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and fee what would be the confequence of those inferences, which he intended fhould be drawn from them. The most likely one of any to be admitted as a parallel cafe to the connection between a bishop and his fpiritual charge, is that which fubfifts between "fovereign and fubject," the connection in both cafes arifing from appointment to an office, although it must be owned, that the mode of appointment is very different, as well as the object about which each of thefe offices is exercifed. Our Lecturer, however, was fond of this allufion-and asked "For example, what would one think of the pre"text of making a man a king, without giving him "either fubjects or a kingdom?" We fhould certainly think the pretext very foolish, and the thing itself as unlikely to happen: Since thefe king-makers, a privilege which fome people are always glad to keep in view, might themselves become the subjects, and their lands would of course be the kingdom.— But the Doctor adds-" Ye will fay, may not the "right to a kingdom be conferred on a man, whom

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we cannot put in poffeffion?" This he readily admits, but infists that it is not parallel to the cafe " in hand." Yet why not parallel, when thofe who have a right to make a bishop, furely give him a right, when fo made, to exercise his office in any part of the world, where he can do fo, without encroaching on the charge or right of another bishop;

and

+ Vol. I. p. 357

and it will not be faid that the right to a kingdom can be conferred but on fimilar terms. Poffeffion may be obtained by force, but right is of a more delicate nature. During all the time of Cromwell's ufurpation, Charles the Second was acknowledged as their rightful king, by all the loyal part of his fubjects, and the length of his reign has been always computed from the day of his father's death, although it was eleven years before his reftoration. gave him the actual exercife of his kingly power.So might a bishop be invefted with Epifcopal authority, although placed in a fituation which would neither require nor admit the exercise of it.

The allufion which our Lecturer makes use of, to the connection between father and child, and between husband and wife, is by no means fuited to the cafe in hand, as these are mere states or conditions of life, the nature of which is very different from that of an office, the former depending altogether on a particular relation, whereas the permanen

cy of the latter will be often found to reft on a more general footing. Such is evidently the cafe with regard to the office of a fhepherd, which as applied to the Epifcopal character, does not neceffarily infer an immediate charge of a flock, fince there may be other subjects of infpection that come not properly within the idea, which that term conveys. When therefore our Profeffor, wifhing to ridicule the notion of a bishop in partibus infidelium, obferved that a bishop's charge being a church, and a church

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confifting only of believers, infidels are properly "no part of his charge, no more than wolves or "foxes are part of the flock of a fhepherd," we are furprised that fo complete an analogift did not recollect, that infidels may become believers, but wolves and foxes can never become sheep. Will any one fay, that to make believers of infidels is no part of the office of a bifhop, or that his office immediately ceafes, when his labours in that way are no longer fuccefsful? If fuch were the precarious nature of the fhepherd's office, it would hardly have been applied to point out the highest poffible instance of paftoral care, and we fhould not have read of "fheep going aftray, and afterwards returning to the Shepherd and bishop of their fouls."

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The only analogy, therefore, which feems at all applicable to the design in view, is that which our Profeffor makes ufe of, when he fays-" Ye cannot "make a man an overfeer, to whom ye give no

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overfight;" and this is fuppofed to arife from the name bishop or overfeer, as connected with, and requiring, things or perfons to be overfeen. He might however have remembered his own obfervation, that the import of words gradually changes with "the manners of the times;" as a proof of which, the word prefbyter has certainly loft the import which he himself affigned to it, as a " title of refpect," denoting a fenator or elderly perfon, fince it would now be thought ridiculous, inftead of "ordaining "or making a prefbyter," to speak of "ordaining

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or making a respectable old man," and may not the fame change have happened in the application of the name bifhop or overfeer, even fuppofing its original import to have been-" Infpector of a parti"cular flock?" Of this however the Profeffor brings no fort of proof, but runs on, in his usual declamatory ftyle, expatiating on his favourite topic, that a bishop continued a bithop only whilft he continued to have people under his paftoral charge, "and where no fuch charge was given, ordination "appeared but a mere illufion, the name without "the thing. For nothing can be plainer," fays he, "than that as yet," that is, in the fifth century, they had no conception of the mystic character impreffed by the bishop's hand in ordaining, which no power on earth can cancel." A little after he tells us, that "the doctrine of the character had "not yet been difcovered;" and profecuting ftill farther his trained analogy between marriage and ordination, he boldly afks-" What then is there "in the one ceremony more nugatory than in the "other? For if unmeaning words will fatisfy, why

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may not the myftical, invifible, indelible charac"ter of husband be imprinted by the firft, as that "of priest or bifhop is by the fecond? Holy writ

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gives juft as much countenance to the one, as to "the other."‡

This,

+ Vol. I. p. 350.

Vol. I. p. 360.

This, we think, is rather rafhly affirmed; and the language made use of in delivering such a strange opinion, appears to us as void of delicacy, as inconfiftent with the character, which ought to be maintained by every profeffor of Christian divinity. Is it really fuitable to fuch a profeffion, even to fuppofe, much more to affert, that there is nothing given in and by apoftolical, primitive, regular ordination, but fuch a bare " aflignment to fome parti"cular congregation," as is perfectly fimilar to the connection between husband and wife? What then are we to understand by the gift (xg) which St. Paul twice mentions as in Timothy, and in both places afcribes it-to "the laying on of hands?” Does this point to any thing like his "affignment "to a particular congregation," or to any fort of connection with a paftoral charge? Have we not more reafon to believe, that this charifma or gift meant fomething, which notwithstanding Dr. Campbell's farcastic way of treating it, might be called a "character impreffed" by impofition of hands, and which Timothy was "not to neglect, but to ftir up❞ and put into exercise, so as to answer the good purpose, for which he had received it? We know, that the charifmata, or gifts fo often mentioned as peculiar to the early ages of the gofpel, have been generally thought to denote the miraculous powers with which many of the primitive Chriftians were endowed, even down to that period, when our adverfaries are obliged to acknowledge that a true and proper Epif

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