that can often be contended for, is, that the practice pursued is useful, and that, in the judgment of those who follow it, it is not inconsistent with any divine law or precedent. Yet professing Christians, not content with framing rules and determining usages for themselves, have attempted to legislate for others against their will. Human inferences have been fearlessly drawn from divine premises partially revealed; and these inferences have been put on a level with the express commands of Christ or his apostles, and pronounced essential to the visible, if not the real, unity of the church. Hence, intolerance - fines-imprisonment-banishment-the Inquisition-torturedeath!-and all these inflicted by those who claimed to be called followers of Him, whose inspired apostle placed charity even above the faith that 'justifies,' and the hope which is as an anchor of the soul!' *

It is by no means the intention of this Essay to discuss the relative merits of the different systems of external church-order. It is sufficient to show that NO ONE FORM OF GOVERNMENT OUGHT TO BE INSISTED ON, TO THE EXTENT OF MAKING IT ESSENTIAL TO THE VISIBLE UNITY OF THE CHURCH OF CHRIST: nor should we refuse to maintain a catholic and open union with Christians who, we have reason to believe, conscientiously adhere to other modes.

* 1 Cor. xiii. 13.

It is not necessary, in order to sustain this principle, that we should hold all kinds of churchgovernment to be equally agreeable to the New Testament. Even if we allow that one form may be more readily deduced from scripture than another, and that the value of a system does not consist entirely in the manner of its administration, -yet, if the divine word have not treated the subject of church-government in such a way as to render agreement on this point essential, (like the faith and morals of the gospel,) no mere human power has a right to make it so. Conscientious differences of opinion, here, ought not to prove a bar to christian union. The inconsistency of allowing them to be such, is often the more obvious, because no one party have been entirely unanimous as to the principles on which they found their own practices.

Admit that there might be less diversity on this subject among Christians, if all were diligent and eager in studying it as related to the divine will, and with less of prejudice, or passion, or party feeling, or worldly motive: still can we suppose that uniformity in the frame-work of church-government was intended by Christ to be an indispensable element of visible unity? Had this been his design, surely the whole order of the christian sanctuary would have been laid down in the New Testament with scarcely less exactness than the

structure of the tabernacle, the functions of its officers, and the entire detail of its services, were prescribed in the Levitical law. The general, and even incidental manner, in which the subject of church-order is alluded to in the Acts and the Epistles, and the paramount importance which is constantly assigned to faith, holiness, and charity, might well have led Christians to pause-ere they attempted to make the adoption of their own particular inferences necessary to the unity of the church.

Grant that one general system of church-government is actually more in accordance with the letter and spirit of the New Testament than another, do the sin and folly of expressing doubts respecting that system appear at once obvious from the divine word, as is the case with questioning certain doctrines and precepts of the gospel, such as the Mediation of Christ, or the keeping of his Commands? Must we not admit that our own adopted system is but partially unfolded in scripture ?-that many questions might be asked thereon, to which the divine oracle returns no answer? and which, if solved at all, must be determined by human analogies, or by an appeal to convenience? Without implying that, in the progress of sacred literature, and profound, analytical, unbiassed biblical criticism, additional light may not, from time to time, be thrown on

the subject of church-government,-is it not a fact that, after all the volumes (and they have not been few) which have been written on it, Christians who think alike in everything else, here differ? Nay, do all the members of any one denomination agree precisely in the grounds, or the details, of their own adopted system?

Have not Presbyterians, for example, held varieties of opinion among themselves, on the particulars of their own platform-such as the office of elders, the authority of church-courts, the limits of popular right,—and even on the question, whether any definite form of church-government be appointed by Christ? Thus, while many Presbyterians have held with the divine right, Luther, Melancthon, Calvin, Beza, Salmasius, and the divines of the Augsburg Confession in general, though regarding the parity of ministers as the primitive form, did not consider it essential. And to the above names many modern ones might be added. Is the Presbyterian system, as often practised, reconcileable with some of the transactions alluded to in the New Testament, as those in the church at Jerusalem,' or in that of Corinth? 3 and may not similar questions be asked respecting the form of Presbyterianism established by that apostolic man, the Rev. John Wesley?

1 Fleming's Testimony. Edin. 1826. p. 283, 286, 256, 363. 2 Acts xv. 31 Cor. v.

Have not Independents differed on many points among themselves,-such as the source and manner of ordination, the right to exhort in the church, the functions of the several officers? A kind of democracy has sometimes been pleaded for, which has tended to level all official distinctions, and to abolish all spiritual obedience' and 'submission; and the autocracy of the churches has often been held with unscriptural jealousy, so as to check that thorough mutual recognition and intercommunion, which evidently characterized the churches of the apostolic age. Would even the Congregationalists, into whose modification the more rigid form of Independency is now fast merging, and who hold what is essential to the system, united with more of Presbyterian combination, profess that there are no diversities of practice in their body? With regard, also, to the jus divinum, have there not been among them, as in other denominations, different shades of opinion? 2

1

2

Heb. xiii. 17.

Dr. John Owen, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, and Dean of Christ Church, in the Protectorate, is regarded as one of the chief writers on the Independent form of church-government, of which he strictly held the jus divinum, maintaining that 'Congregational Churches alone are suited to the ends of Christ in the institution of his church.' (Treatise on Evangelical Churches, chap.