THE BRITISH CHURCHMAN.

NOVEMBER.-1844.

THE TOPICS OF THE TIMES.

No. IX.

THE THREEFOLD MINISTRY.

A LEAF shaken by the wind-a reed swayed by the water- a bubble on the stream of life-a billow on the ocean of eternity-headstrong as the tempest in its fury, yet changeful as the breeze before a calm: such is mortal man.

The leaf quivers till it falls-the reed vibrates till it decays-the bubble bursts and is forgotten-the billow passes from our view—the tempest rages till it is spent-the breeze moans itself to rest ::- and

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man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live, and is full of vanity. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower; he fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay." It is, indeed, a mournful task, an humiliating occupation, to contemplate the instability of man and the perishable nature of his works. How often, alas, has the historian recorded the ruin of cities that were thought immortal, the fall of empires that were deemed eternal! How changeable, too, are the customs and the opinions of mankind! Systems of philosophy which were reverenced in one age, are treated with derision by those who succeed -institutions, civil and political, which fathers cherished are often trodden under foot by their children; and principles of morality which were deified by one generation are dismissed as old wives' fables by that which immediately follows:

Nay the very same generation, the very same individual, frequently exhibits strange contrasts in the course of a single life. How often has the philosopher lamented, how often the divine reproved, the weakness of infancy, the folly of youth, the wilfulness of manhood, and the fretfulness of age! How frequently do we meet with instances of falsehood, faithlessness, fickleness, and caprice! The friend of our early VOL I.-No. XI.

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youth is too often the foe of our manhood, and that which is an idol today may be held in abomination to-morrow.

Such is man, whose breath is in his nostrils,-weak, vacillating, and false. How unlike HIM who is "the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever!" "For all flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our GOD endureth for ever." His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor His ways our ways." "GOD is not a man that he should lie, nor the son of man that he should repent. Hath HE said, and will He not do it? or hath HE spoken, and shall He not make it good?" For in the indivisible unity of the eternal Godhead "there is neither variableness nor shadow of turning."

It is most imperatively necessary to keep in view this essential attribute of the Triune Jehovah when considering His dealings with man, lest, like the heathens of old, we should be led to clothe, with our own imperfections, HIM, who is perfect. Far be from us such a mean appreciation of the all-wise, all-powerful, and UNCHANGEABLE GOD. The propriety of this caution will be yet more apparent, if we consider the causes of the difference which exists in this respect between the ALMIGHTY and man, whom He created in His own image. For the causes of this difference are two-the first primeval, the second adscititious. The primeval cause of this difference is that man, though a glorious being, was still a creature, and was not therefore possessed of those attributes and capacities which belong to GOD alone, and which are necessary to and inherent in His immutability. Had man, however, remained sinless, his change would have been from joy to joy, from strength to strength, from grace to grace, and from glory to glory. It is to the second, the adscititious cause; adscititious to Adam, but inherent in his descendants; to sin, debilitating, corrupting, destroying sin, sin of which we each and all of us bring a sufficient portion into the world to deserve God's wrath and damnation; it is to sin that we must attribute the varying changes of weakness and folly, wickedness and sorrow, which force themselves upon our notice whenever we consider the world and them that dwell therein. The impiety, therefore, as well as the senselessness of attributing to GOD that which is the result of imperfection and sin, must be evident to all those who profess and call themselves Christians.

And hence it is clear, that although the details of God's dealings with sinful man may be different, and must be so, as being adapted by His infinite wisdom to the varying circumstances of His creatures; yet the principles upon which those dealings are conducted, and those details selected, must be and are, unchanging and unchangeable.

That this is the case in the physical world none will venture to deny; that it is so in the moral world, every one who believes in a Providence must necessarily maintain; that the same law should prevail with reference to the covenanted mercy of GOD, is a necessary consequence of His attribute; that it does prevail, is declared by the Scripture, and proclaimed by the Church.

The more we examine the question, the more fully shall we perceive this to be case. Passing over the earlier dispensations, let us briefly consider the strict analogy which exists between the Mosaic and Christian Covenants, and we shall perceive that the differences existing between the two systems arise not from a difference in principle but in practice that they imply no change in GoD's dealing, but in man's circumstances-that GOD is still the same, though man's relative position to HIM is altered.

