CHAPTER VI.

THE TESTIMONY OF THE ROMISH, GREEK, AND SYRIAN CHURCHES, IN FAVOR OF THE CLAIMS OF PRESBYTERY.

Ir is our purpose, at this time, only to refer to those churches which have been supposed to be most hierarchical, and opposed to the system of presbytery, reserving the testimony of others, for our chapter on the antiquity of presbyterianism. Fas est ab hoste doceri, and the testimony of those who practically adopt the system of prelacy, to the original identity of the orders of bishops and presbyters, must be allowed to have great weight with all who wish to preserve the pure order and doctrine of the apostles.

We will first inquire, therefore, what is the testimony given on this subject, by the Romish church. There are three opinions prevalent in this church. Some think that the episcopate is a distinct order from the presbyterate. Some believe that both these orders are one generically, but two specifically, or that they constitute but one order and two degrees. But the prevailing theory is that of those who believe that the episcopate is not a distinct order, but the extension of the order of the presbyterate, by a greater latitude of jurisdiction. "To this class belong the master of the sentences, Bonaventura, Thomas Aquinas, Pope Cornelius, Gregory the Great, Alcuin, &c. The council of Trent is with this class of divines, as we may gather from the second canon of the twenty-third session, which makes the priesthood the principal order, and the episcopate only a branch of it. The catechism, too, says, respecting orders, that its highest degree is the priesthood.'

1

This, indeed, must be the case, for as these were the sentiments of so many fathers, of the great body of the schoolmen, and of the canonists, and as these constitute the exponents of

1) Elliott on Roman. i. pp. 451, 452, 457, 458.

Romish doctrines, the Romish church must be regarded as holding that there is but one general order of the priesthood, and different degrees of dignity and power. 'Popery and prelacy,' says Mr. Sinclair,' 'so far from being necessarily connected with one another, are diametrically opposed. No sooner was the supremacy of the pope acknowledged, than encroachments were made on episcopal jurisdiction. Various districts and entire corporations of ecclesiastics were withdrawn from diocesan control. More power was given, in many instances, to mere priests and deacons, (under the name of cardinals and legates,) than to any bishop but the Roman pontiff. Inferior church officers, invested with the uncanonical authority, were frequently empowered to suspend, and even to deprive, their superiors. The pope, it was affirmed, might grant commissions authorizing the lower ranks of the clergy to confer upon others the order or degree held by themselves: so that a priest was licensed to ordain priests, and a deacon to ordain deacons ; on which commissions we may make this passing remark, that they form the earliest and only precedent, before the days of protestantism, for presbyterian or diaconal ordination.'

3

If, therefore, we look to the practice of the Romish church, we must certainly conclude that the order of the episcopate is not regarded as distinct, or as of divine right. In addition to what has been stated, it is also a fact, that during the greater part of the last century, Romish bishops were consecrated in England and Ireland, by a single bishop, assisted by two priests. It seems, also, that the Roman pontiffs had no difficulty in giving permission to such ordinations in foreign missions. And yet, this is contrary to the canons of the universal church, which would conclude such ordinations invalid. They must, therefore, depend entirely on the dispensing power of the pope, and this implies that the laws dispensed with depend upon ecclesiastical custom, which the pope may set aside, and not upon divine institution, which even the pope, in theory, is not believed to be able to alter or subvert, since, as Bellarmine teaches, in jure divino Papa non potest dispensare.

1) Vind. of Episc. or Ap. Succ. pp. 80, 81. See also Broughton's Eccl. Dict. vol. i. p. 160. Oxd. Tr. vol. iii. p. 138, where is quoted archbishop Braimhall. Laud. on the Lit. and Episc. p. 347.

2) See Burnet's Vind. of the Ch. of Scotland, pp. 172, 173.

3) Faber on Transubstantiation,

pp. 121 and 123, and Palmer's Episc. Vind. against Dr. Wiseman, p. 249. 4) Palmer, ibid, p. 248, &c. Nat. Alex. Corpus Juris. Canonici. dist. lxiv. p. 194, Decret. part i.

