Though the Dissenters practise

dained priest, and by that means || circumstances of the case. Among be permitted to administer the Seceders or Dissenters, ordinations holy communion. A bishop, on the vary. In the establishment of ordination of clergymen, is to ex- Scotland, where there are no bishamine them in the presence of the ops, the power of ordination is ministers, who in the ordination of lodged in the presbytery. Among priests, but not of deacons, assist the Calvinistic Methodists, ordihim at the imposition of hands; nation is performed by the sancbut this is only done as a mark of tion and assistance of their own assent, not because it is thought ministers. Among the Indepennecessary. In case any crime, as dents and Baptists, the power of drunkenness, perjury, forgery, ordination lies in the suffrage of &c., is alleged against any one that the people. The qualifications of is to be ordained either priest or the candidate are first known, trideacon, the bishop ought to desisted, and approved by the church. from ordaining him. The person After which trial, the church proto be ordained is to bring a tes-ceeds to give him a call to be their timonial of his life and doctrine to minister; which he accepting, the the bishop, and to give account of public acknowledgment thereof is his faith in Latin; and both priests signified by ordination, the mode and deacons are obliged to sub- of which is so well known, as not scribe the thirty-nine articles. In to need recital here. the ancient discipline there was no such thing as a vague and abso-ordination, we find they are not lute ordination; but every one was agreed respecting it. Some conto have a church, whereof he was tend for the power of ordination to be ordained clerk or priest. In as belonging to the people; the the twelfth century they grew exercise of which right by them more remiss, and ordained with- constitutes a minister, and confers out any title or benefice. The validity on his public ministracouncil of Trent, however, restor- tion. Others suppose it belongs to ed the ancient discipline, and ap- those who are already in office. pointed that none should be or- Without pretending to determine dained but those who were provid- the question, we shall here give an ed with a benefice; which practice outline of the arguments on both still obtains in England. The times sides. of ordination are the four Sundays. immediately following the Ember weeks; being the second Sunday in Lent, Trinity Sunday, and the Sundays following the first Wednesday after September 14 and December 13. These are the stat-appointed or ordained a preacher ed times; but ordination may take place at any other time, according to the discretion of the bishop or VOL. II.

E e

According to the former opinion, it is argued that the word ordain was originally equal to choose or appoint; so that if twenty Christians nominated a man to instruct them once, the man was

for the time. The essence of ordination lies in the voluntary choice and call of the people, and in the

voluntary acceptance of that call | mediate interposition of the Di

vine Being, a lot being nothing more nor less than an appeal to God for the decision of an affair. But ordinary officers, as elders and pastors of churches, were chosen and ordained by the votes of the people, expressed by stretching out their hands; thus it is said of the apostles, Acts xiv, 23. When they had ordained them elders in every church, xgorovAFTIS, by taking the suffrages and votes of the members of the churches, shewn by the stretching out of their hands, as the word signifies; and which they directed them to, and upon it declared the elders duly elected and ordained.

Some, however, on this side of the question, do not go so far as to say that the essence of ordination lies in the choice of the people, but in the solemn and public separation to office by prayer: still,

by the person chosen and called; for this affair must be by mutual consent and agreement, which joins them together as pastor and people. And this is to be done among themselves; and public ordination, so called, is no other than a declaration of that. Election and ordination are spoken of as the same; the latter is expressed and explained by the former. It is said of Christ, that he ordained twelve, Mark iii, 14. that is, he chose them to the office of apostleship, as he himself explains it, John vi, 70. Paul and Barnabas are siad to ordain elders in every church, Acts xiv, 23. or to choose them; that is, they gave orders and directions to every church as to the choice of elders over them: for sometimes persons are said to do that which they give orders and directions for doing; as Moses and Solomon, with respect to building the taber-however, they think that ordinanacle and temple, though done by others; and Moses particularly is said to choose the judges, Exod. xviii, 25. the choice being made under his direction and guidance. The word that is used in Acts xiv, 23. is translated chosen in Cor. ii, 8, 19, where the apostle speaks of a brother, xgorous, who was cho-pend on the uninterrupted successen of the churches to travel with us, sion of any office or officer; for and is so rendered when ascribed then it would be impossible for any to God, Acts x, 41. This choice church to know whether they ever and ordination, in primitive times, have had any authentic minister; was made two ways; by casting for we could never be assured lots and giving votes, signified by that such ordinations had been stretching out of hands. Matthias rightly transmitted through 1700 was chosen and ordained to be an years. A whole nation might be apostle in the room of Judas by corrupted, and every bishop and casting lots; that being an extra-elder therein might have apostaordinary office, required an im-tized from the faith, as it was in

