another manner of office; they watch over your souls, which tendeth to the salvation both of body and soul." And again:-"The rulers of the Church are called the Church, to whom discipline appertaineth. Not the whole company of the Jews, but the Rulers of the Synagogue, are called the Church of the Jews.* The celebrated Estius, the learned Popish expositor and Professor at Douay, in his Commentary on 1 Tim. v. 17, delivers the following opinion:-"From this passage it may manifestly be gathered that, in the time of the Apostles, there were certain Presbyters in the Church who ruled well, and were worthy of double honor, and who yet did not labor in the word and doctrine; neither do the heretics of the present day (meaning the Protestants) deny this." And, in speaking of the establishment of this class of Elders in Geneva, about half a century before he wrote, he seems only to blame Calvin for considering and styling them laymen. He expresses a decisive opinion, that the Elders spoken of by Paul, in this place, were ecclesiastical men, set apart by ecclesiastical rites, and devoted to ecclesiastical duties; but that they still did not preach. And he explicitly acknowledges that Ambrose, in the fourth century, speaks of such Elders as having existed long before his day. It is also worthy of remark, that the same learned Romanist, in another work, not only avows, in the most distinct manner, his belief in the apostolic appointment of non-preaching Elders, and quotes 1 Tim. v. 17, in support of his opinion; but he also refers to Jerome and Augustine, as witnesses to the same fact.† The opinion of the learned Professor Whitaker, a *Works, p. 352 842. fol. 1612 ESTII Sententiarum Commentaria. Lib. iv. Par. 2. Sect. 21. divine of the Church of England, who flourished in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, as to the true meaning of 1 Timothy v. 17, was given, at length, in a preceding page. The same distinguished divine, in writing against Dury, expresses himself thus, concerning the office under consideration. "Art thou so ignorant as not to know that in the Church of Christ there ought to be Elders who should devote themselves to the work of government alone, and not to the administration of the word or sacraments, as we are taught in 1 Tim. v. 172"* To these testimonies might be added many more, from learned men of the same distinguished character with those already mentioned, and to the same effect. Chemnitius, of Germany; Salmasius, of Holland; Marloratus, and Danaus, of France; Hemmingius, of Denmark,t-with a long list of similar names, might all be cited as warm advocates of the class of Elders under consideration, and almost all of them decisive advocates of its divine authority. Nor are these individual suffrages, though numerous and unequivocal, all that can be alleged in favor of our cause. The great body of the Protestant Churches, when they came to organize their several systems in a state of separation from the Papacy, and from each other, differing, as they did, in many other respects, were almost unanimous in adopting and maintaining the office of Ruling Elder. Instead of this office being confined, as many appear to suppose, to the ecclesiastical establishments of Geneva and Scotland, it was generally introduced, with the Reformation, by Lu * Contra Dur æum, Lib. ix. p. 807. † See these writers, as well as a number of others, referred to in the Politicæ Ecclesiastica of Voetius. Par. ii. Lib. ii. Tract. iii. therans as well as Calvinists; and is generally retained to the present day, in almost all the Protestant Churches, excepting that of England. Those of France, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, &c., received this class of Elders early, and expressly represented them in their public Confessions, as founded on the word of God. It is probably safe to affirm, that, at the period of the Reformation, more than three-fourths of the whole Protestant world declared in favor of this office, not merely as expedient, but as warranted by Scripture, and as necessary to the order and edification of the Church. Does all this, it may be confidently asked, look like the office in question being a mere Genevan innovation? How shall we reconcile with this extraordinary position, the undoubted fact, that Lutherans and Reformed, in every part of Europe; those who never saw Calvin, as well as those who were within the sphere of his acquaintance and influence; nay, some of those who died before the illustrious Reformer of Geneva ever appeared at all, either as a writer or preacher;-are found among the decisive, zealous advocates of the office in question, and quoting, as of conclusive authority, in its favor, the principal passages of Scripture, and the principal Father, relied on by Presbyterians to establish its Apostolical warrant, and its actual existence in the early ages of the ancient Church? Truly, it is difficult to conceive how any one, who seriously and impartially weighs these facts, can resist the impression, that an Institution, in behalf of which so many eminently learned and pious men, of different and distant countries, without concert with each other, and without any common interest to serve, in reference to this matter, have so remarkably concurred in opinion, must have some solid foundation, both in the inspired volume, and in the nature and necessities of the Church. CHAPTER VII TESTIMONY OF EMINENT DIVINES SINCE THE WHILE we justly attach so much importance to the persons and services of the Reformers, and recur with the deepest reverence to their opinions, we owe scarcely less respect to the judgment of a number of other men, who have lived since their time, and of whom the world was not worthy. Men whose testimony can never be quoted but with veneration, and whose characters give an ample pledge of research at once profound and honest. To the decision of a few of these illustrious men on the subject before us, the attention of the reader is respectfully requested. The decisive opinion of Dr. Owen, undoubtedly one of the greatest divines that ever adorned the British nation, in favor of the scriptural warrant of the office of Ruling Elder, was given in a preceding section, and need not now be repeated. I may, however, add, that the more weight ought to be attached to this opinion on account of Dr. Owen's ecclesiastical connexions, which, as is well known, were by no means adapted to give him a bias on the side of Presbyterian order. The venerable and eminently pious Richard Baxter, was no Presbyterian. Yet he expresses himself in the following very unequivocal language, on the subject N under consideration. When I plead, that the order of subject Presbyters, (or lay-Elders,) was not instituted in scripture times, and consequently that it is not of divine institution, I mean, that, as a distinct office, or species of Church ministers, it is not a divine institution, nor, a lawful institution of man; but that, among men in the same office, some might, prudentially, be chosen to an eminency of degree, as to the exercise; and that according to the difference of their advantages, there might be a disparity in the use of their authority and gifts, I think was done in scripture times, and might have been after, if it had not then. And my judgment is, that, ordinarily, every particular Church (such as our parish Churches are) had more Elders than one, but not such store of men of eminent gifts, as that all these Elders could be such. But as if half a dozen of the most judicious persons of this parish were ordained to be Elders, of the same office with myself; but because they are not equally fit for public preaching, should most employ themselves in the rest of the oversight, consenting that the public preaching lie most upon me, and that I be the moderator of them, for order in circumstantials. This, I think, was the true Episcopacy and Presbytery of the first times.”* Although it may be doubted whether this venerable man be correct in his whole view of this subject; yet it will be observed by every attentive reader, that in maintaining the existence of a plurality of Elders in each Church, in primitive times, and that a great part of these Elders were not, in fact, employed in preaching, but in inspecting and ruling, he concedes every thing that * Disputations of Church government.-Advertisement, p. 4. 5, 4to. 1659. |