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Apostolical succession in the Church of England
Apostolical succession in the Church of England Author:Arthur West Haddan Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION AS A DOCTRINE. doctrine of an outward ministry sent by -- God with special and supernatural powers, and requiring accord... more »ingly an ordination derived from the Apostles, is not uncommonly characterized as Sacerdotalism. And Sacerdotalism meets in the very outset with a twofold objection, directed against the thing in itself. First, through the nature of its peculiar office, men are found capable of thinking that such a ministry interferes with the fundamental doctrine of the one finished Sacrifice of the Cross ; and next, it is often regarded as unduly interposing a human medium between the believer and his Saviour. The former objection, however, is really directed against exaggerated doctrine respecting the Eucharistic Sacrifice, and has nothing to do with our orders ; who, whatever doctrine we hold of Eucharistic Sacrifice, repudiate carefully any repetition or supplementing thereby of the one great and only proper Sacrifice. We have here, then, to deal only with the latter. But first it ought seriously to be considered that the arguments which really sway people most upon this and like subjects are precisely those— naturally, indeed, but very wrongly—which ought to sway them least. If a doctrine is true, we have no right to shrink, under certain obvious limitations of common sense, either from its inferences or from its consequences. If the need of an Apostolic ministry is established plainly by the evidence of Holy Scripture, and still more plainly when that evidence is read in the light of the interpretation put upon it by primitive practice; then it is both dishonest and suicidal to form our decision on the subject, either by considerations as to whom it may or may not unchurch, or as to the probable effect of such decision in alienat...« less