The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-05-04

censure of the Churches abroad. and
mat so Tar as some of our men ordained
In foreign parts have been pronounced
TO De no lawful ministers (vol. i. o. 1897.
IL Is evident, by some passages in Strype.
attenuvely considered, that natives reg
ularly ordained abroad in the Presbyte-
ran Churches were admitted to hold
preferment In England the first bishop
who objected to them seems to have been
Aylmer Instances, however, of foreigners
holding preferment without any ordina-
ton, may be found down to the civil wars"
In his History of England, Macaulay
writes les thus (vol. i. PIP. rs 76):-
The founders of the Anglican Church
mad retained Episcopacy as an ancient, o
decent, and a convenient ecclesiastical
pollty, but had not declared that form Of
Church government to be of Divine in
stltutlon. We have already seen how
low an estimate Cranmer had formed OF
the office of bishop. In the reign of
Elizabeth, Jewel, Cooper, Whitgift, and
other eminent doctors defended Prelacy
as innocent, as useful, as what the State
might lawfully establish, as what, when
established by the State, was entitled to
the respect of every citizen. But thew
never denied that Christian community
without bishop might be pure Church.
On the contrary, they regarded the Pro
testants of the Continent as of the same
household of faith with themselves.
Englishmen in England were indeed
bound to acknowledge the authority o!
the bishop, as they were bound to az
knowledge the authority of the sheriff ami
of the coroner; but the obligation was
purely local. An English Churchmap.
nay, even an English prelate, if he went
to Holland, corformed without scruple
to the established religion of Holland
Abroad, the ambassadors of Elizabeth
and James went in state to the verv
worship which Elizabeth and James per
secuted at home, and carefully abstained
IRON decorating their private chapels
after the Anglican fashion, lest offence
should be gwen to weaker brethren. In
the year 1903, the Convocation of the
Province of Canterbury solemnly re
cognised the Church OF Scotland, q
Church in which Episcopal control and
Episcopal ordination were unknown, az
branch Of the Holy Catholic Church OF
Christ. IL was even held that Prasby-
terrain ministers were entitled to place
and voice in Gcumenical Councils.
When the States General of the United
PROVINCES convoked at bort Synod OF
Doctors not episcopally ordained, an
English bishop and an English dean.
commissioned by the head of the Enel
Church, sat with those doctors, preached
to them, and voted with them on the
gravest questions of theology. Nav.
many English benefces were held by
dlvines who had been admitted to the .
ministry in the Calvinistic form used on
the Continent; nor was reordination by
bishop IN such cases then thought ne
cessary, or even lawful"
Mr.. Keble author of the Christian
Year, however he may have deplored the
necessity felt himself constrained to bear
like testimony:
" 1t might have been expected" we
find him saying, in his perface to his edi-
ton of the works of Hooker, that the
defenders of the English hierarchy
against the first Puritans should take
the highest ground, and challenge for
the bishops the same unreserved submis-
SION, on the same plea of exclusive apos-
tolic prerogative which their adversaries
feared not to insist on for their elders
and deacons. 1t is notorious, however,
that such was not, in general, the line
preferred by Jewell, Whitgift, Bishop
Cooper, and others to whom the manage
ment Of this controversy was entrusted
during the early part of Elizabeth
reign: They do not expressly disavow,
but they carefully shirk that unreserved
appeal to Christian antiquity, in which
one would have thought they must have
discerned the very strength Of their cause
to lie. 1t is enough with them to show
that the government by archbishops
and bishops is ancient and allowable
they never venture to urge its exclusive
claim, or to connect the succession with
the validity Of the holy sacraments; and
yet 1t is obvious that such course of ar
gument alone (supposing it to be borne
out by facts) could fully meet all the ext
gencies of the case"
To the same effect are the statements
of eminent Anglican ecclesiastics and d.
vines. 1t were impossible to name three
higher authorities on such a subject than
Lathbury, Keble, and Stanley.
1t is thus beyond all question that, for
hundred years after the Reformation.
the Church of England regarded herself
as but one of the Reformed Churches
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