Weekly national intelligencer., 1864-03-03
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER.
THE NEW ECcLEsIAs sucAL PoLlTY.l

Every reader of that mastery work, "Ihe Laws
of Ecclesiastical Polity," by the learned and judi
cious Hooker, will remember that in selecting a
title for his treatise he chose the word Poity,"
rather than :: Govornment," MT without pur-
pose The word goUermme"t he says, as men
commonly understand it in ordinary speech, +" doth
not COMPRISE the largeness of that whereunto in
this question it is applied" To which he adds,
that the name of Church Polity will better serve,
because it containeth both Government and also
qohatsoever besides 6elorgth to he ordering Of the
Church IN public Neither is any thing in this
degree more necessary than Church Pohty, which
is the form Of ordering the public spiritual affairs
of the Church of God"
And the student of history will equally recall
that the great work of this learned divine took It's
origin and motive from the troubous times in which
he lived, when the disorder and confusion that
reigned in the minds of men had disturbed the
affairs equally of Church and State. The begin
ming of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, under whom
Hooker served in the church, was clouded by
pretended titles to the crown, frequent treasons,
doubts as to her Legitimate successor, and bitter
memories of the late civil war--all Of which, as
Izask Walton records, in his life of this ecclesias
tical worthy, I" begot fears in the most pious and
wisest of the nation lest the like days should re-
turn again to them their present posterity; and
the apprehension of these dangers begot hearty
desire of settlement in the Church and State"
All these evils were greatly envenomed by the
opinions and agitations of the Nonconformists,
against whose contentious and practices Hooker
leyeed his great disquisition. In those times, as
in the present, there were "scrupe-mongers, as
Walton informs us, who pretended tenderness OF
conscience, refusing to take oaths OF allegiance
where the rights of the Crown and of the estab-
lished religion were concerned, but who were " ac-
tive in sowing discontents and sedition by venom
Gus and secret murmurngs and a dispersion of
scurrilous pamphlets aud lbels against the Church
aud State" Ia Scotland these Nonconformists
"grew to such height not to be accountable
for any thing spoken against the Queen, nor for
treason against their own King if it were but spo-
ken in the pulpit, showing at last such disobe-
dence to him that his mother being in England,
and then in distress and in prison and in danger
of death, the church denied their prayers for her,
and at another time, when he had appointed day
of feastiug the church declared for general fast,
in opposition to his authority"
In the presence OF such disloyal contumacy,
which, in the name of the rights of conscience and
of private judgment, sought to mask its seditious
designs against the Crown, the necessity was gen.
orally felt by the friends of Legitimate government
and of sound religion for some vindcation of the
right of the State to order, adjust, and regulate
the polity of the church so that Church and State
might mutually be supports aud buttresses to each
other Hence in great degree, the origin and
object of Hooker's immortal work
We have adverted to these maxims of ecclesias-
tical notify, a. understood in the days of Queen
Elizabeth, because they contain in the mildest and
most philosophical form, an enunciation of the
principles on which the Secretary of War must be
supposed TO have proceeded when he issued his
order taking military jurisdiction Of the churches
in the iusurgent States. Like causes produce like
effects, and hence it is deemed by Mr.. Stanton, in
the idea Of Hooker and almost in his words, to be
ga matter of great Importance to the Government,
in It's eforts to restore tranquility to the commu.
nifty and peace to the nation that Christian minis
ters should, by example and precept, support and
foster the loyal sentiment Of the people"
1t is true that the Constitution of the United
State. provides that " Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion or prohibit
ing the free exercise thereof" but, not to say that
the Constitution was made for time Of peace,
(whereas we now in time Of war; it is suf-
fcient answer to this objection to allege that in
the present case "Copgress" bas made no law on the
subject, as the regulations under this head emanatG
from another source, to wit, the plenary authority
of the Secretary of War, charged with the exer
else Of all beigerent rights" accruing to him
under the "powers of war conferred by the law o.
nations"
We think it will be admitted that the Secretary
Of War has placed himself within the pale Of the
principles laid down by Hooker in the sixteenth
century. The only question that can possibly arise
is, whether, having regard to the genius of the
American people, it j, expedient practicable to
engraft upon the Government, at this late day. an
ecclesiastical polity like that which has just been
initiated under military authority To our mind
the difficulties and incongruities of the system
seem so great that, in the long run, we fear the
Secretary of War will find his policy in this mat
ter rather a hindrauce than help 10 The work Of