THE honour of our common Christianity is involved in the claims of its ministers and teachers. On all occasions, but especially at the present time, correct ideas of the true character and office of bishops must be important to every professing Christian.

Bishops are the first class of ordinary Christian officers; we are therefore to inquire, what were the bishops of the Apostolic Church? In a table generally printed with our Bibles, it is said, " Bishops are successors of the Apostles in the government of the Church." This, of course, as it was appended by the Episcopalian editors, meant such bishops as those of the Church of England. Now we find no such an office as this described in the apostolic Scriptures, except in terms of fearful reprobation, as part of the predicted Antichrist. It is a "Note and Comment" added to the Bible, not only without authority from the inspired records, but in contradiction to the sacredness of divine truth. As Apostles, they could have no successors; their chief qualifications were extraordinary; one of the principal of which was, having seen the Lord Jesus after his resurrection from the dead.

The only notion which, in this country, is commonly attached to the word bishop, is that of lordly prelate, possessing power and authority, through a large district of the country, over several hundred congregations, and over their ministers, so as to ordain or depose them. These ideas, however, cannot be derived from the apostolic writings they are taken from the

assumed dignity and claims of that order of persons, as they appear in the Church of Rome, and thence adopted by the Church of England.

The advocates of the prelacy of those churches contend, that a bishop is an overseer and ruler, not of a congregation of ordinary believers, but of other subject ministers, amounting generally to many hundreds. This, however, is utterly repugnant to the senti ments of the New Testament. The simple language of the text quoted is sufficient to subvert, and totally to annihilate such a notion: for the saints, even in the town of Philippi, had several bishops, as well as deacons. They could not, therefore, be prelatical bishops, each exercising authority over a number of subordinate pastors. These Philippian bishops could be only pastors of small congregations, which Dr. Haweis calls, house churches.*

Dr. Brett, in a learned work in defence of episcopal prelacy, says, "In the preface to the form and manner of making and consecrating bishops, priests, and deacons, our Church tells us, that it is evident to all men diligently reading Holy Scripture, and ancient authors, that, from the Apostles' time, there hath been these three orders of ministers in Christ's Church, bishops, priests, and deacons.""

To this assertion we reply, antient authors are not authority in

* Impartial History, vol. I.

+ Church Government and Governors, by Thomas Brett, LL.D., p. 48.

matters of evangelical truth and duty, and they are totally unworthy of our confidence; on account of their deviations from the inspired Oracles, and their contradictions of one another and themselves, as affirmed by Chillingworth and others, whom we have quoted. To the Holy Scriptures we reverently appeal; if they teach that doctrine, we will implicitly receive it if they do not inculcate the notion, we must reject it; but we can find in them no such thing as bishops, priests, and deacons appointed for the government of the Church; and in this judgment we agree with the most learned and excellent of the Church of England. It is true that the disciples of Christ are all priests: they are a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ," but the New Testament contains not even the slightest intimation of a priest as an officer in the Christian church, except the blessed Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus."+

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Dr. Brett, having quoted Phil. i. 1. as his principal proof, says, "In this verse we have these three orders mentioned, which continue still in the Church of England. Paul and Timothy of the first order, that is, the order of bishops as they are now called, and the other two orders in the last words; the middle order which is now called priests, or presbyters, being then also called bishops." If such a licence were allowed to interpreters of the Scriptures, they might be made to sanction or inculcate every extravagance or absurdity; but we

have wiser commentators, even in the church to which Dr. Brett belongs. The learned and candid Mr. Scott, in his notes upon this verse, teaches a widely different doctrine. He says, "Hence we learn, that the distinction between bishops and presbyters was not then generally established; but that the pastors of the church were distinguished from the deacons, who manage the secular matters and charities of the church. Much labour and learning have indeed been employed to set aside this conclusion; but with little success, even by the allowance of decided episcopalians." * And after having quoted part of Dr. Hammond's attempt to explain away the evident meaning of the passage, in support of prelacy, Mr. Scott observes, "This learned expositor did not perceive, that one bishop, without any presbyter under him, comes to precisely the same thing as one presbyter without any bishop over him. Till the church multiplied, the bishops and presbyters were the same."+

Dr. Whitby dared not so pervert the sense of the passage, as to give Dr. Brett's interpretation. He says, "When the names were common to both orders, the bishops being called presbyters, and the presbyters, bishops. And this, saith Theodoret, is manifest in this place, because he adds here deacons to the bishops, making no mention of their presbyters."

