appears both from the general structure of the apostolic epistles, which, while treating upon all points of doctrine and discipline, are addressed, not to the clergy only, but to the Church at large, and from the precedent of the apostolic council held at Jerusalem, which we may presume to have been intended to be the model of such assemblies in after ages. In that council, "the whole church," consisting of apostles, elders, and brethren, came together for the purpose of deliberation; and the decree ran in the name of the whole community. It would be interesting, were this the place for such a discussion, to trace the steps by which the apostolic model of an ecclesiastical assembly was gradually departed from, until at length not only were the laity, but the presbyters and deacons also, excluded from any real share in the government of the Church. The synodal system, in itself beneficial and indeed necessary, was the proximate cause of the change. When dioceses became consolidated into provinces, it was as natural that there should be provincial as it had formerly been that there should be diocesan synods. The latter for a long time retained that popular element which is the proper counterpoise of sacerdotal influence. Even Cyprian, the chief promoter of episcopal authority, declares it to have been his rule, from the time that he became a bishop, to do nothing without the advice of his presbyters, and the consent of his people. * "Common decency," he writes to his clergy, "as well as our rule of discipline and manner of" (church) "life, requires that we, the bishops, assembling with the clergy, and in the presence of the steadfast laity, to whom, on account of their faith and obedience, due consideration is to be shown, should settle all matters by piously consulting together." But in the provincial synods, to which the more important questions were referred for consideration, it soon became the practice for the bishops only, as representatives of their respective churches, to be formally summoned; the presbyters, if any such attended, appearing merely as followers of their bishop, while the laity were virtually excluded. For though the doors of the synod were not at first absolutely closed against lay persons, yet the latter, inasmuch as they sent to it no formal representatives, were present, if any did gain admittance, more as spectators than as a constituent part of the assembly. At length, in the greater councils, whether provincial or general, the whole administrative † Epist. 13. Ad Cler. Epist. 5. Ad Presbyt. et Diac. * power became concentrated in the bishops: they alone possessed the right of voting; and if a few presbyters and laics were still found in attendance, it was only for the purpose of discharging certain subordinate functions. The decisions of a council thus constituted became binding upon the whole province, or the whole church, as the case might be; and each bishop returned to his own diocese to enforce decrees, in the framing of which neither presbyters nor people had had any share. The government of the Church had become an oligarchy of the most exclusive description. It is easy to say, in justification of this departure from apostolic practice, that, inasmuch as the bishop, being one with his people, and his people with him, cannot be conceived of apart from them, the laity were, in fact, present at synods in and through their bishops: they were represented in him. † But considerations of this refined and mystical kind are not found, in practice, to operate very strongly. A clerical corporation, like every other, naturally and insensibly tends to its own aggrandizement; and this without perceiving the motives which influence it. Nothing would be more unjust than to attribute to the bishops of the third and fourth centuries a systematic design to make their own order the exclusive repository of spiritual power: such nevertheless was the actual result of their measures. The love of power, disguising itself under a variety of forms, was always at work; and the most pious bishops had little difficulty in persuading themselves that, in seeking to augment the influence of the episcopate, they were promoting the interests of the Church at large. Not unfrequently indeed the circumstances of the time were such as to call for, on the part of the bishop, the most vigorous exercise of the prerogatives which his office conferred upon him, in order to prevent the Church from becoming a scene of anarchy and disorder; a fact which accounts for, if it does not justify, the expressions which meet us in the pages of Ignatius and Cyprian. The picture which the epistles of the latter present of that singular class of