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The Historic Episcopate

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The Historic Episcopate THE HISTORIC EPISCOPATE By ROBERT ELLIS THOMPSON, M.A., S.T. D., LL.D. of THE PRESBYTERY of PHILADELPHIA PHILADELPHIA tEfce Wtstminmx pre** 1910 "3^70 Copyright, 1910, by The Trustees of The Presbyterian Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work Published May, 1910 <§;G!.A265282 IN ACCORDANCE WITH ACADEMIC USAGE THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO THE PRESIDENT, FACULTY AND TRUSTEES OF MUHLENBERG COLLEGE IN GRATEFUL RECOGNITION OF HONORS CONFERRED PREFACE The subject of this book has engaged its author's attention at intervals for nearly half a century. The present time seems propitious for publishing it, in the hope of an irenic rather than a polemic effect. Our Lord seems to be pressing on the minds of his people the duty of reconciliation with each other as brethren, and to be bringing about a harmony of feeling and of action, which is beyond our hopes. He is beating down high pretensions and sectarian prejudices, which have stood in the way of Christian reunion. It is in the belief that the claims made for what is called "the Historic Episcopate" have been, as Dr. Liddon admits, a chief obstacle to Christian unity, that I have undertaken to present the results of a long study of its history, in the hope that this will promote, not dissension, but harmony. If in any place I have spoken in what seems a polemic tone, let this be set down to the stress of discussion, and not to any lack of charity or respect for what was for centuries the church of my fathers, as it still is that of most of my kindred. I wish to thank here Rev. Louis F. Benson, D.D., for the encouragement, advice and assistance he has given me in this work. Also to recognize with thanks my obliga- tions to the librarians of Union Theological Seminary, for their kind and prompt aid in my visits to their splen- did library, and especially to Mr. Harold Tryon, my former pupil and always friend, who is now an instructor in that Seminary. Philadelphia, May 1st, 1910. TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Introduction 1 I. The New Testament Age 17 II. The Presbyterl\n Fathers 50 III. The Ignatian Epistles 75 IV. From Senate to Monarch 101 V. Gradatim 145 VI. From Pastor to Prelate 165 VII. The Episcopate of the Middle Ages 185 VIII. Tudor Anglicanism 207 IX. Stuart Anglicanism 233 X. Modern Anglicanism 261 XL Outlook 285 Appendix 292 Index 311 Vll THE HISTORIC EPISCOPATE INTRODUCTION In the later history of the American Churches nothing is more gratifying than the decay of the polemic spirit. The men most honored are no longer those who administer the hardest knocks to other communions than their own. The literature in which the different sects used to pay their disrespects to each other is in small demand. The con- troversies of to-day are not between the different denom- inations of Christians, as they deal with questions on which there is a difference of opinion within the churches, and thus tend to weaken rather than to strengthen denomina- tional feeling. There is one exception to this, growing out of the claim put forward by a party within the Protestant Episcopal Church, but not by that Church itself. This party tells us that theirs alone of all the churches called Protestant possesses an authorized ministry and valid sacraments. Nor is this merely an academic thesis. It is proclaimed in sermons, propounded in leading articles, circulated in tracts, and pressed in social intercourse, as a reason why the members of other Protestant communions should abandon these for this favored Church; and every sug- gestion of a union of the Protestant churches is met with the demand that the pastors of these shall confess their lack of proper ordination, and shall submit to receive this at the hand of their bishops. 2 The Historic Episcopate This teaching, as has been said, is that not of that church, but of a party within it, which has grown up within the last seventy years, and must be reckoned among the novelties which disturb the peace of a much respected communion. Down to the rise of the Oxford school in England, and the spread of its influence in America, the position of Protestant episcopacy in our country was far from that which has been given it by these new contro- versialists. At the first the whole of the English colonies in America were attached to the diocese of London, so that not only ordination but even confirmation was limited to those who could undertake an ocean voyage lasting several months, and exposing passengers to perils of storm, war and pesti- lence, such as no longer exist for those who cross the Atlantic. At the same time, in spite of the appointment of Episcopal commissaries with powers of visitation, there was no possibility of keeping the clergy of the Church