The Express.
London, England, 1852-01-28 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

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LONDON, WEDNIIBD.I Y, .1.1 NUA Rl' V.

O*D►RS are said to have been sent out recalling
to Hoglund three of the principal ships composing
the squadron now lying in the Tag ; and as many
of the vessels which contribute to form our fleet in
the Mediterranean.

If this rumour should prove authentic, —as there is
reason for believing it to he,—the first practical con-
tention rill have been made to the force of public
opinion on the subject; and the first step in the
direction indicated by common tens, in the managc•
sent of our naval attains will have lessen taken. We
shall re-crve our congratulations un:11 we. have the
satisfaction of announcing the arrival of the
ships in question at Portsmouth. Some time
must elapse before those which have to Rohe
their homeward voyage from the ].want can dr.
their anchors in a native harbour; and there has
long becn too much of instability of purpose and in-
decision of measures about the administration of
theme matters to allow us to feel altogether certain
that sonic foolish countermand may not be issued
which man leave the effect of interrupting the home-
ward sail of these floating fortresses. We must
have. more-over, the fact t :illicitly avowed by a re-
sponsible minister in his place in parliament, before
we shall feel unv assurance that the good thus dune
will not be speedily undone at the instance of some
foreign e.turt.or for the sake of some imaginary duty
of dignity or dictation, in the performance of which
oar rulers are usually so much mom sensitive than
sa points relating to popular contentment or
oreurity.
Assuming, however, as we arc willing to do, that
after this week only half the steam frigates and
ships of the line, maimed and paid for by our indus-
trious people, will be wen lying before Lisbon, and
that alter the Ist February some of the supernume-
raries of the Mediterranean squadron will be found
steering for "the Pillars of Hercules," in order that
they may us speedily as possible resume a post of
real usefulness and true honour in our own latitude
—assuming, we say, that these things are so, then
we would ask what greater proof of the instinctive
sense of seltprotecting national sagacity can be
eonoeived than such a proceeding furnishes ? For
years the system of placing the odious part
of political gaoler in Portugal has been de-
nounced by the popular members of our le-
gislature, and by the popular press. Year
after year these remonstrances have been doggedly
disregarded; and amid profound international peace
la Europe, the miserable court of Queen DoNNa
MARIe lies been countenanced and sustained in ob-
durate folly, extravagance, and perfidy by the pre-
sence of an overwhelming naval force under the
British flag. While now that rumours of war are
rife, and that the most charitable and peaceable have
misgivings as to the permanency of the continental
skins quo, we are compelled by sheer necessity and
the paramount duty of protecting our own shores, to
withdraw the fatal boon which has heretofore en-
eiraraged the impenitence and selfishness of our un-
worthy ally. Had Portugal been left after the
expulsion of Dos to settle its in-
ternal affairs as best it might without the
overshadowing influence of our mischievous
intervention, its domestic squabbles would have
been long since terminated—most probably in
the establishment of some constitutional system
which the merchant could trust and which the sol-
dier would loyally obey. But the unhappy reliance
of the royal government on British aid has rendered
all attempts at permanent reform nugatory. and all
pledges and guarantees valueless in the estimation of
the Portuguese nation. They believe in nothing
that is said to them in decrees and ordinances.
They know that there is no waste of their sub-
stance too lavish, no caprice of authority too sudden,
no organised system of official jobbery and robbery
too flagrant tobc assured of impunity through the
medium of British interposition. And the oaten-
able means of this scandalous service, rendered
without thanks or profit in the name of a great and
free people—is the British fleet at anchor in the
Tagus.
Let us hope, even against hope, that now, when
the long-deferred moment has arrived in which our
lag must disappear from the glassy surface of the
noble scream that washes Lisbon's quays, better,
because more self-reliant, counsels will be at last
adopted by the House of BasitaNz s and its confiden-
tial advisers. The spell of their infatuation must
rarely at length be broken. The days of their tute-
lage and their practical irresponsibility are ended.
It remains to be seen whether they have learned
anything, however late, in the difficult art of rule ;
or whether, like the BOURBONS, they shall prove to
the world that " they have learned and unlearned
nothing." Be that, however, as it may, one
thing is certain namely, that having got
our gallant ships, with their gallant crows,
home, the English people will never again suer
them to be perverted to so despicable a purpose as
they have involuntarily been of recent years. Should
peace happily continue with all the great states of
the continent, we may possibly find suitable employ-
ment in remote regions for some of these noble and
truly national defences: while others remain at
home. And in the calamitous event of war we
shall hold them in readiness to defend the only
royalty and the only realm they can honourably or
usefully he employed in defending—the reyatuatend
realm of Britain. But in any case we shall
so more the maintenance of a police swim
is the 'fagns or elsewhere. The goveraineut
and the people of Portugal must settle their
differences between themselves, withost our
aid. We cannot afford to pay taxes for ship at
war we do not want; and we do not want to Imvs
anything to do with the dirty work of foreign
courts. If the safety of our coasts does not require
that we should maintain our present enormous nasal
armament, let it be reduced; but at all events, ht
us have the satisfaction of believing, that in case of
seed we should have something for our money.
The same motives that have led to the issue of
mandates of recall to the Mediterranean and Tagus

