is of the same nature, and derived from the same source.

In both cases the moral powers of intelligent minds, are to be acted upon through the understanding. In both, truths appropriate to influence the conscience and heart, are to be presented to the understanding for that purpose. In both, divine influence works in the mind, that truth may have its due effect. There is nothing more sacred in administering an ordinance, than in preaching a sermon. The form of administration acquires additional solemnity and impressiveness, when significant actions and emblems are added to verbal declarations of truth. But, the signs that exhibit, and the words that declare truth, have each an equal, and a like sanctity, namely, that alone which they derive from a divine appointment to convey truth, and to promote salvation. For such an office, aiming at such ends, and employing such instrumentalities, reason, as well as scripture, assures us, that the true qualifications must be found in character-and he who holds an office, on the ground of possessing right qualifications, holds it validly. Even in respect to the manner of administering Christian rites, moral impression is far more important than that which is merely scenic. That they should be dispensed by a minister revered as a good man, with Christian affection and faithful statements of truth, will far more avail to that success which is connected either with a blessing from God, or an impression on man, than that they should be surrounded with splendour, or enforced by exclusive official claims. Even here, character is the true qualification for service. Gifts, and graces, and desires are a valid call to him who possesses them into the sacred ministry. These discerned and approved by the church will secure his orderly entrance on the work. If the Gospel ministry were chiefly an office for the administration of rites, and realised its success by the accuracy of that service, then under the new, as well as under the old economy, a comely and vigorous person, and a formal title, would constitute the true qualifications and validity. But if that ministry have for its instrument truth, and for its object the salvation of men, through the formation of their characters to true goodness, by faith in Christ, then must its qualifications be sought in the soul, not in the body; in the spirit, not in the letter; and the good minister is the true minister of Christ.

In vindicating the Congregational pastorate as a true ministry, as it is on the one hand necessary to show that it has a validity, higher than any which forms could possibly convey, consisting in the sanction of Jesus Christ-so on the other, it is needful to prove it is possessed of the advantages that arise from a sufficient and scriptural order. The church is a society-the ministry is an office-there are laws and forms for their government-the validity that is given by Christ to the ministry is administered among men. The validity which men cannot bestow, they may discern.. The validity which forms cannot impart, they may attest. The true ministry, though bestowed immediately by

Christ, he requires the possessor to exercise in his church, in an orderly compliance with appointed forms. There is a union or combination of the heavenly and the human in all Gospel administrations; heavenly influence, and human order; both are indispensable-the two are har monious. If an accurate form make a valid ministry; and a valid ministry an efficacious sacrament; and an efficacious sacrament a true Christian-if such results always attend the appointed form, and can never be without it—then the Gospel is administered mechanically. If direct heavenly influences on individual minds were the sole medium of Gospel administration, then would no place be found for the order, without which, combined human agency is impossible. In the economy of the Gospel, each has its place, and both work with a mutual, a reciprocal helpfulness. In conducting the Christian ministry the due connexion is observed, when by appointed means divine influence is sought. In appointing the Christian ministry, that same connexion is recognised when the possession of divine influence is required as the qualification for the office. As in both procedures there may be failure, the exercise of the ministry is deemed ineffectual when divine influence is not obtained, and the appointment to the ministry is considered invalid where it comes to be proved, that divine grace was not possessed. In the one case, men are not made true Christians; in the other, they are not constituted true ministers. In both cases, there were forms-in both they might be accurate-in both they might have their value and use-but in both they are seen to be subordinate to validity; not to confer it, but to fail for want of it.

Then as the ministry being an office exercised in a human society according to prescribed forms, must generally have its orderly appointment, in what shall that consist? Doubtless in the approval of the society, the sanction of the church in which the office is to be discharged. The church may have both its authority, and its rules for this procedure from a higher authority-that on which its own existence rests; but the church has from the Lord the administrative power in this important affair. We use the word church to include such Christian societies, and their elders, as may stand in any connexion with the introduction of a minister into the sacred office and work. Such sanction our pastors have entire and full. The churches to which they originally belong, with thelr elders, encourage, it may be originate, their first movements. The elders, tutors, and presiding authorities of the schools of the prophets sanction their advancement in their course, by superintending their preparatory studies. The churches in which they are to exercise their ministry introduce them into the pastoral office by express and solemn invitation to it. The churches around, and their elders, with and among whom they are to have their future ministerial standing, and their extended ministerial fellowship, complete by their concurrence whatever can be deemed necessary to a complete and

valid order in the office of the ministry. But all this is conducted in professed subordination to a higher validity discerned and recognized. The church gives its sanction for order, because it judges Christ has given His for validity. The principle is sound and scriptural. In its administration human ignorance and infirmity must needs occasion many a mistake, many a failure. But there is the principle. It is not, you are a minister of Christ because you are appointed by the church; but, the church receives you as a minister because its judgment is that Christ has sent you to be such. Meanwhile, both your professions, and its sanction of them, are as in His sight, and await his blessing or his blight in this world, his acceptance or rejection in another.

Now nothing can be more reasonable, nothing more necessary than such procedures as these, to give ordinarily the sanction of human order to the sacred ministry. In regard to the individuals who become ministers, how necessary must such sanction be to those who are really qualified for the office, and are therefore filled with humility, mistrust of self, fear of failure, solicitude to be right, awful sense of the sacredness and responsibility of the desired office, and deep consciousness of both unworthiness and unfitness for it. Who in such an affair would not lean on the advice, the prayers, the sanction of his brethren? Who, not sure that he is inspired, and able by miracles to prove to others that he is so, would not submit his supposed mission by Christ into his service, to the judgment of the church? But it is not merely or principally as it affects the individual who is to exercise the office, that the importance and necessity of the sanction of order in the ministry is seen. How much more strongly does this view present itself, when it is considered that the ministry is not a personal affair. It is not a question which concerns only the individual whether he shall be a minister. It deeply concerns others too. Many must sanction him in the office by receiving his ministrations. Many must assume responsibility by joining with him in them. It concerns the good of the church, the honour of religion, the cause of truth, who shall be ministers. The character is public, the interest is public, and that the sanction should be no less, is the dictate of reason.