of England in America under due discipline, and the lives of some were a scandal to their cloth. The hardships of the situation were not unfelt in England and three several attempts were made to transport the English episcopate to America. The first of these was set on foot by Archbishop Laud, but was thwarted by the outbreak of the civil war. The second was due to the zealous churchmanship of the Earl of Clarendon, but came to an end with his expulsion from the chancellorship and banishment from England in 1667. The third grew out of the revival of zeal for the Church in the reign of Queen Anne. The papers were about to pass the great seal, and a house for the bishop had been secured in Burlington, N. J., when the queen's death transferred the English monarchy to a family of Germans, who cared nothing for the matter. The accession, however, of the third Introduction 3 king of the house of Hanover seemed to offer a favorable opportunity for the appointment of an American bishop. George III was proud of his position as a British sovereign, and loyal in his way to the Church of England. Arch- bishop Seeker and Bishop Porteous of Chester—the latter a native of Virginia—were friendly to the proposal. The difficulty in the way was the indifference of English statesmen to Church interests, and their reluctance to take any course for such an object which ran the risk of exciting extensive opposition either at home or in the colonies. And in both there was opposition enough. The British and Irish nonconformists resisted the pro- posal to extend the influence and power of English prelacy beyond the seas. The colonists, not excepting the Epis- copalians in Virginia, objected to the coming of a bishop who might bring with him the prelatic courts, with their jurisdiction over marriages, wills and other matters, which lasted in England until 1857, to say nothing of the peril of having Parliament enact a general tithe or tax upon all the colonists for the support of the bishop and his clergy. To propitiate this opposition, Dr. Thomas Bradley Chandler, of Burlington, published An Appeal to the Public in Behalf of the Church of England in America (New York, 1767), in which he set forth the hardships attending the dependence of the Episcopalians in the colonies on an English bishop, and assured his countrymen that nothing more was intended than the erection of an American diocese with jurisdiction over the clergy and people who voluntarily submitted to its bishop. The good faith of Dr. Chandler and his associates was not called in question; but it was pointed out that they could give no assurance that the British Parliament would not follow up this step by levying a general tithe and erecting 4 The Historic Episcopate a bishop's court with powers similar to those exercised by English bishops. In fact, the proposal brought into light the perils to religious equality which attached to the connection with the mother country, and thus helped to bring on the war for independence. It led to annual con- ferences of the Puritan churches of New England with the Presbyterians of the middle colonies, and to correspon- dence with the English dissenters, with a view to watching the movements of the friends of an American bishopric. For these reasons the war wrought disaster to the Church of England in the colonies. Although Washing- ton and other laymen of that communion, and William White and others among its clergy, were on the patriotic side, }'et it lost heavily in membership through the emi- gration of the loyalists to other parts of the British Empire and the withdrawal of patriots to other communions. Dr. Chandler gave good reason for believing that it was the strongest Christian communion in America before the war; but it certainly was far outnumbered by several others after its close, and to this day ranks below four other Protestant churches in point of membership. For this reason, and because independence had removed the peril of an established church, the opposition to the trans- planting of Protestant episcopacy to America ceased. Opposition was disarmed, and the representative of our government at the Court of St. James took part in the negotiations to secure the consecration of bishops for a church which was now content to take its place among the Christian communions of America. Outside the diocese of Connecticut, the bishops and other clergy of the Protestant Episcopal Church assumed an attitude of great moderation in their presentation of the merits of episcopacy. In the preface to the Book of Common Prayer, as adopted by the General Convention : Introduction 5 of 1789, a reference is made to the attempts to revise the prayer book of the Church of England in 1689, and it is said But this good work miscarried at that time; and the Civil Authority lias not since thought proper to revive it by any new commission.
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