and they that should be approved would be made manifeft.

Accordingly, the impartial voice of history proclaims, that as the converts multiplied, the profeffion of the faith was corrupted; the character of the ministry debased; the discipline of manners fubverted; and in fucceeding times we look in vain for the external reprefentation of a true Church, any farther than as it was to be found in the fucceffion of a legitimate, though depraved ministry; in the preservation of the lively oracles of truth; and in the profeffion of the genuine faith, mingled with, and obfcured by the fictitious doctrines of human invention.

All therefore that the gracious affurances of our Lord, with refpect to the protection and guidance of his Church, can be stated, in its ample extent to have promifed, muft be, that in the body, of which he was the mystical head, fhould continue to exift, through all ages, the union of a common fellowship, the unperishable permanency of the Divine Word, and the cffential appointments and ordinances of a real Church.

This Church, in its vifible character, was to continue to exhibit the chequered fhades

of

of an earthly representation, and to realize the description of its unblemished purity, only in the perfection of its final glory *. No fanction then, was given by the facred promifes to the pretences of an infallible and unchanging profeffion of the faith, nor to the arrogant conceit of those who, rejecting the oftenfible inftitutions, confider the Church as compofed only of members invifibly united, and predef. tinated by partial election to the fpiritual kingdom.

'As the confined limits of a local establishment were thrown down, this Church was no longer to be reftricted to any favoured and peculiar people†, or to be organized in accommodation to any politic form of temporal government. Separate congregations, exifting in diftinct character, or combined in voluntary conjunction, were to compofe connected parts of an universal dispensation; not constrained in subjection to any partial ascendancy, but each regulated by its own laws, in dependency on general principles, and in

This idea of the Church was received at the commencement of the Reformation, as agreeable to its state in this life, ubi habet malos bonis fimul admixtos. See a definition of the Church, corrected by Henry VIII. in Burnet's Addenda.

+ Coloff. ch. iii. ver. 11.

the coherence of mutual attachment; and all enlightened by rays, diverging from that "Sun "of Righteoufnefs," which can alone constitute the centre of a Church extended through heaven and earth. In the facred writings, and not in traditionary doctrine, or in the precarious profeffion of a varying faith, was to be preferved" the form of doctrine and found words "which was firft delivered to the Saints;' fince" all nations were to be baptized into "that one houfhold of God," which was "built the foundation of the Apostles

upon

"and prophets, Jefus Chrift himself being the "chief corner-ftone, in whom all the building, fitly framed together, groweth into an holy Temple in the Lord *."

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In the prefervation of these unerring and fufficient oracles of truth, the accomplishment of a fignal part of the Divine promise, as to the fuperintendence of the Church, may be maintained; fince it was furely no inconfiderable demonstration of an especial Providence, that an holy law; denouncing through every page infpired cenfures against existing doctrines and manners, fhould, though withdrawn from general attention, be pre

Ephef. ch. ii. ver. 20, 21.

ferved with unabated fidelity, by those, whose flagrant departure from its inftructions it expofed, and whofe downfall it predicted; and be tranfmitted with integrity, and the unanimous confent of all Churches, till it roused the difpofition to reform. It was no trivial evidence of Chrift's care, that the records of revelation fhould be fecure from injury, in languages little known but to those whom every line rebuked with keenest reproach; through ages of darknefs favourable to base design, and in which fuperftition might have united every intereft in confederate measures, had not ambitious diffenfion established the vigilance of mutual hoftility *.

The Confeffion of Faith, contained in these writings, is the rock on which Christ has built his indefectible Church. Of its fincere profeffors, linked in invifible fellowship, and characterised by the observance of effential ordinances, no age, it is prefumed, has been deftitute; nor shall the gates of hell at any time

*It is a palpable and pregnant demonftration of the truth of Christianity, as well as of God's providential care of his Church, that the Prophecies of the Old Teftament have been conftantly preferved with unfufpected integrity by the Jews, who reject the Gofpel; and the inftructions of the New Testament secured to us by thofe corrupt Churches which were most interefted to fupprefs them.

prevail against fuch Catholic Church * ; so as to destroy its existence by external oppreffion, or to undermine its foundations by internal herefy. By the infallible teft and criterion of infpired wisdom are the pretenfions of every earthly representation of fuch communion of the faints to be tried and examined † ; and, in proportion as its decrees are reverenced, will the genuine character and excellency of the Church be difplayed, and the coming of the heavenly kingdom be advanced.

We, who believe the divine declarations and promifes to intimate and affure & the perpetuated fucceffion of a miniftry with regu

* Whitby conceives our Saviour's promise in Matt. ch. xvi. v. 18, to imply, that even death itself should not prevail against the genuine members of Chrift's Church, or that they shall enjoy a happy refurrection. But our Lord is generally understood to have defigned to fignify, that the Church, which should be built on St. Peter's preaching, fhould never be destroyed on earth by external or inteftine injury. A promife which imported, not an exemption from error, but a fecurity from deftruction by the afcendancy of the powers of darkness. 'Ads means Death. The gates of hell, being an Hebraical expreffion, mean Hell or Death.

+ Concil. Carthag. Act. tom. i. p. 1189.

The fervants mentioned in Matthew, ch. xiii. v. 27, who propofed to gather up the tares; and the stewards, who are deícribed as the rulers of the Lord's household, to remain till his coming in, Matt. ch. xxiv. ver. 45, 46; muft by analogy be confidered as the minifters of Chrift's Church. See Potter's Church Govern. ch. iv.

§ Matt. ch. xxviii. v. 20.

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