6) Lib. ii. de Concil. c. 18, and De Matrim. c. ii. and see Aureolus to the same effect, in Div. Right of Min. p. 142.

Neither is the council of Trent to be regarded as contradicting this opinion. "The divines in the council of Trent who were in the pope's interest, argued against the position, that bishops had any other authority whatever, than that derived from the pope,' by using 'those same arguments against the divine right of episcopacy, which from them, and the popish canonists and schoolmen, have been licked up by presbyterians and others."1 No subject occasioned more fierce and protracted debates in the council of Trent, than that of the divine right of the order of bishops, as may be fully seen in the histories of that body. That the final decree, which was a compromise between the opposing parties, favors the opinion that the first and second orders of the ministry, that is, bishops and presbyters, are identical in order, is allowed even by the semi-popish Mr. Palmer, who gives as his reason, that it does not reckon the episcopate as a distinct order from the priesthood, though it denounces anathema against those who deny that there is a hierarchy, divinely instituted, consisting of bishops, presbyters, and ministers.' In the catechism, published by authority of this council and pope Pius V., and embodying their views, this doctrine is most unequivocally advanced. "These,' it says,* after enumerating the priestly functions, 'these are the proper and special functions of the priestly order; which order, THOUGH IT BE BUT ONE, yet it has different degrees of dignity and power. The first is of those who are simply called priests, whose functions have hitherto been declared. The second is of bishops, who are placed over their several bishoprics, to govern, not only the other ministers of the church, but the faithful people, also; and, with the utmost vigilance and care, to take regard of their salvation.' Here, we are expressly taught, that there is but one order of the ministry, while the degree of bishops is proved only by those passages which are now universally allowed to refer only to presbyters. The catechism, then goes on to enumerate archbishops and patriarchs, as the third and fourth degrees of this order; and since it admitted, with equal universality, that these are, in order, one and the same with bishops, bishops must also be, in order, one and the same with presbyters. And hence, in the note

1) Leslie's Letter on Episcop. in Scholar Armed. vol. i. p. 75.

2) Paolo's Hist. of the Council of Trent, pp. 160, 217, 316, 552, 557, 574, 590-598, 677, 687. Mendham's Hist. of Council of Trent, pp. 249

253, 256. Cramp's Text Book of Popery, p.297, and Notes, Eng. ed. 3) Treatise on the Ch. vol. ii. p. 376.

4) Sect. xlviii. p. 308, Lond. 1687.

inserted in the new body of the canon law, it is said, 'there has been always a difference, and still is, between bishops and presbyters, in respect of government, preëminence, and sacraments, but the name and title is common to both.' The Pontifical advocates, with the pope himself, certainly desired to amalgamate the order of bishop and presbyter in the one order of priest, assigning to the bishop no superiority but that of degree."

This opinion, even though infallibly determined, we do not affirm to be universally received, in the Romish church, but only, that it is the established and general doctrine, and that of many of her ablest divines. Cassander holds this language,3 'if episcopacy be an order, divines and canonists do not agree. BUT ALL AGREE THAT, IN THE APOSTLES' AGE, THERE WAS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BISHOP AND PRESBYTER, but afterwards, for order's sake, and that schism might be shunned, the bishop was set over the presbyter, to whom, alone, the power of ordination was committed. It is certain, also, that the presbyterate and diaconate, are THE ONLY SACRED ORDERS, which we read to have been in the primitive church, which pope Urban witnesseth, and Chrysostom and Ambrose observed.' Estius, in his commentary on Lombard's distinctions, allows, also, that the divine. right of episcopacy cannot be clearly proved from scripture.* Cardinal Cajetan, on Acts 20: 28, says, that 'the apostle calls the same persons bishops, who had been named presbyters, verse 17th. For,' saith the cardinal, 'bishop is the name of an office; which office, the apostle subjoins in these words, to rule the flock of God.' Erasmus, on 1 Tim. 4: 14, says," that, 'anciently, there was no difference between presbyter or priest, and bishop, as Jerome witnesses.' 'Among all christians,' says Baxter, 'the papists are the highest prelatists; and among all papists the Jesuits; and among all the Jesuits Petavius, who hath written against Salmasius, &c., on this subject.' Petavius, Dissert. Ecclesiast. de Episcop. dignit. jurisd. p. 22, concludeth his first chapter, in which he had cited the chiefest of the fathers. 'Hitherto, it is proved by the authority of the ancients, that in the first times, not only the names but the orders of presbyters and bishops did concur into the same persons.' Petavius, also, fully proves, that the ancient bishop was a pastor of one communion. Page 24th. 'I think that either all or most of the

