The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1851-04-08 00:00:00

CLERICAL INTELLIGENCE.

The Bishop of Exeter will-, it is stated, issue a pastoral
letter this .week on the state of the church.
The incutaliency of•FriMley, which was rendered vacant
by the deathof' the Rev. George Edward Holiest, M.A.,
has been conferred on the Rev. Frederick Wickham,
M.A., second master of Winchester College.
Mr. Macdougal, the missionary of the Borneo Church
Mission at Sarawak, gives an interesting description of his
new edifice raised for public worship, and also a curious
account-of a race-of cannibals lately discovered in Borneo.
The statement that the services at St. Paul's Church,
London, (Mr. Bennett's) were unchanged, has been con-
tradicted. All useless decorations have been removed,
and Mr. Liddell conducts the services in a manner " de-
cently and in order." . •

Lord Londeshorough, in a letter to the Times, accuses
a clergyman of Brighton of declining to baptise his child,
because his lordship did not think it prudent to have the
child's cap taken off, in order that water might be poured
on the child in compliance with the rubric, to which the
reverend gentleman pointed. Lord Londesborough de-
clined to submit the child to this risk ; and the reverend.
gentleman left the font, declaring that he must speak to
his lordship as to the poorest man.
THE VICAR OF SHEFFIELD AND THE REV. CANON
TREVOR.—Dr. Addams has given it as his decided opi-
nion that the rights of the chaplains of the Parish Church
to its pulpit are co-equal with those of the vicar ; under
advice, therefore, the Rev. Canon Trevor will, on Sunday
next, formally request to be allowed to perform duty as a
legally appointed chaplain. In the event of the vicar re-
fusing to comply with this request, a mandamus is to
issue forthwith, calling on the vicar to show cause, &c..
It said that if the rev. canon should establish his claim,
the vicar will resign the living.—Leeds Intelligencer.

THE AUTHORITY OF THE CLERGY.—Whet should be
the offices, and of what kind should be the authority, of
the clergy ? I have hitherto referred to the Bible for an
answer to every question. Ido so again ; and behold, the
Bible gives me no answer. I defy you to answer me from
the Bible. You can only guess, and dimly conjecture,
what the cffices of the clergy were in the first century.
You cannot show me a single command as to what they
shall be. Strange, this ; the Bible give no answer to so
apparently important a question ! God surely would not
have-left His word without an answer to anything His
children ought to ask. Surely it must be a ridiculous
question—a question we ought never to have put, or
thought of putting. Let us think of it again a little. To
be sure,—lt is a ridiculous question, and we should be
ashamed of ourselves for having put it :—what should be
the offices of the clergy? That is to say, what are the
possible spiritual necessities which at, any time may arise
in the Church, and by what means and men are they to
be supplied ; evidently an infinite question. Different
kinds of necessities must be met by different authorities,
constituted as the necessities arise. Robinson Crusoe, in
his island, wants no bishop, and makes a thunderstorm do
for an evangelist. The University of Oxford would be ill
off without its bishop ; but wants an evangelist besides ;
and that forthwith. The authority which the Vaudois
shepherds need, is of Barnabas, the son of Consolation ;
the authority which the city of London needs is of James,
the son of Thunder. Let us, then, alter the form of our
question, and put it to the Bible thus : What are the ne-
cessities most likely to arise in the Church ; and may they
be best met by different men, or in great part by the same
men acting in different capacities ? and are the names
attached to their offices of any consequence ? Ah, the
Bible answers now, and that. loudly. The Church is built
on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus
Christ himself being the corner-stone. Well, we cannot
have two foundations, so we can have no more Apostles
nor Prophets ;—then, as for the other needs of the Church
in its edifying upon its foundation, there are all manner of
things to be done daily—rebukes to be given, comfort to
be brought, Scripture to be explained, warning to be en-
forced, threatenit.gs to be executed, charities to be admi-
nistered ; and the men who do these things are called, and
call themselves, with absolute indifference, deacons, bi-
shops, elders, evangelists, according to what they are doing
at the time of speaking. St. Paul almost always calls
himself a deacon ; Sr. Peter calls himself an elder, 1 Peter,
v. 1, and Timothy, generally understood to be addressed
as a bishop, is called a deacon in 1 Tim. iv. 6.—forbidden
to rebuke an elder in v. 1, and exhorted to do the work of
an evangelist in 2 Tim. iv. 5. But there is one thing
which, as officers, or as separate from the rest of the flock,
they never call themselves—which it would have been
impossible, as so separate, they ever should have called
themselves ; that is, priests. It-would have been just as
pos.-Rile for the clergy of the only Church to call them-
selves Levites, as to call themselves (ex officio) priests.
The whole function of priesthood was, on Christmas
morning, at once and for ever gathered into His Person
who was born at Bethlehem ; arid thenceforward, all who
are united with Him, and who with Him make sacrifice of
themselves, that is to say, all members of the Invisible
Church, become at the instant of their conversion, priests ;
and are so cdlled in 1 Pet. ii. 5, and Rev. i. 6, and xx. 6 ;
where, observe, there is no possibility of limiting the ex-
pression to the clergy ; the conditions of priesthood being
simply having been loved by Christ, and washed in His
blood.—Notes on the construction of Sheepfolds by J.
Ruskin.