SECTION 1

THE " EXAMINATION " OUTDOES POPERY IN THE INVIOLABILITY WHICH IT ATTRIBUTES TO THE CLERGY.
It is more convenient than safe to put aside the question of the Catholic hierarchism, when one is oneself accused of acting according to the same principles; and, even according to the " Archives of Christianity," the system of the author rests on those principles. In a very laudatory notice of the " Examination," the " Archives of Christianity," after having given assent to what is said by the author on " universal priesthood," expresses itself in these terms: " But, as often happens, it seems to us that he (the author of the " Examination ") recalls with one hand what he has yielded with the other, and shows himself in some respects inconsistent with the great and beautiful principles he has just laid down. Thus, taking his stand on a passage of Paul (2 Tim. 2:2), of which he evidently exaggerates the bearing, he claims for the evangelical ministry, neither more nor less than the character of apostolical succession, and that, if we have rightly understood him, in a sense with which the bishops of Rome and of Canterbury ought to show themselves equally very well satisfied. Now this principle, which, forgetting that the Spirit of God blows where it lists, traces for Him, through all the ages of the Church, one only channel (often a very impure one), in which He must ever flow; this principle, the creator of an aristocracy whose erring ways are known, a flagrant denial of the privileges of the Church of Jesus Christ, which we have just been proving; this principle, which has recently produced the fruit of Puseyism, contains in germ the whole Catholic establishment, which, for that very reason, claims for itself the exclusive title of Christian Church.... It has already produced in the ideas of the author a strange, though very logical, result. I speak of a veritable divine right which he claims, not only for the spiritual gifts of the ministry, but for the office. He supposes the case in which the ministry, ' wandering from the right way, instead of transmitting the sound apostolic doctrine, makes itself the instrument of a pernicious and poisonous doctrine, and from being a means becomes a hindrance....' What is then to be done? Then reappears in all its dignity that ministry, that imperishable priesthood of all the faithful, of which mention is so often made in the Holy Scriptures.' And what is the right and the power of this priesthood? To withdraw from an unfaithful ministry the office which has been entrusted to it? No, it is to God alone that it belongs to overturn that which He alone has set up! ' The priesthood of all the faithful will be able, ought, to render testimony to the truth, but, at the same time, to suffer this scourge to rest upon the whole Church, to suffer this pernicious and poisonous doctrine to flow in great waves into souls, ' and then wait for the right hand of the Lord to act in power.' ("Examination," pp. 82, 83.)
" For there would be needed, in order to renew this ministry, ' a divine act, a creative act, similar to that by which it was in the first instance founded.' Behold, then, a christian church crushed under the weight of a divine and always inviolable right, without authority to exercise any discipline upon an unfaithful ministry, although she is invested with an imperishable priesthood. But Catholicism has not gone so far; it has suspended priests, bishops, popes. Besides, have you well considered? This divine right of the office, you recognize it even in your hypothesis of an unworthy ministry! This ' instrument of a pernicious and poisonous doctrine,' it is God who has set it up! Therefore, it remains inviolable! It is exactly the principle on which an Alexander Borgia could be, by his office, as infallible a pontiff as if he had been a saint, and I am not unaware that something of this superstitious regard for a lying title has been perpetuated even in the bosom of Protestantism."
" Finally, there is another consequence of these views which we should be unwilling to admit. The author, resting on a more than doubtful interpretation of some passages of scripture, believes he finds there a monarchical government for each flock, concentrated in the person of the pastor alone, though he ought to endeavor to utilize the religious elements which he meets with among the faithful. Monarchy, absolute monarchy!... I greatly fear it would soon be a mere pope. The poor heart of man and experience are at hand, let them be interrogated! I need no other proof, without reckoning that here again universal priesthood is found pitiably banished in ' the cloudy regions of abstractions.' "
Such is the language of an article which does its best to praise the "Examination."