The Ephesian ministers, of whom we read Acts xx., were the same class of persons as those mentioned in our text, upon the 17th verse of which Mr. Scott observes, "The same persons are, in this chapter, called, elders,' or pres

*

byters, and overseers' or bishops, (28 Gr.); it must, therefore, be allowed, that these were not distinct orders of ministers in the church at that time. To assert, as some have done, (Dr. Hammond especially,) that these elders of Ephesus were indeed diocesan bishops of all the Asiatic churches, only exposes the cause which it is meant to support: for, besides the inexcusable liberty taken with the words of Scripture, how could these bishops have been got together at so short a notice? The statement would also show, that there were no presbyters, and consequently a parity of ministers, in the primitive church, directly contrary to the sentiments of those who make it."*

Mr. Hooker, about two hundred years ago, wrote his celebrated work on ecclesiastical polity, which is generally accounted the ablest defence of the Church of England prelacy. He labours to maintain, in a whole book, as his leading proposition, that although the Holy Scriptures are a perfect standard of divine doctrine, they are not a rule of discipline and government.t He farther says, "A thousand five hundred years and upwards the church of Christ hath now continued under the sacred regiment of bishops." And concerning the Church of England, he declares, "This we boldly, therefore, set down as a most infallible truth, that the church of Christ is at this day lawfully, and hath been since the first beginning, governed by bishops having permanent superiority and ruling power over other ministers of the word and sacrament."+

* Expos. in Acts xx. 17.

+ Ecclesiastical Polity, Hanbury's edition, vol. I. book III.

Ibid. vol. III. book VII page 90.

To abandon the Word of God as our only rule of obedience in divine worship, is to return to the very worst principle of Popery, from which all its corruptions spring. Nor could it have been possible for the errors and evils of the papal system to have existed, had the oracles of God been duly reverenced, as declaring the statutes of heaven; but these being laid aside, and human decisions adopted in their stead, no bounds could limit the innovations and the claims of the priesthood.

As to the Romish and English prelacy of diocesan bishops, if Mr. Hooker be right, Whitby and Scott must be wrong; for they plainly contradict his doctrine. As to the government of the Christian church by bishops, even from the time of the apostles, we entertain no doubt: the chief point in dispute is, What were the bishops of the apostolic churches? or, Are the prelates in the churches of Rome and England the bishops of the Scriptures? We contend they were not; and that they bear no resemblance to them, and this we engage to make evident from the Scriptural application of their titles, the condition of the primitive churches, and the admission of many of the most able writers, who have attempted to defend their claim.

Bishop is originally a Saxon word, from the term biscop; the Greek word so translated in the New Testament is episkopos,* the proper meaning of which is overlooker, or overseer. Thus the word in the text quoted is episkopois.† Thus also the Ephesian ministers are called overseers, Acts xx. 28, the Greek word is episkopous.

These could not be prelates over their ministerial brethren, but pastors of small congregations, being on a perfect equality, and having no superiority over one another. In the New Testament the same persons are sometimes called presbyters, which is more commonly translated elders, both words being of the same signification. Bishops are called overseers, from the nature of their office, which is to overlook the spiritual state of a Christian congregation. Presbyter or elder being a title of age, denotes their advancement in life, or the gravity and wisdom which are the proper characteristics of matured years. They are some. times called apostles, 2 Cor. viii. 23, Phil, ii. 25, from the Greek word apostolos, a special messenger. They are also called angels, Rey. i. 20. from the Greek, angelos, a messenger. They are called pastors and teachers, Eph. iv. 11, from their peculiar office as instructors of the people, and their guides in the ways of holiness and salvation. Dr. Mosheim describes this character and employment of the primitive bishops, with no less accuracy than elegance. He says, "The rulers of the church were called either presbyters or bishops, which two titles are, in the New Testament, undoubtedly applied to the same order of men. Let none, however, confound the bishops of this primitive and golden age of the church with those of whom we read in the following ages. For though they were both distinguished by the same name, yet they differed extremely, and that in many respects. A bishop, during the first and second centuries, was a person who had the care of

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one Christian assembly, which, at that time, was, generally speaking, small enough to be contained in a private house. In this he acted, not so much with the authority of a master, as with the zeal and diligence of a faithful servant. He instructed the people, performed the several parts of divine worship, attended the sick, and inspected into the circumstances of the poor.'

This description has its exact counterpart in our congregational churches, and in them only.

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To the same purpose Lord Chancellor King, in his learned “ Inquiry into the Constitution and Discipline of the Primitive Churches," marks, "Having in the former chapter shown, that there was but one bishop to a church, we shall in this evidence, that there was but one church to a bishop, which will appear from this single consideration, viz. that the ancient dioceses are never said to contain churches in the plural, but only a church, in the singular. The greatest bishoprics in the world, even in the third century, were no more than single congregations, A parish and a particular church are synonymous terms, signifying one and the same thing; and consequently a bishop having but one parish under his jurisdiction, could extend his government no farther than a single congregation, because a congregation and a parish were all one, of the same bulk and magnitude." Having confirmed these statements, by many quotations from different writers of the first three centuries, he adds, "These passages clearly prove, that all the members of the bishop's

* Eccles. Hist. vol. I.

King's Inquiry concerning the Constitution of the Primitive Church, page 17.