The Church and the ministry - 1852 Author:John Pearson 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: A VINDICATION OF THE TWENTY-THIRD ARTICLE OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. At a late election of members to sit in Convocation, a very worthy person being chosen ... more »proctor for the clergy of a certain diocese, was desired by one of them to take care of Episcopacy, because several of the bishops were against it. That bishops should be against Episcopacy seemed to me, at first, a thing incredible, and I could not but condemn that clergyman of slander and calumny, for aspersing, in so foul a manner, persons of that order, whom we are taught, not only by our own Church, but also by all the Churches of Christ, in all the ages before us, to obey and D reverence. But when I considered what a Bishop of (B. Hall, Episc. Epist. Ded.) Orkney did at Edinburgh in the reign of King Charles I.; that there he renounced his episcopal function, and in a full assembly of the kirk, craved pardon for having accepted it; and what advice a reverend Prelate not long ago gave to one Mr. Mai- come, and several of the ousted Scottish clergy, (Fund. Chart. Pres. Pref.) namely, to return to their native country, and submit there to the ecclesiastical government as now established, which they could not well do without disowning episcopacy, and looking upon that venerable office as anti-Christian, and an insupportable grievance and trouble to their nation; I was quickly reconciled to what that clergyman said, and thought that bishops were liable to as great mistakes as other men, and that they might be against episcopacy, turn enemies to their own order, and give away such things as peculiarly belong to them, and are no less than essential branches of their authority. I am far from being willing to believe that any of our bishops are of this sort, notwithstanding the Dissenters pretend they have reason to ...« less