persons, the "confessors," of their spiritual arrogance, and contempt of lawful authority, is sufficient to prove that nothing but the utmost "At Catholicorum sententia est, solos prælatos majores eosque omnes, id est, episcopos, in conciliis generalibus et provincialibus habere jus suffragii decisivi ordinarie: ex presbyteris autem et aliis clericis minoribus tantum vocari aliquos viros doctos, qui juvent in disputando vel aliis ministeriis: denique ex privatis laicis tantum vocari aliquos qui videantur utiles, vel necessarii ad aliquod ministerium concilii." Bellarm. de Concil. lib. i. c. 15. + Moehler, Einheit in der Kirche, p. 211. stretch of that authority could have availed to keep them within bounds. The position, however, which individual bishops were thus led to assume, and the claims which they put forward, were never abandoned when the circumstances which had given rise to them ceased: assumptions which were forced upon Cyprian became the ordinary style of his successors: every contest between the presbyters, or the laity, and the bishops, terminated in favour of the latter and thus by continual accretions, each small in itself, the hierarchical system attained those gigantic proportions which it exhibited in the middle ages. * No Church can be in a healthy condition which excludes from the administration of its affairs any constituent part of the body ecclesiastic. They who feel that they are regarded not as a part of Christ's body, but as an appendage to the priesthood, will naturally cease to feel an interest in the preservation and purity of the Church; and a spirit of indifference, perhaps the most foreign of all tempers to the Gospel, will take the place of that hearty sympathy and co-operation which springs from a felt identification of interests. There can be no genuine church feeling, where there is no church life; and there can be no church life where the relation of pastors and people resembles that of governors and subjects, or where one order of the clerical body absorbs in itself the powers which belong to the whole, and can enact laws without the concurrence, and even against the will, of the other orders. It is our Lord's injunction that the spirit in which civil government is carried on should be banished from the community of his .... .... * The statements of Ignatius on Episcopacy have usually been thought to overstep the limits of sobriety; but they are mild when compared with those of the Apostolical Constitutions. From these spurious, but very ancient, compositions the reader may form an accurate notion of the prevailing cast of theological sentiment towards the beginning of the fourth century. Their spuriousness detracts nothing frem their value in this respect, for the writer, whoever he may have been, must be supposed faithfully to reflect the opinions of his age. To bishops the Constitutions assign the following prerogatives: - To mediate between God and man, and to represent God upon earth: & iríokonos · · μεσίτης Θεοῦ καὶ ὑμῶν ἐν ταῖς πρὸς αὐτὸν λατρείαις . . δι ̓ ὕδατος καὶ πνεύματος ἀναγεννήσας ὑμᾶς εἰς υἱοθεσίαν οὗτος ὑμῶν βασιλεὺς καὶ δυνάστης, οὗτος ὑμῶν ἐπίγειος Θεὸς μετὰ Θεόν. L. 2. c. 66. Εi οὖν ἐῤῥέθη Μωυσῆς ὑπὸ Κυρίου Θεὸς, καὶ ὑμῶν ὁ ἐπίσκοπος εἰς Θεὸν τετιμήσθω, καὶ ὁ διάκονος ὡς τροφήτης αὐτοῦ. - Ibid. c. 30. Το possess the keys of heaven and hell: οὗτοι γὰρ παρὰ θεῶ ζωῆς καὶ θανάτου ἐξουσίαν ειλήφασιν ἐν τῷ δικάζειν τοὺς ἡμαρτηκότας καὶ καταδικάζειν εἰς θάνατον πυρὸς αἰωνίου, καὶ λύειν ἁμαρτιῶν τοὺς ἐπιστρέφοντας, καὶ ζωογονεῖν αὐτούς. - Ibid. e. 33. Το be sole judges between Christians: τοῖς γὰρ ἱερεῦσιν (i. e. the bishops) επετράπη κρίνειν μόνοις· ὅτι Ibid. c. 36. εἴρηται αὐτοῖς, Κρίμα δίκαιον κρίνετε. — (Deut. i. 26. and 16. 18.) And to be superior to temporal sovereigns: Τούτους ἄρχοντας ὑμῶν καὶ βασιλεῖς ἡγεῖσθαι νομίζετε, καὶ δασμοὺς ὡς βασιλεῦσι προσφέρετε . . ὅσῳ τοίνυν ψυχὴ σώματος κρείττων, τοσούτω ἱερωσύνη βασιλείας. - Ibid. c. 34. .... followers; that nothing resembling a secular lordship (oi faoikeis τῶν ἐθνῶν κυριεύουσιν αὐτῶν) should find a place in his Church. To exclude this evil is hardly possible where the councils of the Church are composed exclusively of clerical persons, sitting in secret conclave, and jealously refusing to admit the laity to a share in their deliberations. The second point in which the laity have joint rights with the clergy is in the appointment of pastors; not in the transmission of the ministerial commission (for this, as we have seen, is the peculiar prerogative of the clergy), but in the local settlement of the pastor. The rule which Scripture furnishes on this point is, that no pastor is to be placed over a Church without its consent