tion by either bishops, presbyters, or any superior character, cannot be necessary to make a minister or ordain a pastor in any particular church; for Jesus Christ, say they, would never leave the subsistence of his churches, or the efficacy of his word and sacraments, to de

England in the days of popery. I mention ordination as the work To say, therefore, that the right || of the elders, and as being regarded as a distinct thing from the choice of the people, and subsequent to it.

of ordaining lies in men who are already in office, would drive us to hold the above-mentioned untenable position of uninterrupted

succession.

Most of the foregoing remarks apply chiefly to the supposition that a person cannot be ordained in any other way than as a pastor

find a difference of opinion. On the one side it is said, that there is no scripture authority whatever for a person being ordained with

On the other side it is observed, that, although Christians have the liberty of choosing their own pas-over a church. But here, also, we tor, yet they have no power or right to confer the office itself. Scripture represents ordination to be the setting apart of a person to the holy ministry by the autho-out being chosen or nominated to rity of Jesus himself acting by the the office of a minister by a church. medium of men in office; and this Elders and bishops were ordained solemn investing act is necessary in every church, not without any to his being lawfully accounted a church. To ordain a man originalminister of Christ. The originally, says Dr. Campbell, was nothing word, Acts vi, 3. is xalasnowμs, else but in a solemn manner to aswhich according to Scapula, and sign him a pastoral charge. To the best writers on the sacred lan-give him no charge, and not to guage, signifies to put one in rule, ordain him, were perfectly idenor to give him authority. Now did tical. On the other side it is conthis power lodge in the people, tended, that from these words, how happens it that in all the epis"Go ye into all the world, and tles not a single word is to be found giving them any directions about constituting ministers? On the other hand, in the epistles to Timothy and Titus, who were persons in office, we find particu-ployed in the important work of lar instruction given them to lay hands suddenly on no man, to examine his qualifications before they ordain him, and to take care that they commit the office only to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also, Titus i, 5. 2d Tim. iv, 14. Acts xiv, 23.

preach the Gospel to every creature; and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world," it is evident that missionaries and itinerants must be em

the ministry; that, as such cannot be ordained over any particular church, there cannot be the least impropriety in ordaining them for the church universal. Allowing that they have all those talents, gifts, and grace, that constitute a minister in the sight of God, who will dare say they should not be designated by their brethren for the administration of those ordinances Christ has appointed in

Besides, it is said, the primitive Christians evidently viewed this matter in the same light. There is scarcely a single ecclesiastical writer that does not expressly the church?-Without allowing

this, how many thousands would || ferences should be made a matter be destitute of these ordinances? of violent contest among ChrisBesides, these are the very men tians; nor ought any words to be whom God in general honours as pronounced against each other by the first instruments in raising those of the episcopal, presbytechurches, over which stated pas-rian, or independent way. Surely tors are afterwards fixed. The separation of Saul and Barnabas, say they, was an ordination to missionary work, including the administration of sacraments to the converted Heathen, as well as public instruction, Acts xiii, 1, 3. So Timothy was ordained, 1st Tim. iv, 14. Acts xvi, 3, and that is equal reason by analogy to suppose that Titus and other companions of Paul were similarly ordained, without any of them having a particular church to take under his pastoral care. So that they appear to have been ordained to the work of the Christian ministry at large.

