mind of the Church-an older 'freedom of prophesying'? Not in the least. The Church never in fact committed herself at all to any position with reference to the rights and powers which would be allowed to those whose real inspiration she could recognise. She did not admit Montanist inspiration and then deny that it had accompanying rights; she simply denied that it was inspiration. Towards prophecy she was taking up no new line whatever. And the more closely we look at Montanism, whether in its. origin or in its development, the less inclined shall we be to attribute to Montanism conservative or retrospective tendencies. It was the element of conservatism in it,' it has been said by one whose justice always commends his words, 'the fact that it spoke the language and reaffirmed the ideas of a bygone day, that gave Montanism its strength, and won over to it so powerful a champion as Tertullian.'2 Such language, however, seems contrary to the evidence we have of the nature of Montanism. If we read Tertullian's de Virginibus Velandis, we shall be struck with its unconservative tone. Tertullian, the catholic, strikes the note of conservatism in the Praescriptio. As a Montanist he still kept his hold on the ancient doctrine; but novitas' is his watchword in matters of discipline. In this region he

We have not, it must be remembered, to deal in Montanism with a claim for 'liberty of prophesying' in any modern sense, but with a claim of supernatural inspiration. See Dr. Salmon's article in the Dict. Chr. Biog. S.V. MONTANUS; and Authority and Archaeology PP. 392 ff.

Dr. Sanday in Expositor, Feb. 1887, p. 110. Bonwetsch, the best recent investigator of the matter, though he does not altogether accept this view of Montanism as a conservative or reactionary movement, quotes some words from the acts of a bishop Achatius in the Decian persecution (Ruinart Acta Martyrum Sincera: § 4) as a sign that this view of them was held already in early days (Zeitschr. f.k. Wissenschaft u. k. Leben, 1884, heft ix. p. 473). The words are: Cataphryges aspice, homines religionis antiquae.' But even if the reading is correct, the words certainly do not bear any meaning of that sort. They are put in the mouth of the pagan magistrate. He had first induced the Montanists to apostatize and sacrifice, and then held them up as examples of return to the ancient religion, i.e. the old Roman religion: ad mea sacra conversos,' he continues, 'reliquisse quae fuerant, et nobiscum diis vota persolvere."

denounces custom: 'custom, which, taking its origin from ignorance or simplicity, is strengthened by succession into a practice, and then makes its position good against the truth. . . . It is not the charge of novelty, but the truth, which refutes heresies. Whatever is against the truth, this is heresy, even though it be an old custom.' The rule of faith indeed is immovable,1 but the other matters of discipline and life admit the novelty of correction, because the grace of God works and advances even till the end.' There is a gradual development, then, in the Church as the Spirit the Lord's Vicar'—gradually works out His plan of discipline. This development has for its content 'the direction of discipline, the revelation of Scriptures, the improvement of our understanding, the advance to a better state of things.' It is like the natural development of physical life. The infancy of mankind was under the Law and the Prophets; it came to its hot youth under the Gospel; now, through the Spirit (i.e. the Spirit which inspired the new prophets, the Montanist Spirit, in virtue of which they set the Church of the Spirit' against the 'Church of the bishops') it is realizing the strength of manhood.' This passage has no direct bearing on the claim to possess a substitute for ordained bishops in inspired prophets, but it disposes of the contention that Montanism represented conservative tendencies in matters of church

1 But even that is more fully unfolded to Montanists: see adv. Prax. 2. 30, de Res. Carn. 63.

de Virg. Vel. 1: Hac lege fidei manente, cetera iam disciplinae et conversationis admittunt novitatem correctionis, operante scilicet et proficiente usque in finem gratia Dei. . . . cum propterea Paracletum miserit Dominus ut, quoniam humana mediocritas omnia semel capere non poterat, paulatim dirigeretur et ordinaretur et ad perfectum perduceretur disciplina ab illo vicario Domini Spiritu sancto. Quae est ergo Paracleti administratio, nisi haec, quod disciplina dirigitur, quod scripturae revelantur, quod intellectus reformatur, quod ad meliora proficitur? Nihil sine aetate est, omnia tempus exspectant. . . Sic et iustitia (nam idem Deus iustitiae et creaturae) primo fuit in rudimentis, natura Deum metuens; dehinc per legem et prophetas promovit in infantiam; dehinc per evangelium efferbuit in uventutem: nunc per Paracletum componitur in maturitatem.' N