We may illustrate what we mean from the phenomena of physical nature. It is not the sun that rises, but the earth that turns towards him; it is not the sun that shines less or more brightly, but the clouds that rise or depart. His rays are always the same, though the changes of our atmosphere affect their relation to us.

Let us, then, examine the Mosaic and Christian covenants, with the view of comparing their machinery; we use the term in contradistinction to their object, which is the happiness of mankind-to their end, which is the glory of God-to their motive principles, and their living energies. Omitting any discussion on these and other points, we proceed to compare their machinery.

In both we perceive a visible Church vested with exclusive privileges; though in the Jewish dispensation we have a covenant offered primarily, and conferred principally, upon one race; in the Christian we have one offered equally to all mankind. In the first we have the seal of circumcision, in the second that of baptism, which act as the entrance gates to the dispensations to which they respectively belong. Of circumcision we read, "And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep my covenant therefore, thou, and thy seed after thee in their generations. This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between ME and thee and thy seed after thee: Every man child among you shall be circumcised. And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt ME and you. And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every man child in your generations, he that is born in the house, or bought with money of any stranger, which is not of thy seed. He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must needs be circumcised: and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of the foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant." Of baptism we read "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." whilst on the other hand we are told, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved."

In the Mosaic, and all the previous dispensations, we have the anticipatory sacrifices, foreshadowing the ONE ONLY propitiatory sacrifice, satisfaction, and oblation for all the sins of the whole world; in the Christian dispensation we have the commemorative sacrifice of the Holy Eucharist, by partaking which we shew the Lord's death till HE The strictness with which the former were enforced is well known to all who have read the law of Moses. And that the due

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celebration of the latter is necessary to the being of a Church, and its due participation in the perfect fulfilment of the individual covenant, is fully declared in Scripture, and authoritatively asserted by the Church. Another striking point of analogy between the Mosaic and Christian dispensations is exhibited in the fact, that the Sabbath of the Jews, which was kept upon the last day of the week, has been exchanged for the Lord's day of the Christians, which is celebrated on the first day of the week.

And in that which it is the more especial object of this paper to consider, namely, THE THREEFOLD MINISTRY, we perceive a resemblance equally apparent, an analogy equally exact. In the Mosaic dispensation we have a particular tribe set apart for the sacred ministry—a particular family of that tribe entrusted with the priestly office, and one individual, the head or chief of that family, possessed of supreme powers and entrusted with transcendant ecclesiastical dignity-under the title of high priest. In the Christian dispensation we have the deacons, who are permitted to perform the inferior offices of the ministry; the priests, who are empowered to absolve the penitent and bless the righteous, and permitted to consecrate the Holy Eucharist, and thus to enable the faithful to receive the body and blood of Our Lord; and lastly, we have the bishop, who is as it were the heart of his Church, the source of power, the fountain of grace, the root of the tree of life, the keystone of the arch of salvation, at once the foundation and capital of the pillar which supports the truth of God, whom his flock and his clergy are bound to revere as their father in GoD, their ruler in CHRIST, ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ ΑΝΤΙ ΤΟΥ ΧΡΙΣΤΟΥ-Anointed instead of THE

ANOINTED.

It will not, we presume, be denied by any one who has carefully perused the Oid Testament, whether he be Christian or Infidel, Jew, Turk, or Heretic, that the sacred offices of the Levitical ministry and the more holy functions of the Aaronic priesthood were guarded with peculiar care by the author of the Mosaic dispensation. Thus Saul is deprived of his kingdom, because he, being a layman, had dared to offer sacrifices to Gop, though he pleaded in his excuse the most stringent reasons of political expediency and temporal necessity. Thus amongst the crimes of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, it is recorded of him, that he made priests of the lowest of the people, whosoever would he consecrated him, and he became a priest of High Places. And it is added, "And THIS THING became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off and to destroy it from off the face of the earth." Thus, too, Dathan and Abiram were swallowed up alive by an earthquake, for attempting to perform the sacred functions; thus even Korah himself, although a Levite, was slain by fire from heaven for aspiring to the priestly office. And, not to multiply examples, thus too was Uzzah struck dead because he presumed to touch the Ark of God even to steady it.

The analogy between the Mosaic and Christian ministry has already been considered. The equal authority and superior dignity of the latter is explicitly asserted by St. Paul. "And such trust have we through