•eats ought to dictate like measures with respect to
the naval force on the Brazilian and African sta-
tions. Philanthropy is excellent in its way; but
even supposing its way in the instance in question
were the right one,—which there is no ordinary rea-
eon to doubt,—philanthropy must begin at home. A
dozen steam-ships more in the Channel may make
all the difference some fine moonlight night
between the infliction of a humiliating blow aimed
at our national integrity, and the prompt and ex-
emplary defeat or any attempt of the kind. And
laying aside, therefore, fur argument's sake, all
unphilosophie partiality for the safety of our
own bones and households above those of
Negro-land, we submit to their lordships of the
Board of Admiralty that it is upon the whole plainly
more important that the physical and moral power
of this gnat empire should be preserved intact ar.d
intangible, than that some half dozen of slavers should
be chased by our cruisers during the next twelve
months. In the lung run it will manifestly be better
even for the interests of the negroes themselves
that England should call on every man who wears
her naval uniform to do his duty—the duty above all
others which he owes to her—of maintaining in tho
oarr,,w SCSI the inviolability of her flag.

111.110 r PIIILLPOTTS again! When will the octo-
genarian prelate suffer his friend~ and his foes to
rest Again, too, an ebullition of exclusiveness,
uncharitableness, and episeopal spleen, such as ho
alone knows how to pour out. Again, above all, a
new onslaught on his metropolitan.
_ _

Forgetful of the rule, solve sexescentem, ho dis-
ports himself with argument, alas! to the infinite
delight or his opponents. To prove the exclusive
validity of episcopal ordination against his primate,
against common sense, against his church, and
egotist scripture, was a temptation irreeistible to
the aged contmversialist. " Nothing dm but the
hands of my order," cries he, "can make a mm a
minister. Dissenting and foreign churches aro
served by a herd of usurping and unauthorised lay-

men. They have no sacraments, no miniafty : they
are not churches at all."
Let our foreign and dissenting friends be ander no
alarm; they could have desired nothing better than
that so subtle a casuist should have undertaken the
positive proof of "no bishop, no church." It could
I hardly have been known how absolutely nothing can
be said for this arrogant doctrine, till this elaborate
attempt to establish it had come forth. There is
literally no evidence to go to a jury. Scarcely any
other reply is needed than the repetition of the de-
mand for proof. The break-down is complete.
"The tieeessily of episcopal ordination is the pro-
position which Dr. l'it t 'Axons has undertaken to" de-
fend publicly in the face of the church." Necessity is a
strong word : not stronger than his case required ; but
one, however, which calls for the proof of a very pe-
remptory obligation. We do not want to he told that the
Lord seta his Apostles; yvhodenied Northat " the
pure word of lieu should be preached:"—what body
of Christiana, except perhaps the bishop's friends of
the catholic persuasion, neglected this duty ? Nor
that the officers of the Chrastian, or of every other
society, should be duly commissioned :--who defends
or practises anarchy? Nor that there was a sue-
ceamon of authorised rulers and teachers in the
Christian churches: —bow could it have been

