Neither Apostolical Succession nor Priestly Pretension. 63

Ignatius refers more than once to the 'precinct of the altar' (OvotarTriptov). But it is plain that he is not thinking of a sacred spot reserved for the priests, for he distinctly says, If any one be not within the precinct of the altar, he lacketh the Bread of God' (Ephes, 5); and again, He that is within the sanctuary' (or precinct of the altar') is clean' (Trall. 7), in both cases implying that this precinct of the altar was not the place of the priest, but the place for the congregation. Dr. Lightfoot refers us to the plan of the tabernacle or temple, taking the votaryptov as the court of the congregation, the precinct of the altar, as distinguished from the outer court (vol. ii. p. 44). The only altar Ignatius knew was not the communion table, but Jesus Christ (see Magnes. 7).

As we have no reference elsewhere to Christian priests and their sacrifices, it is manifestly unreasonable to seize upon one phrase, which simply describes the position of a Christian. congregation by an illustration drawn from the ground-plan of the Jews' place of worship as a proof of the existence of sacerdotal notions in Ignatius. If it proves anything in this direction, it makes priests of the whole of the congregation.

Having thus cleared the ground, let us look at the positive side of the opinions and wishes of Ignatius regarding the Christian bishops. A careful perusal of the seven Epistles must convince us that he has one and the same object throughout while he is reiterating his views on the episcopal office. This object is to exalt the authority of the bishops for the maintenance of order in the Churches. Among the earlier fathers Ignatius and Irenæus are the two who insist most strongly on the importance of the episcopate. Neither takes note of sacerdotal episcopacy. But their objects are not identical. Irenæus regards the bishop as the surest witness to the truths of Christianity, as the best depository of early tradition. Ignatius considers him as the centre of unity and the preserver of harmony. This idea runs through all his references to episcopacy. Thus, to the Ephesians he writes: So then it becometh you to run in harmony with the mind of the bishop; which thing also ye do. For your honourable presbytery, which is worthy of God, is attuned to the bishop, even as its strings to a lyre. Therefore in your concord and harmonious love Jesus Christ is sung. And do ye, each and all of you, form yourselves into a chorus, that, being harmonious in concord, and taking the key-note of God, ye may in unison sing with one voice through Jesus Christ unto the Father, that He may both hear you and acknowledge you by your good deeds to be members of His Son Ephes. 4).

Referring to their bishop, he advises the Magnesians to be obedient without dissimulation' (Magnes. 3).

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To the

Trallians he writes of being obedient to the bishop as to Jesus Christ' (Trall. 2). When writing to the Romans he is silent on the question of episcopacy. But the Philadelphians are urged to beat one with the bishop and the presbyters who are with him' (Phil., opening sentence.) He bids the Smyrnæans 'shun divisions as the biggest of evils,' adding, 'Do ye all follow your bishop, as Jesus Christ followed the Father, and the presbytery as the apostles; and to the deacons pay respect as to God's commandments' (Smyrn. 8); and in writing to Polycarp, he inserts a message to the Church at Smyrna, saying, 'Give ye heed to the bishop, that God also may give heed to you. I am devoted to those who are subject to the bishop, the presbyters, the deacons' (Polyc. 6). From beginning to end the same idea permeates all the Epistles that refer to the episcopate. The office of the bishop is magnified in order that his authority may lead to the maintenance of order and unity in the Churches.

Two or three special points are worthy of note.

1. Bishop Lightfoot points out that submission is required to the presbyters as well as to the bishop (Ephes. 2, 20; Magnes. 2, 7; Trall. 13), and also even to the deacons (Polyc. 6; comp. Magnes. 6; Trall. 3; Philad. 7; Smyrn. 8. See Lightfoot, vol. i. p. 382).

2. The great motive for exalting the power of the bishop was the danger of divisions. Ignatius is not merely disturbed at the sight of false doctrines of Judaistic and Docetic character creeping into the Churches. He has observed the actual division of a Church, and the formation of a detached congregation apart from the bishop, presbyters, and deacons of the original body. It is this schism following upon heresy that most distresses him. Even in our own day, when Christianity is broadly established in our country, we cannot but deplore the internecine wars which sometimes take place in Churches, leading to what is called in the cant phrase 'a split,' the splinters usually being as feeble as they are quarrelsome. In the early days of Christianity, when the Christians in any city could form at best but a little group, surrounded by a dense mass of opposing heathendom, such a separation must have struck an onlooker as nothing less than disastrous. It may well be questioned whether the method of preventing division which Ignatius advocated was wise and right. A stronger sense of brotherly sympathy, combined with an enlarged freedom of individual spontaneity,

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would commend itself to us as a wiser and more Christian method of securing the desired unity. But this is a matter of opinion The point now to be observed is that Ignatius was not concerned to exalt the episcopate on its own account, or because of any mystical ideas on the subject. He had a direct practical end in view. Looking back upon these times, Jerome gave it as his opinion that the exaltation of the episcopate above the presbyteriate, with which it had formerly been identical, was brought about by the growth of heresy and the necessity of suppressing it. In the Ignatian Epistles we see the very process of the crystallization of the idea of the episcopate.

