prevailing, although the powers themselves were evermore distinct. That ground of dispute may well, as I have said, be set aside, where the proof is to be made that in no case, singly or conjointly, did the Presbyters, now properly so called, ever exercise those powers which belonged to the Apostles, and to those to whom they conveyed a portion of their own authority. Of that number of Apostolical persons we have divers names recorded in the sacred page of Scripture. The question then is, yet again, whether the power of ordination with other privileges of Episcopacy, were conveyed to chosen men even in the days of the Apostles, or were left indifferently to the Presbyters. And what can so well decide this, as the known fact recorded in the sacred Scriptures, to which all antiquity has borne so plain a testimony.

Having then stated the main particular which I have in view, which requires less proof, because it has been so often and so well established, I may observe now with reference to another of the questions touched before, that the point debated whether the difference between Bishop and Presbyter be that of order or degree, although it make nothing to the main circumstance with which I am concerned, yet does it claim a special notice at our hands, since some of our communion appear to have countenanced the distinction of degree, but

with no design, assuredly, to impeach the honor of Episcopacy. We know the evil aspect which the papal See, since the claim for one to be an universal Bishop was set up, has borne upon episcopal prerogatives; but none of our communion will be suspected of leaning to those attempts against the rightful independence of Episcopal authority.

We must, however, look for the rise of that question concerning order or degree, to the doctrines of the schools, and to those opinions which made orders to be another Sacrament; and then regarding also the right of consecrating the Holy Eucharist as the highest privilege and exercise of sacerdotal power, the distinction of degree came in very naturally; for as much as the sacramental character, and the consecrating power as it regards the Eucharist, are common to the Bishop and the Presbyter. But the inference that the power of ordaining would be, therefore, valid in the Presbyterial hand, because he had the character of orders and the power to consecrate the Eucharist, did not follow. The schoolmen themselves, never urged that consequence, though they might adapt their language to their own conceits, and were indeed much followed by many of the first reformers, and gave the tone to some of their opinions. But the language of our chief reformers in this land, is best seen in their public acts.

"The book of Common Prayer, and for ordaining and consecrating Bishops, Priests, and Deacons,” speaks for itself" It is evident," says the preface to that formulary, "unto all men diligently reading the Holy Scriptures, that from the Apostles' time there have been these orders of ministers in Christ's Church, Bishops, Priests, and Deacons." In the answers printed by our historian Strype, from the Cotton manuscript, Cranmer, with two others in reply to the tenth query, says "Christ made Apostles first, which were of his own making -after that the Apostles made both Bishops and Priests, the names whereof in Scripture be confounded." In a word, whatever becomes of the question (if it can be made a question) concerning the terms used, neither the schoolmen nor the reformers ever questioned the distinction of power. The power of ordination and the privileges of episcopal authority stand, as we have seen, on other grounds of provision made to that effect; and the proof of any actual exercise of such powers by Presbyters has been sought in vain. It is past all hope that it ever will be found. Where could the reformers seek it? Not in the valleys of Piedmont, nor among the primitive Waldenses; they from the first had ever had episcopacy; and the reformed Bohemians, in their hour of need, prudently and wisely sought their

aid, and derived the succession of their orders from them.

Must we turn then to St. Jerome in this case? His expostulation with his aspiring Deacons, goes far indeed in gratuitous assertion; and yet by his own confession, it falls greatly short of that for which it is alleged. He puts in a plain exception in favour of the Bishop's power, which quite spoils the triumph which is raised on his assertion, "Quid facit Episcopus exceptâ ordinatione, quod Presbyter non faciat,"-are words which establish the very truth to which his suffrage is opposed. The Scholiast on this place refers to St. Jerome's own words elsewhere, in order to supply this further testimony, “quod hic omisit, Hieronymus in dialogo contra Luciferianos posuit; scilicet quod Episcopus etiam confirmet."

Nor is this all-for in the conclusion of the same epistle, St. Jerome distinctly compares the Bishops, Priests, and Deacons in the Christian Church, to Aaron, the inferior Priests, and Levites, of the legal dispensation. His words are, "ut sciamus traditiones Apostolicas sumptas de Veteri Testamento, quod Aaron, et filii ejus, atque Levitæ, in Templo fuerunt, hoc sibi Episcopi et Presbyteri et Diaconi vindicent in Ecclesiâ."

He says as plainly on Gal. i. 9. "procedente

tempore, et alii ab his quos Dominus elegerat, ordinati sunt Apostoli." Nay, in the very passage so much urged he says no more than this-that it was agreed, for the sake of avoiding schism, to set some above the rest,-" quod autem postea unus electus est qui cæteris præponeretur, in schismatis remedium factum est; ne unusquisque ad se trahens, Christi ecclesiam rumperet." Where although he ventures, without a trace of sacred history for his support, to put this agreement as an after thought, not first intended by the Apostles, which is strange enough, and no very decent supposition; yet he acknowledges that this was done by the Apostles, they being still alive; and, as he declares elsewhere, had it been otherwise there might have been as many schisms as Presbyters. Nor does he hesitate in another place to say, without reserve, "Apostolorum locum tenent episcopi ;" and again-" Episcopi stant in loco Pauli, et gradum Petri tenent."

Take these things together, and our cause can suffer little by St. Jerome. And if writers be regarded, older than he by centuries, whose writings have been vindicated by our own divines against all exceptions, the case will be clear enough.

What St. Jerome says concerning the peculiar customs which he states to have obtained in the

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