Summary.

discipline. As well, then, might one quote the contemporary humanitarians as illustrating what had hitherto been the Church's doctrine about Christ, as the Montanists to illustrate her doctrine of orders.1

It was of course

principle gained It was with this

Now we have come to the end of a long argument. Starting from the age of Irenaeus, we have traced downward the stream of church life, and everywhere we have found the Church recognising the authority of a ministry, derived by succession from the Apostles, and consisting of bishops, presbyters, and deacons ; everywhere we have seen reason to believe that these ministers were qualified for their high functions by an ordination given after due election with the laying-on of the hands of the bishops who were before them, and only in virtue of such ordination held to possess the authority and the grace of God requisite for the ministry they were called to fulfil. only gradually that this ministerial complete and adequate expression. as with church doctrine. In both departments there is a development in explicitness of conception and in accuracy and fulness of language. But the principle held the ground from the first with thorough recognition; and the evidence of this is that, wherever the claim of the ministry was challenged, the spirit of the Church rose to maintain it, and those who could not recognise the authority of their fathers in Christ found themselves aliens from the brotherhood. The challenge may have come from the side of Montanist enthusiasm or Novatianist separatism; or it may have been due to the self-assertion of an individual against church order; or it may have had its origin in a collapse of discipline such as led to the attempt of

1 These humanitarians really did make the claim to be the true conservatives; see Euseb. H. E. v. 28. 2-4. The writer from whom Eusebius is quoting (Hippolytus?) makes the suggestive rejoinder: 'What they said might have been perhaps convincing, if, first of all, the Holy Scriptures had not contradicted them.'

some deacons, in days of persecution, to offer the eucharist; or it may have been a challenge in theory rather than in practice, like Aerius' denial of the distinctive dignity of the episcopate. But in whatever sense, and from whatever quarter, the authority of the ministry was challenged, the mind of the Church spoke out loud in its vindication. For the ministry was acknowledged, instinctively and universally, as the divinely given stewardship of truth and grace, as part of the new creation of God; and, 'the things which the Lord instituted through His Apostles, these,' in Athanasius' words, 'remain honourable and valid.' As an institution of Christ through His Apostles-divine, permanent, and necessary-the threefold ministry made its appearance on the horizon of our epoch and 'the memory of man ran not to the contrary.'

position of the argu

ment.

CHAPTER IV

THE INSTITUTION OF THE APOSTOLATE

The present HITHERTO we have been occupied in expounding a certain set of principles which are involved in the phrase 'the apostolic succession of the ministry,' and in adducing a great body of evidence calculated to show how completely, and indeed without fundamental exception, these principles obtained acceptance in the Church, and governed her action, from the middle of the second century onwards. It is, in fact, impossible to exaggerate the intimacy with which the episcopal succession is bound up with the fixed canon of Scripture and the permanent and stable creed to constitute what can rightly be called 'historical Christianity.' We may indeed see more clearly, on reviewing the earlier period, that there was the same tentativeness in the process by which the formulated nomenclature and the exact form of the ministry was arrived at, as appears in the corresponding formulation of the creed of the Church; but in neither case did this development in language and form involve any uncertainty of principle during the period so far reviewed and if we compare the development of the ministry with the process by which the canon of Scripture was fixed, we are struck with the fact that the hesitation which appears in the latter process, as to what did and what did not fall within the canon, has no parallel in any hesitation as to what did or what did not constitute at any particular