Dean of a High Church, was constrained to testify here:

"That ekklesia cannot mean the church, as represented by her rulers, appears by verses 19, 20, where any collection of believers is gifted with the power of deciding such cases."

And he is honest enough to add :

"Nothing could be further from the spirit of our Lord's command than proceedings in what are oddly enough called 'ecclesiastical courts."

And Lange says:

"The term ekklēsia must always be understood as referring to the Christian church, or to the meeting of believers, whether it be large or small. . . . Roman-Catholic interpreters are entirely in error in explaining the passage, 'Tell it to the bishops.""

I am well aware of the suggestion which has been made that, inasmuch as no church was in existence when our Lord uttered these words, He must have referred to the not specially democratic-synagogue. But this ignores the fact that Christ was speaking for the future, when churches should exist.

That this is the true exposition of the word "church' here becomes more clear and irresistible when we reflect that the very object of friendly labor with the offender by the mass of his neighbor believers, as supplementing the work of the "one or two more," and tenderly aiming to quicken and guide his conscience; to persuade him that his accusation is no mere misjudgment on the part of a little knot of interested or prejudiced persons, but does indeed deserve his gravest reconsideration, and call for his deepest penitence; must necessarily become impaired, if not be altogether

thwarted, by the substitution of anything resembling the process of a series of appellant tribunals with a remote and distant judgment upon his case.

Clearly, then, by enacting, as the permanent law of discipline for offenses among His followers, one which can be thoroughly and loyally carried out by the Congregational system, and cannot be so applied by any other, our Saviour did for substance ordain the democratic as the true polity for His church.

It remains, under this part of our subject, only to notice the fact that the idea of the essential fashion of the future Christian church having been thus practically decreed by Christ—as we have seen that it had already been hinted in spirit by Him- His subsequent important utterances conformed themselves to the same conception. This was especially the fact in [John xvii: 1-26] His last prayer for His followers; in [Matt. xxvi: 26-29; Mark xiv: 22-25; Luke xxii: 19, 20] His formula of institution for the Lord's Supper; and [Matt. xxviii: 18-20; Mark xvi: 15, 16; Luke xxiv: 36-49; John xx: 21-23] His last command. With genuine and profound respect for the various excellences of our sister denominations, I do yet most earnestly believe, and most respectfully urge, that no polity so fully as ours is able to accord with and promote the spirit of that divine and loving oneness and brotherhood for which the Saviour prayed; while His last command, addressed, not to any hierarch or bench of bishops, but to the company of His followers, as a fraternity of equal individuals, who are commanded to "go preach," befits our system better than any other; and our churches are the only ones which are able with

verbal accuracy exactly to copy, in the Eucharist, the words and deeds of its first institution, as Inspiration has preserved them "for our learning."

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One utterance of our Lord only, of a seeming contrary to all these, and which I have reserved until others have been examined, remains to be considered. It is that [Matt. xvi: 18] in which Christ says to Simon, Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church," etc. At first glance, this does look as if Peter were appointed to some special foundation work for the church above his brethren, and offers some slight color to the Romish claim of the primacy of this apostle, continued as they allege-by transfer to the Popes of Rome. It is an obscure text, and has been very variously interpreted. Some, like Augustine, Jerome, and others, have referred the "rock" to Christ Himself; but this seems forced. Some, like the majority of the Fathers, with Huss and Luther, have referred it to Peter's confession of faith in Christ's Messiahship; but it may be doubted if this be warranted by the facts of the case. Some, like Origen, have applied it to Peter as the representative of believers in general; but this appears labored and unsatisfactory. Lange explains the expression as generalizing, so to speak, the individual Peter into what might be called the petrine characteristic of the church; viz., faithfulness of confession, as first distinctly exhibited by Peter; but this is open to the objection of being wire-drawn and fanciful. It remains simply and naturally to understand it as spoken of Peter himself in his own proper person, but not, in the Popish sense of Baronius and Bellarmine, as investing him with any

primacy; nor, with some Romanists, and many Protestants, like Bengel and Crusius, of any specialty in Peter's work as an apostle; but in a direct and practical significance: "Thou art Peter [a rock]; and upon this rock-quality- this boldness and firmness of character, this solid fitness for service in the difficult work of winning men to the gospel-I will build my church." And this interpretation, while it satisfies the exigencies of the sense, seems to be borne out by the fact that Peter was first to preach Christ to both Jews [Acts ii: 14] and [Acts x: 34] Gentiles.

Reasonably considered, then, this passage in no sense contradicts, or modifies, those teachings of fraternal equality among His followers, which Christ had before solemnly announced.

So far, then, as the Gospels are concerned, it becomes clear that, as Jesus was the visible and only head of His church so long as He remained on earth, and besides Him there was no superiority and no ruling, but all were brethren, equal in rights, however unequal in their work or their renown; so it was His theory and purpose in regard to the subsequent development of His church for all the ages, Himself to remain, though ascended, its invisible yet real and only head, its membership standing permanently on the same broad platform of essential equality and brotherhood, and its offices being offices of service and not of control.

SECTION II.

CONGREGATIONALISM IN THE ACTS OF

THE APOSTLES.

Such being the hints and foregleams of church government which the Gospels contain, and such the fun

damental constitutional law by Christ laid down to control all future development; together suggesting that from the beginning He had the democratic polity in mind, and the intent to prepare the way for its practical establishment so soon after His crucifixion and ascension as the fullness of time for that work should come; the question becomes both most interesting and most important, What kind of churches, by the guidance of the Holy Ghost, were actually formed under the primal conditions of the development of the Christian system among Jews and Gentiles? The answer to this question we shall find in the Acts of the Apostles.

1. The first passage bearing upon the subject is that giving, in the first chapter [verses 15-26], the account of the choice of an apostle in place of Judas. Here the main points of interest are the facts that, although Peter was spokesman and leader of the eleven, he assumed no such primacy as would fill the vacant apos tolate, nor intimated that the eleven collectively had power to fill it; but submitted the matter to the whole church of one hundred and twenty members, then present, telling them that from those who were competent one must "be made”—as Wiclif rightly translated it, not "ordained" a witnesse of his resurexcioun with us;" that the church then, literally, "stood up -i. e. requested to stand up-two ;" and then, recognizing Christ, who had chosen all of the eleven, to be their still existing, though risen, Master and Head, they prayed him to indicate, by the lot, which of the two he preferred; which resulted in the designation of Matthias.

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