On reviewing the whole of this controversy, I would say with Dr. Watts, "that since there are some texts in the New Testament, wherein single persons, either apostles, as Paul and Barnabas, ordained ministers in the churches; or evangelists, as Timothy and Titus; and since other missions or ordinations are intimated to be performed by several persons, viz. prophets, teachers, elders, or a presbytery, as in Acts xiii, 1, and 1st Tim. iv, 14, since there is sometimes mention made of the imposition of hands in the mission of a minister, and sometimes no mention of it; and since it is evident that in some cases popular ordinations are and must be valid without any bishop or elder, I think none of these dif

all may agree thus far, that various forms or modes, seeming to be used in the mission or ordination of ministers in primitive times, may give a reasonable occasion or colour for sincere and honest searchers after truth to follow different opinions on this head, and do therefore demand our candid and charitable sentiments concerning those who differ from us." See articles EPISCOPACY, IMPOSITION OF HANDS, INDEPENDENTS, and MINISTERIAL CALL, in this work; Dr. Owen's True Nature of a Gospel Church, p. 78, 83; Brekell's Essay on Ordination; Watts's Rational Foundation of a Christian Church, sec. 3; Dr. Campbell's Lectures on Ecclesiastical History, vol. i, p. 345; Gill's Body of Divinity, p. 246, vol. iii, 8vo. ed.; Theological Magazine for 1802, p. 33, 90, 167; Ewing's Remarks on Dick's Sermon, preached before the Edinburgh Missionary Society, in 1801.

ORIGENISTS, a denomination which appeared in the third century, who derived their opinions from the writings of Origen, a presbyter of Alexandria, and a man of vast and uncommon abilities, who interpreted the divine truths of religion according to the tenor of the Platonic philosophy. He alleged that the source of many evils lies in adhering to the literal and external part of scripture; and that the true mean

ing of the sacred writers was to || terrestrial matter, the modification be sought in a mysterious and of all their operations by it, and hidden sense, arising from the nature of things themselves.

the heavenly body promised in the Gospel, as the highest perfection of our renewed nature, clearly evince. Therefore if our souls ex

The principal tenets ascribed to Origen, together with a few of the reasons made use of in their de-isted before they appeared inhafence, are comprehended in the following summary:

bitants of the earth, they were placed in a purer element, and enjoyed far greater degrees of hap

overflowing goodness brought them into existence, would not deprive them of their felicity, tilk by their mutability they rendered themselves less pure in the whole

1. That there is a pre-existent state of human souls. For the na-piness. And certainly he, whose ture of the soul is such as to make her capable of existing eternally, backward as well as forward, because her spiritual essence, as such, makes it impossible that she should either through age or vio-extent of their powers, and belence be dissolved; so that nothing came disposed for the susception is wanting to her existence but the of such a degree of corporeal life good pleasure of him from whom as was exactly answerable to their all things proceed. And if, accor-present disposition of spirit. Hence ding to the Platonic scheme, we it was necessary that they should assign the production of all things become terrestrial men. to the exuberant fulness of life in the Deity, which, through the blessed necessity of his communicative nature, empties itself into all possibilities of being, as into so many capable receptacles, we must suppose her existence in a sense necessary, and in a degree co-eternal with God.

2. That souls were condemned to animate mortal bodies, in order to expiate faults they had committed in a pre-existent state: for we may be assured, from the infinite goodness of their Creator, that they were at first joined to the purest matter, and placed in those regions of the universe which were most suitable to the purity of essence they then possessed. For that the souls of men are an order of essentially incorporate spirits, their deep immersion into

3. That the soul of Christ was united to the Word before the incarnation. For the scriptures teach us that the soul of the Messiah was created before the beginning of the world, Phil. ii, 5, 7. This text must be understood of Christ's human soul, because it is unusual to propound the Deity as an example of humility in scripture. Though the humanity of Christ was so God-like, he emptied himself of this fulness of life and glory, to take upon him the form of a servant. It was this Messiah who conversed with the patriarchs under a human form: it was he who appeared to Moses upon the Holy Mount: it was he who spoke to the prophets under a visible appearance: and it is he who will at last come in triumph upon the clouds to restore the universe to