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rightly regarded the Pontifical, which has hitherto been in use, as 'superstitious and ungodly,' the Church of England Book of Consecration, lately set forth and which we now formally approve of, cannot be so characterised." Thus, if this be so, does the Church of England and Ireland positively condemn Rome's Orders, and that as "superstitious and ungodly.”

From whatever points of view we look at the question, and we need not I think multiply them, it is clearly seen the Church of England does not hold the Orders of the false Church of Rome as valid; it inevitably follows therefore, that the recognition of them as, in any sense, sufficient for the due administration of the word and sacraments within the pale of the Church of England, is both civilly and ecclesiastically unlawful.

The relative position of the Church of England towards all Churches respecting ordination is the same. Those ministers who have been instituted in the Presbyterian form, or in any form established by the Churches, Episcopal or otherwise, who seek to minister within the pale of the Church of England, must, as the law now stands, be reordained. The common boast, there

fore, of the High Church party, as it is called, that the Church of England requires even the most gifted ministers in all non-Episcopal Churches to be reordained before they can assume any office within it, and does not so require from any ordained in the Church of Rome, is unfounded. Its requirements from all are alike. The Church of England makes rules only for itself; and to this agrees the opinion of Archbishop Leighton who, having been the subject of reordination, had well considered the question in all its bearings. Of him, it is said by his intimate friend, Bishop Burnet, in his "History of his own Time" (Ed. 1553, vol. i., p. 194), that "he thought that every Church might make such rules of ordination as they pleased, and that they might reordain all that came to them from any other Church; and that the reordaining a Priest ordained in another Church [true, of course] imported no more, but that they received him into orders according to their rules, and did not infer the annulling the orders he had formerly received." These two

Sharp and Leighton," Bishop Burnet, proceeds to say, "were upon this privately ordained Deacons and Priests, and then ... were consecrated publicly in the Abbey of Westminster."

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Our present practice towards Romish priests stultifies our common sense. It is not denied but confessed that before a man can be suffered to execute any of the arduous and sacred duties of the ministerial office it is requisite he should be "first called, tried, examined, and known to have such qualities as are requisite for the same," but our practice declares as plainly as any words can, that none of these essential forms are necessary. See what has been detailed at pages 4 and 5, in the “form of abjuration used with Romanists on renouncing their apostate creed," and this will undeniably prove that we do not and cannot regard them as having been previously fit for any service in the Church; and yet, notwithstanding the Ordinal on these several points, and the course that is pursued towards a converted priest, we deem their Romish Orders valid! If this were really the case, in consistency, we should be compelled to regard their Romish Ordination as a true and lawful mission,—that they were truly called according to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the due order of this realm, to the ministry of the Church. We should have to believe that every one ordained in the Church of

Rome was inwardly moved by the Holy Ghost to take upon himself the office to which he had been ordained!! I only add, Credat qui vult!

We may remark, that by our advising converts from the Church of Rome to make a public recantation of the damnable doctrines of that Church-which, as her professed adherents, they are supposed to have held-we are thereby acknowledging the necessity of a formal admission into the Church; and since the service is privately introduced, that is, without public or legal authority, it is clear that, if the necessity of a public admission be maintained-of which there ought to be no doubt-we are substituting a private for a public form that has been already made and sanctioned suitable for the purpose, and this is no other than the Public Form of Baptism. In this form we have the confession of a true faith so plain and unequivocal, that the holding of it so set forth renders the denial or abjuration of the distinctive tenets of the Church of Rome unnecessary. The person who holds the fundamental verities of the Gospel, as therein explicitly unfolded, cannot hold the doctrines of the Church of Rome; and as the convert from the Church of Rome never has ostensibly held

those verities, his public profession of them is essential to his admission into the Church. Some there are who will repudiate such a system as re-baptizing, as they do re-ordaining; but the baptismal service of an apostate Church cannot be upheld as a rightful baptism, unless apostacy be truth. The form which admits within the enclosure of an apostacy cannot at the same time admit within the fold of the Church. It would be palpably absurd to say that it does.* Our

* I do not work out this subject, because the proposition I have here stated ought to be admitted as an axiom in the theology of the Church visible. I hope also it will be seen to follow as a natural corollary to the truths evolved in the arguments advanced on the invalidity of Rome's Orders. I however would cursorily remark that the baptism of the Church of Rome is a mockery upon the Divine ordinance of the sacrament of baptism, admitting, as she does, every kind of baptizer, even to that of Jews, Pagans, and Infidels! In her Ritual of Baptism she has this Rubric or direction, "that though the ordinary minister of baptism be only a priest or deacon, yet, in the case of necessity, it may be done not only by a layman or woman that is a Catholic, but by a Jew, a Pagan, or an Infidel." The Church of Rome holding this doctrine will account for the cruelty, and obstinacy in that cruelty, the Pope has exhibited lately in the case known in this country and throughout the world where the English language is spoken, as "the Mortara abduc

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