Although the whole preceding discussion has been limited to the spiritual supremacy of the bishop of Rome; yet it has not been from the supposition, that the other of a temporal nature is altogether irrelevant to the argument. It is agreed on all hands, that bishops of Rome have claimed the prerogative of influencing the civil concerns of states and princes. Of this, one of the most exceptionable exercises, has been the absolving of subjects from their allegiance. In relation to England, the last instance of such nefarious conduct, was in the case of queen Elizabeth; the consequences of which were felt, in many conspiracies against her government and her person. In England and in these states, it is certain of those who conceive themselves bound in conscience to adhere to the communion of the bishop of Rome, that they profess to abhor the above-mentioned wicked doctrine; however unquestionably advocated and acted on by many of his predecessors, and not merely professed by his flatterers, as is sometimes said. And further, it has been of late years publickly disowned, by sundry foreign universities of the same faith. The persuasion is here entertained, that this has been done with great sincerity; although nothing to the same effect has proceeded from the chair, to which so extravagant a prerogative has been claimed, by those who filled it formerly. Notwithstanding this, when a certain opinion is again and again declared, by persons who manifest nothing in their characters to warrant the charge of insincerity; if they are presumed to be insincere, for the justifying of intolerance, it is a ground, on which this fiend will always find victims, in proportion to the power which he may at any time possess. The said claim has been here referred to, for a very different purpose. That it has been made and carried into effect by many of the Roman bishops, and that it has, even in modern times, been advo eated by some and never authoritatively relinquished, will be conceded. The fact is here thought to have a weighty bearing, on the question of general councils; the decisions of which, with the sanction of the Roman prelate, are supposed to be infallible. The prominent object of those bodies, is professed to be the rooting out of errour: and yet, during the greater portion of the Christian æra, this errour, in the head of their body, has lain untouched before them. It surely was not of small moment; either to the peace of society, or to the purity of faith. Connected with this point, is the question concerning the inflicting of temporal penalties, for supposed errours in religion. The lawfulness of it is not more scouted by Protestants, than by the Roman Catholicks of the two countries which have been referred to. Here also is an errour, which has been untouched by any general council; and has even been affirmed by one of them-that of the Lateran in 1215: although it is not here unknown, that the instance is contended to be irrelevant; because, after the Pope's reading of the decrees prepared by himself to the effect, they were consented to by the council, without discussion. There is no reluctance to acknow. ledge, that Protestant councils and Churches have had their hands deep in like works of iniquity. But this is foreign to the point in view, in which the subject has been introduced in the present dissertation. The purpose is, to show the emptiness of the plea for the spiritual supremacy of the See of Rome; in the supposition, that her bishop is the head of a body, which can fairly be held to be representative of the whole Christian Church. The claim of the bishops of Rome to temporal authority, interfering with that of civil rulers, is what no liberal minded Roman Catholick will at this day defend. But there is another kind of temporal authority-that limited to certain boundaries, comprehending what has been called the Popedom, or St. Peter's Patrimony, be the same more or less extensive: which it is dif ficult to conceive of as separated from the spiritual character, without a derangement of the whole system of papal jurisdiction, as it now stands. The author is the more free to declare this sentiment, because of its having been clearly expressed by the present Pope, in one of his late communications; on a question which existed between him and the government of France. The instrument alluded to, is dated June 10, 1809. Therein the Pope complains of being deprived of the temporal sovereignty; with which, as he justly remarks, his spiritual independence is closely connected. Let but the temporal character be done away; and the spiritual character will designate an ecclesiastick, bound to the interests and perhaps submissive to the will of a particular sovereign; while the subjects of other sovereigns will be dependent on a foreign subject in spirituals: which, as is well known, may be made materially to affect the concerns of nations. Under such circumstances, episcopal oaths of fidelity to those who fill the Roman chair, and the carrying of appeals in judicial causes of the Church to their tribunal, is an absurdity which has not yet existed, and could not long continue in countries, independent on that of which such an ecclesiastick would be a subject. The judgment of the present Pope, is exactly in consent with what Mr. Lowman, in the preface to his Paraphrase and Notes on the Apocalypse, * quotes from a treatise of Puffendorf, on the spiritual monarchy of Rome. This eminent civilian writes as follows-" Though the Church was never so abounding in riches, and in the great numbers of ecclesiasticks, yet it was absolutely necessary that the Pope, if he intended to establish an ecclesiastical monarchy, should not be in any way dependent on any temporal prince; but that he should reside in a place which was free from all subjection to any civil power but himself, that he should always be possessed of such an estate, as might be sufficient to maintain his grandeur, and not be liable to be taken away from him on any pretence whatsoever: where *Page 21. also his adherents might find a safe retreat, whenever they should be pursued by the civil power." These statements are made, in order to show how much, under some circumstances, the spiritual power may derive its complexion from the temporal. It is also fair to remark, how different must be the spiritual authority of the papacy, as exercised for many centuries, from any that subsisted in Rome, not to say in the primitive times, but until the middle of the eighth century; when by the gifts of Pepin, the father of Charlemagne, the Pope became a temporal prince. For until then, he had not exercised civil authority, within the city of Rome and in its neighbourhood. POSTSCRIPT. The interest recently taken, in the concerns of a body of Christians long known to have existed in the interior of India, because of some circumstances concerning them lately brought to light, induces the author to plead the fact of the existence of such a people, as strong evidence of the absolute nullity, during many centuries after Christ, of the affirmed jurisdiction of the bishop of Rome over the Church. There is here supposed to be evidence of the following facts: that when the Portuguese, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, sailed round the Cape of Good Hope to the coast of Malabar, they found on it the body of Christians in question; that they were in entire ignorance of there being in Rome an ecclesiastick, who claimed jurisdiction over the Christian world; and that they professed to have derived their faith from Antioch, wherein the disciples of Christ were first called Christians, and to have retained their faith for the space of thirteen hundred years. If they should be supposed to have swelled the account of their duration, it applies to the strengthening of the present argument. What is known of the Syrian Christians here referred to, is fa vourable to the principles of the Protestant Episcopal Church, in various ways. It demonstrates the high antiquity of episcopacy, and of worship by forms of prayer. But there is no point to which it applies with so much weight, as to that of the exemption of the primitive Church from Roman jurisdiction. DISSERTATION X. OF EPISCOPACY.* The moderate ground taken by the Church of England, and by this Church.-The Special Ministry of the Apostles, including St. Paul.-They Associated others in the Permanent Ministry.-Case of St. James.-Of Barnabas.-Of Timothy, Titus and others.-Ignatius.-Other Fathers.The Episcopacy was Diocesan.--Of Congregational Episcopacy, in a Pastor and Lay Elders.-Or in a Bishop dif fering from Presbyters in office only.-Limit of this Dis cussion. THE subject may be considered in two points of view-as it relates to fact, and-as it relates to precept. That is, the inquiry may be limited to the question-Whether the apostles instituted an order of the ministry, of a higher grade than that commonly known, in the acts, and in the epistles, under the name of presbyters or elders: and this fact being supposed proved, another question may be raised-Whether the institution be obligatory on Christians, in all times and places; so that on this is dependent the being of a Christian Church. Although the present argument is to be occupied on the former point, yet it may not be improper, to premise a few remarks concerning the latter. * See Lecture VII. |