Essays on the Church, by a Layman [R.B. Seeley]. - Softcover

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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1834 Excerpt: ... CHAPTER VIII. ON THE VARIOUS OFFICES OR DEGREES IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. Descending, now, from the general principles by which this great question ought to be primarily governed; we come to speak of certain points objected to by dissenters, in the Internal Economy of the Church of England. Among the foremost of these will be found, the ministers or officers of the church, which are "multiplied," say dissenting writers, "beyond all scriptural precedent." The styles and titles of Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons, Priests, and Deacons, are recounted by them with great particularity, as though the mere enumeration of them, with a demand for the production of any direct scripture authority for their appointment, must be, at once, decisive of the whole question. But this method of reasoning,--or rather of leaping to a conclusion without reasoning, is of the most superficial description. It rests wholly on the use of certain titles, which, confessedly, do not occur in holy writ. And because we can shew no instance of a Dean or an Archdeacon in the apostolic times, therefore, argue those controversialists, they are contrary to the rules of scripture, and form sufficient ground of dissent from a Church which employs them. But how inconsistent is this strict adherence to the exact letter of scripture, with the mode of reasoning which, on other subjects, they do not hesitate to adopt. They " maintain the absolute and unalienable right of electing their own ministers," although they admit that there is not to be found in ail scripture a single " case in which the people chose their own pastors." In fact, they never think it necessary in the least degree to regulate their own conduct by this absolute and exclusive rule. Where do they find any authority, in the ...

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