them.*

And may it not then be asked, what were the ordainers themselves? Were they of no order in the church? Or were they of the fame order with either of these whom they ordained? From the answer that must be given to these questions, it is evident that there were three orders in the church, at the time when the apostles ordained the two inferior orders, whom St. Clement in the current language of the apoftolic age, calls bifhops and deacons, and thereby alludes to a text, which he quotes from Ifaiah, as rendered in the Greek tranflation-" I "will constitute their bifhops in righteousness, and "their deacons in faith." Whether this be a just tranflation, or a proper application of the prediction, Dr. Campbell acknowledges is not the question."It is enough," he fays, "that it evinces what Cle"ment's notion was of the established minifters then "in the church." And his notion, we have no doubt, was the fame with what we have feen prevailed at the time, when he wrote this Epistle to the Corinthians; that under the apostles, the care or overfight of certain portions of the flock of Chrift was committed to inferior overfeers and ministers, whom we have called bishops and deacons, till it

* See the fame inference drawn, and the very same reasoning made use of to fupport it, in An Enquiry into the Conftitution, &c. of the Primitive Church, which was fo completely answered in An original Draught of the Primitive Church, by a prefbyter of the Church of England, that it is faid to have brought over the Enquirer to this author's opinion.

Ifaiah, lx. 17.

was thought proper to put them under the government of perfons invefted with apoftolical power, fuch as Clemens himself poffeffed and exercised in the church of Rome, of which he is always diftinguished as bishop, and by another writer of the fame name, Clemens of Alexandria, is exprefsly called the "apostle Clemens." This is all that can be justly inferred from the paffage of his Epistle, quoted by Dr. Campbell; which was not at all intended to point out particularly the number of orders in the church; and could no more be confidered as fetting afide the fuperior rank and authority of bishops, than the common language of both Jewish and Chriftian writers could be understood as excluding the high priest, when they mentioned the Jewish ministry under the general appellation of priests and Levites.

The next teftimony, which our author produces, to fhew that, in the primitive times there were only two orders of minifters in the church, is that of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who is faid by Irenæus to have been taught by the apoftles, and to have converfed with many, who had feen our Saviour; to which account it is added, that Irenæus himself had feen

Strom. lib. 4.

In fome parts of the English liturgy, the clergy are prayed for under the twofold diftinction of "bishops and curates." But no perfon will hence infer, that the Church of England has but two orders of clergy, when the has fo carefully provided for the " making, ordaining and confecrating of bishops, priefs, and deacons."

feen him, in his younger days, and knew him to have been conftituted bishop of Smyrna by the apoftles. One might suppose, that when the adverfaries of Epifcopacy bring forward fuch a witness as this in fupport of their cause, they had certainly difcovered in his writings, fome clear, undoubted evidence, on which might be justly founded their rejection of the Epifcopal order. But instead of this, all that we meet with in his Epiftle to the Philippians, is a very brief intimation of "their being fub

ject to the prefbyters and deacons, as unto God "and Chrift; while at the fame time, the very in, troduction to the epiftle marks the fuperior character of the writer, in these words-" Polycarp, and "the prefbyters that are with him, to the church "of God which is at Philippi." And if only the

prefbyters and deacons of that church are mentioned in the words quoted by Dr. Campbell, it might be owing to the Epifcopal charge being vacant at the time when this epiftle was written, as was the cafe at Rome, when Cyprian bishop of Carthage

wrote

If the author of this Epiftle had not been diftinguished by a fuperior dignity of office, we could hardly fuppofe it confiftent with his modefty and felf denial, to have named himself only, and made no mention of his brethren, but by the general name of prefbyters: A circumftance, which obliged even Blondel to make the following remark-"Id tamen in S. Martyris epiftola peculiare apparet, quod eam privatim fuo et prefbyterorum nomine ad Philippenfium fraternitatem dedit, ac fibi quandam fupra prefbyteros→→ Upon refervasse vidctur, ut jam tum in Epifcopali apice conftitutum reliquos Smyrnenfium prefbyteros gradu fuperaffe conjicere liceat." Apol p. 14.

| Vol. I. p. 139.

wrote his letters to the presbyters of that place. But what fhall we fay of our Lecturer's afferting it, as "evident from the above quotation, that Polycarp "knew of no Chriftian minifter fuperior to the "prefbyters," when, together with his own, he earnestly recommended, and actually fent to the Philippians, at their defire, thofe very epistles of Ignatius, in which the office and the duties of a bishop, as diftinguished from thofe of the prefbyters, are fo fully and frequently infifted on, that Polycarp might well think it unnecessary for him to fay any thing farther on that fubject? Being himself a bishop, and writing in that character to the Philippians, he might justly confider the epiftles of Ignatius, which they were fo defirous to fee, as perfectly fufficient to establish the regard which was due to the Epifcopal office, efpecially as one of thefe epiftles was addreffed to himself as bishop of Smyrna, and another of them to the church of that place, exhorting them to be obedient to their bishop, and to do nothing of what belongs to the church without his confent.

Indeed the epiftles of Ignatius bear such strong undeniable evidence to the existence of three diftinct orders in the Christian ministry, known by the names of bishops, prefbyters and deacons, that there is no poflibility of evading the force of this pofitive teftimony, but by boldly affirming, that the epiftles themselves are spurious, or have been fo interpolated by various tranfcribers, as to leave but a very small, if any degree of credit due to them. This has been

the

the pretence, in one shape or other, of all the advocates for prefbyterian parity, from the days of Calvin down to Dr. Campbell; and we have only to take notice of the fame arguments, dreffed out perhaps in different forms, according to the taste and ability of the several writers, who have prefumed to attack thofe venerable remains of ecclefiaftical antiquity contained in the epiftles of St. Ignatius.— It is very fuitable however to our prefent defign, to fhew all proper attention to what has been faid on this fubject; and we shall begin with obferving, that Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, having prefided over that church with admirable prudence and conftancy, for almost forty years, was at laft condemned to fuffer death, about the tenth year of the reign of the Emperor Trajan, and on the way to his martyrdom at Rome, wrote his epiftles to the several churches, to which they are addreffed. That fome fuch epiftles were written by Ignatius, is evident from the account, to which we have juft now referred, as given by Polycarp in his Epistle to the Philippians, in which he tells them-" The

cr

epiftles of Ignatius, which he wrote unto us,'

(that is to himself, and to the church at Smyrna)

66

'

together with what others of his have come to our hands, we have fent to you, according to your order, which are fubjoined to this epiftle; by "which ye may be greatly profited; for they treat "of faith, and patience and of all things that per

"tain