opinion, he consenteth not to the passion of Christ. Endeavour, then, to use one and the same eucharist, for there is but one body of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup, that his blood may make us one. There is but one altar, also there is one bishop, together with the presbyters and deacons ; that so, whatsoever ye do, ye may do all according to the will of God." Would Ignatius have exalted the episcopate far above the presbyters and deacons, in their very presence too, conscious that in so doing he was falsifying scripture? I trow not. Would they have submitted to the unwarrantable degradation of their office? Would they have reverenced the man, nay more, would they not rather have trembled for the ultimate fate of one under the sentence of death, and whom even the prospect of being a prey to savage beasts could not deter from propagating falsehood, nor subdue the proud spirit which led him to bestow titles of honour upon the bishops, disallowed by the apostles, and tending to superstition? I am persuaded-I am convinced of his sincerity. My reason yields to the evidence of these facts; and when I rise from the perusal of his works, I cannot for one instant doubt that all his recorded opinions and precepts regarding the church, were the opinions, not of his own time only, but that they were delivered to him by the blessed apostles, on whom the church

E

of the living God was founded, and of which Jesus Christ was, and ever shall be, the chief corner-stone. Ignatius wrote not to convince the churches of the necessity of obedience to the bishops, presbyters, and deacons, and of the unlawfulness of any other than these administering the sacraments—the Babel of heresy had not then been built, and there needed not many arguments to persuade the faithful of facts and truths not then called in question. But, as a dying christian, it was meet to bequeath to the survivors his earnest prayer and exhortation "to continue steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in breaking of bread, and in prayer," knowing full well that the time would come when "they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears." Seeing that so great a cloud of witnesses bears testimony both to the doctrines contained in the epistles of St. Ignatius, and also to the genuineness of these epistles, I cannot, I dare not despise them as the opinions of a man of no authority, and in their stead give heed to contrary opinions, broached by men who lived about 1500 years after the apostles, and whose opinions were founded, not on facts, but on theories of their own invention. From what has been quoted from Ignatius, that Father held, as I have ventured to affirm, that the validity of the sacraments consisted in

"Let

their being administered by lawful persons: no one do any thing pertaining to the church without the bishop." If it be true, and it will not surely be denied, that people do not generally seek for baptism except from the hands of one who is called a minister, counting the ministerial office necessary to give effect to that sacrament; and if it be true that no layman can administer baptism,-it must likewise be true that no layman can give authority to another to baptize : and if a presbyter has never received authority to ordain, he cannot confer upon others the faculty of ordaining. That therefore which was originally unlawful, null, void, and of non-effect, can never after any lapse of time become lawful. We conclude, then, that baptism, and all other ministerial offices, in order to be effective, must be celebrated by persons whose authority has been regularly transmitted to them from the holy apostles, the only persons to whom the scriptures declare our Lord gave authority. And whoever derives his authority from any opposite or separate source, all the acts which he performs of a ministerial character must be nothing worth.

magistrates, nor laymen of any

Neither kings, nor

degree, not even

presbyters or deacons, were ever empowered by God to ordain. The whole question, then, is not whether the Episcopal or the Presbyterian form of church government is the better of the two. But it is, where doth

the ordaining power rest? Where is the fundamental principle? Where the vital spark of the priesthood? We answer, With the bishops, the alone successors of the apostles. And were it even granted, for argument's sake, that the episcopate arose after the death of all the apostles, even this concession cannot benefit presbyterians; for, from the days of St. Ignatius down to those of Calvin, the power of ordination was exclusively exercised by bishops; presbyters never received authority to ordain, but only to administer the sacraments and to preach; so they could not possibly transmit to others a power which they had not themselves received. And I know not that it has ever been asserted by any presbyterians, that any Catholic or Romish bishops ever renounced their episcopate, and, under the name of presbyters, became the founders of presbyterian churches, and thus transmitted the apostolic seed to the present generation. I conceive, could this be established, that any church, though denominated presbyterian, would be entitled to be recognised as a branch of the true church. But if this leaven exist not, upon what grounds, I would ask, can any man claim to be a minister of Christ? Why should we imagine that God, who fixed the sacred offices in the Jewish Church to the tribe of Levi, and. to the family of Aaron in particular, would not likewise order the Christian

priesthood in a particular line? The former by a natural, the latter by a spiritual generation. The whole Jewish economy, its priesthood, sacrifices, altar, and festivals, were typical, and shadowed forth better things to come. Now a shadow cannot proceed from nothing, but must be the immaterial representation of some material and substantial body intervening between the light. If we see on a road a shade, we know that it is caused by a house, or a tree, or a man, or some other solid body which the sun cannot penetrate; and if, in order to satisfy our minds which of all these objects has caused the darkness, we trace the shadow from its extreme point down to the end, we shall come in contact with some solid substance which we can handle, and examine, and ascertain the meaning of; it remains while the shadow passeth away. In like manner the Jewish priesthood was the shadow of the Christian. The Paschal Lamb of Christ our passover, and of his representatives, the bread and wine of the holy communion. The altar shadowed the cross on which Christ was offered, and also the altar on which the eucharist is placed. In like manner, also, the Jewish festivals were shadows of the Christian; the Feast of the Passover of Good Friday, the day of the crucifixion; and Whitsunday, which falls out fifty days after the resurrection, and is commemorative of the miraculous effusion of the