wise Nor, that when chosen, they were inducted
into their 00k-ca by some solleinn form or ceremonial:
—who ever imagined that Christians departed from
the universal custom of mackitid ? All this is utterly
beside the mark: a mere empty.show of proof hardly
capable of deeciving boys.
What we do want to be shown is what the Office
of a bishop really was, and that the ismer of ordain-
in was limited to it--a matter about which scripture
is altogether silent. Then we require to know whe-
ther (even supposing it was a bishop who placed his
hands on the new officer) this ordaining„—that is the
choosing, examining, and appointing.—did not belong
to the whole church, the bishop acting merely as the
president of the congregation. 'Ten we ought to be
informed whether (as fur us appears from scripture)
the imposition of hands was made by the bishops
and presbyters alone : still more, whether it was
caati•rred on these officers alone ; and, if not, whe-
ther the very numerous officers referred to in the
New Testament were all clergymen ; and whether
they might not all impart the succession which they
Yid received. Nay, we want to know whether this
vetch-vaunted ceremonial conferred Holy Orders, as
we understand the term ; whether the presbyters,
who did Not "labour in the word and doctrine," were
clergymen ? whether they were not absolutely lay-
men ? Further, we require to be told, whether there
is the slightest authority in the Bible for supposing
that the imposition of hands was necessary for giv-
ing validity to the sacraments?—whether there was
any connexion whatever between the two things ?
whsther the Eucharist could not be fully celebrated,
without even the presence of a presbyter ?
On these great matters (so all-important to his
can e), Dr. PuttLeorrs offers no proof, makes no re-
marks at all. On the further inquiry, whether
presbyter and bishop are not two names for
the same office, he does indeed speak; and, as might
be expected, with infinite contempt for the presby-
terian view. But a loud appeal to tradition and
episcopal authorities of ninny generations is wholly
insufficient to dispose of the difficulty. And, in
spite of his sateen;' Dr. Piticsrorrs must be again
reminded that biblical scholars are now almost uni-
versally agreed in holding that there was one office
only, and nut two. If he demands proof, he may re-
fer so his own authority, " the great man," Dr. BlT-
sox, who lays down the fundamental principle of
episcopacy, " That in every church and city there
might be many presbyter; there could be but one
chief to govern the rest." If so, how is it that seve-
ral bishops of Ephesus came down to Miletes; and
that these same bishops are also called presbyters.
But the question may be safely placed upon one
issue. Even if it were possible to give a detailed de-
scription of what episcopacy really was in the epos-
tolical age, what argument can be adduced, either
from the express command of scripture, or from the
essential principles of Christianity, which shall bind
Christian churches of every age to follow the exact
model of church government adopted by any genera-
tion, even though it be aportolical ? What law of
CHRIST or his church has deprived Christian commu-
nities of the right of framing their institutions as
may seem best suited to their circumstances? Until
such a prohibition is produced, the necessity of epis-
copal ordination will ever remain an unfounded pre-
tension, whatever opinion may be formed of the ge-
neral e.rpedieney of episcopacy.
" But, at any rate," replies the Bishop, " the
church of England interprets scripture thus: she
at least adheres to the succession, and makes epis-
copal orders the indispensable qualification for min-
istry in her congregations." Granted. But how
does this make her pronounce the ministers of non-
episcopal churches illegitimate? Our civil constitu-
tion places the QUEEN at the head of the executive,
and causes all commissions to issue in her name. But
do we Englishmen, therefore, deny the officers of the
President of the United States to be lawful minis-
ters of government? This is the oft-exposed fallacy
which has been banished from every region of
batman life bat the ep:seopal, viz., the fallacy of
eenverting the acknowledged legitimacy of an ac-
Smelly established institution into an eternal and
exclusive right, to be the only one which can even be
considered lawful. It is easy to quote an array of
fathers, bishops, and presbyters, who have believed
that they alone enjoyed the prerogative of being
ministers of CHRIST; it is, however, quite as easy to
make an equally long display of English bishops and
priests, who freely acknowledged the parity of order
and legitimacy of their non-episcopal brethren. To
say nothing of the manifestly superior weight of
authority attaching to the repudiators than to the
assertors of a monopoly of right in such a case ; what
after all does this come to? Nothing more than that
the church of England has ever been full of men
who held most conflicting opinions. She can be
made responsible only for her own statements, her
own words alone can fasten the ban of illegitimacy
on her foreign sisters.
The Bishop is well aware of this, and accordingly
endeavours to elicit the sentence of excommunication
from her declaration. And where does he find it ?
In the last place, certainly, in which an ordinary
understanding would have supposed so terrible an
anathema to be lurking—in the 23rd Article : " It is
not lawful for any man to take upon him the office
of public preaching, or ministering the sacraments in
the congregation, before he be lawfully culled and
sent to execute the same." Are we deficient in com-
mon understanding of English ? Is it passable that
we shall be very absurd if we ask whether there is a
single organised church in Christendom, be it pres-
byterian, Lutheran, reformed, or any other, which
would not readily subscribe this declaration ? Does
it really prescribe anything more than orderly and
proper government in a Christian church ? " head on,"
nays Dr. PUILLPOTTS, "you will see who these law-
fully called ministers are; not any one commissioned
and authorised by the church, but those only who
are marked out by Oon by the public sign of impo-
position of hands." Who was the Bishop's school-
master ? The " Edinburgh Review" does not tell us.
Ile, however, sadly failed in the ministry of correc-
tion, if he could not make his scholar translate ac-
curately a piece of easy Latin, with the advantage,
too, of a good translation by his side.
But however much old age may make a man
forget his Latin, it seldom succeeds in extirpating the
bitterness of an evil temper. The last pages of the
pamphlet are filled with invectives against our foreign
protestant brethren, as insolent as they are disgust-
ing. "In Paris," says Mr. GRAM/I'IEIIRK, " the
members of the different sects all agreed to take the
Sacrament of the Lord's Supper together—so that a
Calvinist minister was seen serving one table, a
Lutheran another, a Wesleyan minister another, an
Independent another, and so with all the other
denominations." Who but an Episcopalian priest
could have added to these words the commentary,
" Many will still less ever comprehend the feel-
ing with which I should turn roan such a
spectacle asfront a dem,ration —I had almost said,
a prafane apa-krry---or the last crown-fig act' of our
Lord's own ministry !" M my, we say, aril yet less
comprehend how such is Mall as he who wrote these
shocking words can be the minister of such a Lord,
or have caught any portion of the spirit of the divine
religion which lie taught. And this, too, from one
who can speak so tenderly of Boman catholic,': who
rejoices to call them bream's, in spite of their
" corrupt additions "—how soft the term--to the
pure word of Goo.
The idolatry which worships a woman is a trifle
eonspared with the rejection of episcopal orders. It
b pbassat, doubtless, for such a man to gloat with