose for which it is stretched across. Now I will show you, that in this far-stretching chain of succession to the apostles, the very first link after the Apostles is wanting.

My proof, on this point, is drawn from the existing state of the See (using the word in the ancient sense,) or bishopric, or oversight, or by

whatever equally expressive name it may be called, of Alexandria. Eutychius of Alexandria states, that St. Mark the evangelist, first of all preached the gospel at Alexandria: "Moreover," says Eutychius, "Mark appointed twelve presbyters, with Ananias, on whose head the other eleven might place their hands, and bless him, and create him patriarch or bishop, and then choose some excellent man, and appoint him presbyter with themselves in the place of him. Nor did this custom, that the presbyters should create their patriarch, cease at Alexandria, until the time of Alexander, who was of the number of 318 bishops who met together at the Council of Nice. He forbade the presbyters to create the patriarch for the future, and decreed, that when the patriarch was dead, the bishops should meet together, and then ordain a patriarch in his stead." It is here distinctly declared, that during the three hundred years that preceded the Council of Nice, that is, up to 325, the custom in Alexandria was, not for other bishops to consecrate the bishop that was to be the head of the diocese, but for the twelve presbyters to meet together, and choose one of themselves as chairman, or moderator, or patriarch; and their choice and designation, without consecration, was ipso facto and de jure the appointment of that bishop. This is utterly opposed to recent views; and, on moderate Episcopal principles, irregular at least. If all the presbyters of London were to meet together at the death of the present Bishop of London, and to elect one of themselves as bishop, and appoint him, every Tractarian would protest against it as a departure from the laws of the Church, and an utter interruption of the succession; and such a person would be pronounced to be no more bishop than I should be held to be by the same party. But if it be the fact that the presbyters thus originally constituted their bishops, and if it be the fact also that there is no transmission of the apostolical succession, where there is no consecration by bishops, then I ask can any one of the present bishops of the English Church prove that his succession may not, after all, be null, on Tractarian principles, however sound on ours, because derived from some of the elected and non-consecrated presbyters of Alexandria? Sure we are, there is a risk of some non-conducting link being introduced into the chain, during these three hundred years, when a custom prevailed in so important a diocese, so opposite to that which is now thought essential.

This view may be confirmed by an historical statement, extracted from Severus :-"The presbyters and people were collected together at Alexandria, and laid their hands on Peter, a priest, and placed him on the patriarchal throne of Alexandria, in the tenth year of the Emperor Diocletian." The words are,- -"Congregatos fuisse Alexandriæ sacerdotes et plebem manusque imposuisse super Petrum eumque collocasse in silio Patriarchali Alexandrino." And Jerome, a Latin father, who lived in the fourth and fifth centuries, states,-" At Alexandria, from Mark the evangelist to the bishops Heraclas and Dionysius, presbyters always called one elected from among themselves, and placed him in higher rank as their bishop, just as an army may elect its general, or deacons elect one of themselves, and call him the archdeacon."-[Epistle ad Evagr. 146.] These collateral witnesses prove, equally, that the custom existed at Alexandria, of the presbyters consecrating, or appointing, or ordering their bishops. And if this be