3. The Church unity which Ignatius hoped to preserve by means of the exaltation of the episcopate was that of the individual local congregation. He did refer to the universal Church (zaloλexy Exxλnoía, Smyrn. 8), and all his tendencies were in the direction of common action, harmony, and union. But the special function of the bishop was to rule his own congregation, and to preserve the unity of the Church in his own town.

There can be no doubt that Ignatius insisted upon these views with great vehemence, to the serious danger of the liberty of private judgment and individual action. His advice would lead to a dangerous suppression of the democratic element in the Church. And the question naturally arises, How far did the Ignatian idea of the episcopate prevail in the early Churches? There is every reason to believe that Ignatius stands alone. The reiteration and urgency of his appeals imply that he is impressing upon his readers a higher doctrine than that already followed by them. For if a man's position is already admitted, there is no occasion for him to be continually insisting on it. Thus, while in France there are newspapers expressly devoted to the propagation of Royalist ideas, no such papers are published in the dominions of Queen Victoria. Similarly, although The Times' reports. many eloquent speeches in favour of free education, The New York Herald is practically silent on the subject. The future historian will be very foolish if he infers from these facts that republican principles were stronger in Britain than in France, or that free education found favour in England before it had been adopted in America. It may be taken as a general rule that the vigorous advocacy of any given cause is determined by one or other of two influences either an attack upon an old position has to be resisted, or a new position is aimed at. The former is the case in the defence of the Established Church NO. CLXV.

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in our own day; but no one can suppose that the episcopate was an old institution undermined and attacked, and in need of defence, in the time of Ignatius. The strenuousness of his advocacy of that institution can only be attributed to the zeal of propagandism. Moreover, we may notice in Ignatius more than one hint of a feeling that the bishops were not exercising the authority which he wished to have accorded to them. Sometimes it looks as though he thought them too mild, too retiring, if not positively weak, and frequently his language implies that his readers were not submitting to their rulers as he would have desired. Thus he warns the Magnesians 'not to presume upon the youth' of their bishop (Magnes. 3); he writes of the gentleness' of the Trallian bishop (Trall. 3); he is amazed at the Philadelphian bishop's 'forbearance' (Philad. 1); he urges Polycarp to vindicate' his office in all diligence of flesh and of spirit' (Polyc. 1).

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Now when the archaic meaning of a word has become obsolete, and the continued use of that word in its old connections gives rise to nothing but confused and false impressions, would it not be better to abandon the word in these associations and substitute for it its modern equivalent? The word enthusiasm ' formerly stood for a belief or conceit of private revelation,' as Webster defined it; it now represents warmth, zeal, passionate earnestness. To a reader unacquainted with the older signification, The Natural History of Enthusiasm' must be a delusive title. He would better understand such a title as The Natural History of Religious Delusion.' Not less has been the transformation of the word 'bishop' since it was in the mouth of Ignatius. It is quite misleading to say that Ignatius advocated the rights and powers of the episcopal office. He knew nothing of what we call episcopacy. What he did amounts simply to an endeavour to increase the authority of the pastorate, since his bishop' is only the pastor of a single congregation, though no doubt, if he is to please Ignatius, he must be a decidedly despotic pastor, like the little Pope of many a long-suffering congregation among Protestant Nonconformists in our own day.

This resolution of the Ignatian bishop into the pastor of a single congregation must dissolve the dream of the apostolic origin of the episcopate. If we admit that 'bishops' arose in the time of the apostles, and grant the authenticity of the tradition that St. John travelled about Asia Minor ordaining 'bishops,' we are not one step nearer the apostolic establishment of an 'episcopate' in the modern acceptation of the term. On the contrary, the evidence of Ignatius is all the

other way. If, in Asia Minor, where the episcopate is generally asserted to have arisen in the first instance, Ignatius, who is held on all hands to be the greatest champion of the system, knows of nothing more than the pastorate of individual Churches, and advocates nothing more advanced than an increase of the despotic power of the clergy without a vestige of a hint at creating a territorial see, or introducing sacerdotal pretensions, we shall look in vain elsewhere for evidence of any apostolic authority for a diocesan and priestly episcopate. The most that can be shown is that apostles helped on the transformation from democratic and oligarchical forms of Church government to a monarchical order, or, in plain words, that they encouraged the creation, of an individual pastorate.

W. F. ADENEY.

ART. IV.-The Greville Memoirs.

A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria, from 1837 to 1852. By the late CHARLES C. F. GREVILLE, Esq., Clerk of the Council. London: Longmans. 1885.

THE Second Part of this valuable work is at least as interesting as the First Part, the book of the season of 1874. It differs, however, in some respects, though similar in its general character from the attractive but rather gossiping volumes, of which many pages are a mere chronicle of anecdotes and scandals of the high life of the Courts of George IV. and William IV. Mr. Greville, as he advanced in years, acquired a more reflective turn of thought, cared less for the talk of clubs and society, and became more familiar with affairs of State than had been the case with him in early manhood; and, accordingly, these reminiscences are more grave and serious and are more a political record than those contained in his first journals. Besides, the court life of the Victorian era has on the whole, been singulary pure; the editor of the present series, moreover, has properly suppressed, as he approached our day, whatever in the original MS. might have hurt the feelings of living persons; and both these causes doubtless account for the comparative absence from these pages of unpleasant and even prurient details such as formed a marked feature of the preceding volumes. These journals embrace the period between the years 1837 and 1852-the first years of the present reign. Not only do