Then Congregationalists have their ordination solemnities. If it were of consequence to prove the fact, they are as well able as any other body of Christians, to prove that ordination has reached their ministers in an unbroken succession from the Apostles. But this is little to them who do not believe it a circumstance necessary to complete either the validity or the order of their ministry. The fact may have its use, as it serves to prove that the entire claim now urged by Episcopalians to an exclusive succession from the Apostles, rests not on an uninterrupted line of ordinations simply, but of ordinations of a particular class and form; namely, those of diocesan episcopacy.

And all who know what a matter of doubtful disputation that episcopacy is, on what slender grounds it rests, may well be sad, if they are not surprised, that its advocates should condemn all who doubt or differ on that one point as without a church, without a ministry, without a Christian ordinance; and their salvation in jeopardy, as being without a promise, if not absolutely without a possibility. But Congregationalists have ordination solemnities of which they venture to think and say

"How decent, and how wise,

How glorious to behold,

Beyond the pomp that charms the eyes,
And rites adorned with gold."

In these services ordinarily, all those bear a part who have been engaged in the previous steps by which the young pastor has arrived at this actual entrance on his office and work. There is generally prominent in the proceedings the elder, who as pastor of the brother now himself to enter on that work, sanctioned his first desires for the office, of a bishop. There are present to concur and assist, almost invariably, the tutors, who trained the young prophet for his work. There are the elders of surrounding churches to bid him welcome, as a brother beloved, to their ministerial fellowship. There is the church, by whose sanction and express desire, the whole procedure takes place, witnessing and consenting, if not acting in it. There are the members as well as the officers of surrounding churches, who give silent but real assent, and gain that knowledge of the pastor and the church, and of their proceedings, on which they may safely proceed in intercommunion with

them.

These are all the solemnities that can be required. There are on the part of the pastor ordained, declaration of character, confession of faith, dedication to the work. There are the adducement of scriptural principles and authority to warrant the procedure-the enforcement of truths and duties appropriate the devout recognition of God-the race of the father, the mediation and kingly authority of the Son, the work and influence of the Holy Spirit-the solemn designation. of the pastor ordained to his work by dedicating prayer, usually accompanied with imposition of hands by the assembled elders, as an action for such a purpose decent, reverent, and scriptural.

Yet in the ordination of a Congregational pastor there is no assumption of anything resembling hierarchial authority. By this proceeding it is not professed that office is conferred, character imparted, gifts bestowed, or authority conveyed. It is an affair of order, and no more. It declares, and assures the due observance and godly order in all the preceding steps by which the ordained pastor has entered on his work. It completes and solemnizes his actual entrance on all pastoral engage

ments.

Ordination among Congregationalists stands in the same

relation to the sacred office that inaugural solemnities hold in respect to civil offices. Coronation does not make a king. It solemnizes the entrance on kingly dignities and functions, of him who is already king by laws and rights which coronation does not impart, or even confirm, but only celebrates and publishes. It is true that among Congregationalists, pastors till ordained, do not administer the Christian rites of baptism and the Lord's supper, but this does not arise from belief that the fact of ordination gives a character to the man, and therefore to the ordinances ministered by him which they would not otherwise possess, and without which they would be invalid and inefficacious. It also is a rule and an affair of order. And order is a consideration and principle quite strong enough to sustain such a custom, and to give it all requisite force, without resorting for its maintenance to notions of hierarchial authority, or priestly superstition. If of self-will and conceit a young minister would not among us be ordained, or would, though intending ordination, previously enter on all pastoral functions, he walks disorderly. He gives by whom order is contemned, little proof of the validity of his ministry. His brethren leave him to his course, telling him they "have no such custom, neither the churches of God." If circumstances unavoidable and lamented, rendering the attainment of ordination impracticable, compel a devoted man, though unordained, to administer sacred ordinances, the validity of such acts would not be impeached by consistent Congregationalists. If scruples evidently conscientious, and quite insurmountable, lead a brother faithful and beloved to decline ordination, his so sustaining the pastoral character and functions would be an occasion no doubt for deep regret, yet for wise and Christian forbearance. Surrounding churches and pastors must pursue a course that would first vindicate their own conscientious conviction of Scriptural order, and of its divine authority, and would then manifest respect for the conscience of another man when swayed by what is deemed error. Order is a grave and venerable principle. It has distinct and sufficient grounds on which to rest. It is only damaged and weakened when it is mingled and confused with the distinct question of validity, much more when it is exalted above, and made in fact to impart, this really higher and more sacred claim.

Congregational pastors thus ordained may on every ground of piety, scripture, and reason, feel a calm, sustained satisfaction as to the order of their ministry. It is marked neither by presumption, nor by confusion, nor by desecration. Its force of order has not failed under two centuries of administration. If it is not ordered according to a distinct platform of appointed proceedings exhibited in the mount of oracle, the New Testament, it is because no such minute instructions are given there, but it is ordered according to apostolic principle and spirit we are sure, and as nearly accordant with apostolic precedent as we can discern and attain. If to this solid satisfaction as to their order, not orders,