having been previously obtained thereto. In the Romish system this regulation would, obviously, be an anomaly. For the laity being there regarded as in a state of spiritual pupilage, and, therefore, unable to discern what is best for their spiritual interests, to seek their concurrence in the institution of him who is to be over them in the Lord would be as unwise as unnecessary: a right like this can be safely entrusted to those only who have attained to some maturity of Christian knowledge, and spiritual wisdom. There is no point of apostolic order which seems more easy of establishment than the one of which we are now speaking. The first occasion on which, after our Lord's ascension, an election to an ecclesiastical office took place was that on which a successor to Judas Iscariot was to be chosen. The mode of proceeding in this instance deserves notice. If in any case it might have seemed allowable to dispense with the concurrence of the people in ecclesiastical appointments, this was such a case: that Apostles only should fill up the vacancy in the apostolical college, so peculiar in its functions, so much elevated by spiritual endowments above the rest of the Church, would appear but reasonable. Yet on no other occasion is there a more express mention made of popular intervention. The disciples, not the Apostles alone, being assembled together to the number of a hundred and twenty, Peter, in an address directed to the whole assembly, introduces the subject. At his suggestion, "they"-that is, the Apostles and disciples"appointed" two individuals as the best fitted for the vacant office; and referring the decisive selection between the two to the Lord Himself, they all "prayed," and "gave forth their lots."* The same course was pursued in the first appointment of deacons. The Apostles brought the matter before "the multitude of the Acts, i. 23-26. disciples," directing them to choose out among themselves those whom they should judge best qualified for the new office: the multitude make the selection, and present the persons selected to the Apostles, for the purpose of receiving the imposition of their hands. It is true that if, as some have thought, † those seven ministers of the Church of Jerusalem were not deacons, properly so called, that is, as that term was afterwards understood-but lay administrators of the revenues of the Church, the transaction no longer constitutes a precedent for the principle of which we are speaking; but, on the other hand, it becomes one for the equally important rule, that, in the administration of church affairs, and especially in the management of the funds of the Church, the laity should have a part, either personally or by their representatives. Thus, in whatever point of view we choose to regard the appointment of Stephen and his companions, it is adverse to the clerical exclusiveness of the Romish system. Passing onwards in the history of the early Church we read that, in locating ministers in the newly planted churches of Asia, Paul and Barnabas took the suffrages of the people; and in this way, "ordained them elders in every church: " conceding to each society the power of selection, but reserving to themselves the right of approval and institution. The remark that the word χειροτονήσαντες, which is the one that occurs in the passage alluded to, is often used to signify the simple act of appointing, and need not necessarily mean appointing with the consent of others, is a just one; but it is better, where there is no reason, as there is none here, for departing from it, to adhere to the natural, and original, signification of the word, which is, to appoint officers by means of suffrage; especially when the practice of the Apostles on other occasions is in favour of this interpretation. It may be added that the notices which the New Testament contains concerning the rule by which the Apostles guided themselves in the settlement of pastors are confirmed by the weighty testimony of Clement of Rome: "Those," he writes, "whom either the Apostles or other distinguished men" (their delegates) "placed in the ministry, with the consent of the whole Church" (that is, of each particular church), "it is not right to depose from their office," &c. § Acts, vi. 2-6. Bilson, Perpet. Gov. &c. pp. 109, 110. See Wahl's Lexicon, xɛporovεiv, and the examples of the use of the word there given. In the sense in which it is used by later ecclesiastical writers,-viz. "to lay hands upon,”it does not occur in the New Testament. 8 Τοὺς οὖν κατασταθέντας ὑπ' ἐκείνων, ἢ μεταξὺ ὑφ ̓ ἑτέρων ἐλλογίμων ἀνδρῶν, συνευδοκησάσης τῆς ikkλnolas máons, &c.,- 1 Epist. s. 44. For several centuries after the Christian era, the |