(No. IV.) PRIESTHOOD. BY JAMES BIDEN, MONCKTON HOUSE, ANGLESEY, HANTS, AUTHOR OF "THE TRUE CHURCH." TAN Winchester: H. WOOLDRIDGE, HIGH STREET. London: WERTHEIM AND MACINTOSH, PATERNOSTER ROW. IN THE NOMINAL, OR CATHOLIC, KINGDOM ARE RULERS AND TEACHERS, BUT NOT ECCLESIASTICS. IN THE TRUE KINGDOM, OR THE CHURCH, IS UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD. Ir is maintained by the Clergy Church, that an Ecclesiastical Church was established by Christ, founded upon the Apostles, and that to the Apostles was given power to perpetuate their order, and so maintain an endless line of ecclesiastics. The principle of perpetuity is the foundation principle of the Clergy Church. And laying this down as a foundation, and this foundation, as we shall show, being false, the whole scheme being adverse to Christianity, divines build upon it a superstructure of falsehood. They claim to themselves thereby, as a separate body, a position and privileges which belong not to them. With their privileges, as claimed from the promises of Christ, we are not now concerned. These form the subject of a future paper. In this we are to consider the position of rulers and teachers, and the principles which govern their election. The inquiry will involve the leading principles; and the question to be determined will be, whether a mediating sacramental priesthood as a separate body, or rulers and teachers chosen out of the general body, be most consonant to Christianity. Let us fairly state the matter in dispute. Divines affirm that our Lord, established an Ecclesiastical Church, creating by the hands of the Apostles an order of men, called the clergy, as a separate body, to govern the Church, to perpetuate their order, to administer all rites, to absolve from sin, and to affix guilt or modify punishment. In opposition to this, we affirm that Christ instituted no such Church, that such a scheme is opposed to the Gospel, and that Christ established a Church wherein all members have free access to Him, who alone is their Mediator and their Judge; and that in virtue of union with Him they are "priests and kings," and that an order of men, not as a separate class, but chosen by and out of the people should be rulers and teachers. Christians are brethren, and a separation of the body into two distinct classes of clergy and laity is adverse to Christianity. Before we proceed to discuss this subject, let us be reminded of the two great leading truths before established. 1. The harlot of Scripture is not atheistic anarchy, but a body in intimate connection with Christianity. It is a false body representing itself to be the true. The Church is the spouse of Christ, and it is that system embodied which claims to be the spouse, and is not. It is the false ecclesiastical system. 2. The Church is a body of persons in spiritual union with Christ, irrespective of a clergy order, or not having an ecclesiastical organisation. These two truths are established, we think, beyond dispute, and they go far, or quite, to negative the claims of the ecclesiastical body, or the Clergy Church. But let us further examine into the arguments used by divines to favour their opinions, and see whether they are borne out in their assertions, and whether we cannot, by investigating the Scriptures, arrive at certain conclusions opposite to theirs, and whether church life is not something very different to that which a Clergy Church presents. That divines themselves must have some suspicion of their doubtful position, is apparent from the laboured way in which they set about to establish their claims to rule. And what has occasioned them the difficulty, is the fact that the Church is superior to, and above, ecclesiastical government. Consequently, |