from considering the purpose, for which the Jewish priesthood is spoken of on this occafion, and the fi tuation of those on whom St. Clement thus presses the neceffity of ecclefiaftical fubordination.

A fresh spirit of schifm and divifion had broke out in the church at Corinth, fimilar to that which St. Paul was obliged to reprefs, when he wrote his first Epiftle to the Corinthians: And now his fellow labourer St. Clement, making use of fome of the powerful arguments which the apostle had formerly urged, brings the matter home to the point in queftion, by fhewing how the members of the church. at Corinth ought all to conduct themselves in a quiet and peaceable manner, each within his proper ftation; thus humbly imitating the order and harmony which prevailed in the Jewish church, the inftituted type or figure of the church of Chrift. "See

ing then," fays St. Clement, that "these things "are manifest unto us, it will behove us to take care, that looking into the depths of the divine knowledge, we do all things in order, whatfo"ever our Lord has commanded us to do: and par

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ticularly, that we perform our offerings and fer"vice to God, at their appointed seasons--and by "the perfons that minifter unto him. For the "chief priest has his proper fervices, and to the priests their proper place is appointed, and to the "Levites belong their proper ministrations (or deaconfhips), and the layman is confined within the "bounds of what is commanded to laymen. Let

"every one of you, brethren, blefs God in his

proper station, not exceeding the rule that is ap"pointed to him." When we confider the scope and defign of this paffage, we must be convinced, that though the venerable writer is fpeaking of the economy of the Jewish church, it is only in the way of allufion, and for drawing the neceffary inference, with regard to the Chriftian ministry. But neither the allufion would have been proper, nor the inference juft, if the diftinctions of ecclefiaftical order in the Chriftian church had not correfponded to thofe in the Jewish, as they are here defcribed by St. Clement, for the fake of pointing out the refemblance, and fhewing the proper conclufion which was to be drawn from it.

Yet our Profeffor endeavours to make this ancient author contradict himfelf, by quoting a paffage from him, in which, as he thinks, the orders of the Christian ministry are reprefented as but two, and fo not the fame in number with those of the Jewish. It was for the fame purpose that Blondel made use of this paffage, in which St. Clement fays-that "the apostles having preached the gofpel through "countries and cities, conftituted the first fruits of "their converfions, whom they approved by the

fpirit, bishops and deacons of those who should "believe" From which words it is inferred, that the apostles, in planting churches through countries and cities, ordained but two orders to take care of

them.

them.* And may it not then be asked, what were the ordainers themselves? Were they of no order in the church? Or were they of the fame order with either of these whom they ordained? From the anfwer that must be given to these questions, it is evident that there were three orders in the church, at the time when the apostles ordained the two inferior orders, whom St. Clement in the current language of the apostolic age, calls bishops and deacons, and thereby alludes to a text, which he quotes from Ifaiah, as rendered in the Greek tranflation-" I "will conftitute their bifhops in righteousness, and "their deacons in faith." Whether this be a just translation, or a proper application of the prediction, Dr. Campbell acknowledges is not the queftion."It is enough," he fays, "that it evinces what Cle"ment's notion was of the established ministers then "in the church." And his notion, we have no doubt, was the fame with what we have feen prevailed at the time, when he wrote this Epiftle to the Corinthians; that under the apoftles, the care or overfight of certain portions of the flock of Christ was committed to inferior overfeers and ministers, whom we have called bishops and deacons, till it

See the fame inference drawn, and the very fame reasoning made use of to fupport it, in An Enquiry into the Conftitution, &c. of the Primitive Church, which was fo completely anfwered in An original Draught of the Primitive Church, by a prefbyter of the Church of England, that it is faid to have brought over the Enquirer to this author's opinion.

Ifaiah, Ix. 17.

was thought proper to put them under the govern ment of perfons invested with apoftolical power, fuch as Clemens himself poffeffed and exercifed in the church of Rome, of which he is always diftinguished as bishop, and by another writer of the fame name, Clemens of Alexandria, is exprefsly called the "apostle Clemens." This is all that can be juftly inferred from the paffage of his Epiftle, quoted by Dr. Campbell; which was not at all intended to point out particularly the number of orders in the church; and could no more be confidered as fetting afide the fuperior rank and authority of bishops, than the common language of both Jewish and Chriftian writers could be understood as excluding the high priest, when they mentioned the Jewish miniftry under the general appellation of priests and Levites.

The next teftimony, which our author produces, to fhew that, in the primitive times there were only two orders of minifters in the church, is that of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who is faid by Irenæus to have been taught by the apoftles, and to have converfed with many, who had feen our Saviour; to which account it is added, that Irenæus himself had

feen

Strom. lib. 4.

In fome parts of the English liturgy the clergy are prayed for under the twofold diftinction of "bipops and curates." But no perfon will hence infer, that the Church of England has but two orders of clergy, when the has fo carefully provided for the "making, ordaining and confecrating of bifeops, priests, and deacons."

feen him, in his younger days, and knew him to have been conftituted bishop of Smyrna by the apoftles. One might fuppofe, that when the adverfaries of pifcopacy bring forward fuch a witnefs as this in fupport of their caufe, they had certainly difcovered in his writings, fome clear, undoubted evidence, on which might be justly founded their rejection of the Epifcopal order. But instead of this, all that we meet with in his Epistle to the Philippians, is a very brief intimation of " their being fub"ject to the prefbyters and deacons, as unto God "and Chrift; while at the fame time, the very introduction to the epiftle marks the fuperior character of the writer, in these words-" Polycarp, and "the prefbyters that are with him, to the church "of God which is at Philippi." And if only the prefbyters and deacons of that church are mentioned in the words quoted by Dr. Campbell, it might be owing to the Epifcopal charge being vacant at the time when this epiftle was written, as was the cafe at Rome, when Cyprian bishop of Carthage

wrote

If the author of this Epistle had not been diftinguished by a fuperior dig. nity of office, we could hardly fuppofe it confiftent with his modefty and felf denial, to have named himself only and made no mention of his brethren, but by the general name of prefbyters: A circumstance, which obliged even Blondel to make the following remark-" Id tamen in S. Martyris epiftola peculiare apparet, quod eam privatim fuo et prefbyterorum nomine ad Philippenfium fraternitatem dedit, ac fibi quandam fupra prefbyteros→ Tipox refervaffe vidctur, ut jam tum in Epifcopali apice conftitutum reliquos Smyrnenfium prefbyteros gradu fuperaffe conjicere liceat." Apol p 14.

Vol. I. p. 129.