1) Dr. Reynolds's Letter to Sir Fr. Knolly's, in Boyse's Anct. Chr. P. 17.

2) Mendham's Council of Trent, p. 249.

3) Consult art. 14, in Jameson's Cyp. Isot. p. 295, Ayton, p. 577. 4) Lib. iv. dist. xxiv. § 25.

5) Jameson's Sum of Episc. Contr.

241.

6) Ibid, p. 242.

7) Baxter on Episcop. part ii. pp. 13, 14.

8) Baxter, ibid, pp. 14, 15, where will be found lengthened quotations from him.

presbyters were so ordained, as that they obtained both the degree of bishop and of presbyter.' Where he proceedeth to show, that he thinks this was done that there might be a store of bishops prepared for all countries, page 25. He holds that there were many bishops in one church, as in that of Ephesus, which he taketh for a particular church, and not a province.'

The testimony thus abundantly offered by the Romish church, in favor of presbytery, may also be found in the Greek church. To this church belong all those fathers whose voice has already been heard, connected with that portion of the world falling within the limits of the Greek church. In addition to the weight. of their testimony, we have a powerful repudiation of prelatical claims, and attestation to the original powers and functions of presbyters, in the existing customs of this church. According to the Romish and the Anglican hierarchy, there is no function. more preeminently episcopal, or appropriated to the bishop, than that of confirmation, so that it would be as outrageous, and as worthy of being accursed, to impute to presbyters this function, as that of ordination itself.1 Now in the Greek church, presbyters are allowed to confirm; not only so, but, what is still more awful, even to consecrate the chrism; and, what crowns the mystery of this iniquity, this practice is sustained by an appeal to the apostolical constitutions!! A proof positive, that, in the judgment of this church, the whole arrangement of the functions of these two orders depends upon no original difference, but altogether upon ecclesiastical law.

To this we may add the testimony of Platon, archbishop of Moscow, who, in his Summary of Christian Divinity, teaches, that 'the governors of the churches consist of pastors and spiritual teachers, according to the doctrine of Paul, Eph. 4: 11, 12. Of pastors some are greater, such as bishops; and others are lesser, such as presbyters or ministers.' Both, however, are pastors, who are governors of the churches. Nilus, also, archbishop of the Greek church, says, 'nay, every priest is, by this reason, a successor of the apostles, of whom, by tradition, they have received the priesthood,' &c. To these we may add, that 'Zaga Zabo, an Ethiopic bishop, names, says Dr. Willet," priests and deacons and subdeacons, and addeth no more, in his confession of the Ethiopic faith.

1) Potter on Ch. Govt. Cramp's Text Book of Popery, p. 124, Eng. ed.

2) Riddle's Chr. Antiq. p. 498, Apost. Const. 1. iii. c. 16, 17, and iv. c. 43.

3) Pinkerton's Transl. 1814, p. 167, § 28.

Edinb.

4) Lib. ii. de primat. in Willet, Syn. p. 168.

5) Synopsis Papismi. Fol. p. 268, from Damianus de Morib. Ethiop.