EPAULE

EPAULE, or ESPAULE, in fortification, the shoulder of the bastion, or the angle made by the face and flank, otherwise called the angle of the epaulé.

EPISCOPACY is a subject of which, in our own opinion, enough has been said in the Encyclopædia. We are requested however to insert in this place an argument additional to No 17. of that article; and we comply with the request the more readily that we find the argument, which has been suggested to us, in that very work of Dr Berkeley's which we were permitted to abridge even before our amiable friend had published it himself. The argument indeed is not new. It was, we believe, first used by Dr Wells in some controversial letters against the English dissenters, which were published early in the current century. Dr Berkeley adopted it from Dr Wells; and other doctors have taken it from Dr Berkeley. It is as follows:

That the apostles established two orders of ministers in the Christian church is admitted by all who contend not for the equal and common rights of Christians; and that the persons occupying the higher order, by what-

ever title they were known, or however limited may have been the jurisdiction of each, possessed authority as well to ordain others as to preach the gospel and administer the sacraments, is the very point on which the advocates for the divine right of presbytery insist. At the reformation, however, and for 1400 years before, there was an intermediate order of ministers between these two, known by the name of priests or presbyters, authorized indeed to preach the gospel and to administer its sacraments, but not authorized to send labourers of any kind into Christ's vineyard. This intermediate order therefore being, by the supposition, distinct from the two apostolical orders of ministers, must have been, at whatever period it was introduced into the church, an order of human invention; but it is from this order of ministers that the clergy of those churches, which are not Episcopal, derive all their authority to minister in holy things. The consequence is obvious.

Scotch Episcopalians are a society of Christians certainly as respectable, if not so numerous, as any other in the kingdom which dissent from the worship and discipline of the established church. For many years, however, the public worship of that society was proscribed by the legislature; and there is reason to suspect that its real principles are not yet universally understood. If this be so, it surely becomes the editors of a work in which some account is given of almost every denomination of Christians down to the novel sect which styles its members BEREANS, to do justice to the venerable remains of what was once the established church of their native country.

That the reformation from popery was in Scotland tumultuous and irregular is known to all Europe; and very few of our readers can be ignorant that there was neither order in the reformed church nor decency in her worship till James VI. with much address, accomplished the establishment of a very moderate episcopacy. To this form of church-government the better part of the nation was sufficiently attached; and it continued to be the ecclesiastical polity, supported by the state, till the grand rebellion, when it was overthrown by the partizans of the national covenant. It was restored, however, in 1662; and again abolished in 1689 by that convention which placed the Prince and Princess of Orange on the ancient throne of the Scottish monarchs.

These events are so universally known, that it is sufficient in this place barely to mention them; but there are probably many of our readers who do not know, that, during the whole period of her legal establishment, the Scotch episcopal church had no public liturgy. It appears indeed, that the first reformers made use of the English book of common prayer; and there is on record sufficient evidence that John Knox himself, though he disapproved of some things in that book, had no objection either to stated forms of prayer in general, or to a subordination among the ministers of the gospel; but his successor Andrew Melvil, who possessed neither his learning nor his worth, had influence enough to introduce into the church a perfect parity of ministers, and to excite among the people a very general abhorrence of liturgical worship. So rooted indeed was that abhorrence, that, as every one knows, an attempt to introduce into the church of Scotland a book of common prayer, copied with some alterations from that of England, produced the solemn league and covenant,

which involved in one common ruin the unfortunate Episcopacy. Charles and his darling Episcopacy. At the restoration of the monarchy, the Episcopal constitution of the church was restored, but no new attempt was made to establish the use of a public liturgy; and except at the ordinations of the clergy, when the English forms were used, no service book was seen in a Scottish church.

For some years after Episcopacy had ceased to be the religion of the state, the deprived clergy made no alteration in their modes of social worship. Having refused to transfer to King William that allegiance which they had sworn to King James, they were treated, during his reign, with such severity, that on the Lord's day they durst not venture further than to officiate "in their own hired houses, where they received such friends as chose to come in unto them;" and in those small congregations, if congregations they may be called, they continued to pray, if not extempore, at least without book, till the accession of Anne to the throne of her ancestors. The attachment of that Princess, not only to the constitution, but also to the worship of the church of England, was well known to them; and they very reasonably thought, that they could not more effectually recommend themselves to her protection than by adopting the use of the English liturgy, which the most enlightened among them had long professed to admire. It was accordingly introduced by degrees into Scotland; and an act of parliament being passed on the 3d of March 1712, "to prevent the disturbing of those of the Episcopal communion in that part of Great Britain called Scotland, in the exercise of their religious worship, and in the use of the liturgy of the church of England," that liturgy was universally adopted by the Scotch Episcopalians; and public chapels, which had hitherto been prohibited, were everywhere built, and well frequented.

That those who had refused allegiance to King William and Queen Anne should scruple to pay it to a new family, clogged as it was by so many oaths, can excite no wonder; nor is it at all wonderful, that, for their attachment to the abdicated family, the public worship of the Scotch Episcopalians was, after the infirmitude of 1745 and 1716, laid under some restraints. These, however, were neither rigorously severe, nor of long duration; and by the year 1720, their congregations were as numerous as formerly, consisting, especially in the northern counties, of men of all ranks, even such as held offices of trust under the established government, who frequented the Episcopal chapels in preference to the parish churches.

Hitherto the Episcopalians had been safely conducted through all dangers and difficulties by the prudence of Dr Rose, the deprived bishop of Edinburgh; but soon after his death, which happened on the 20th of March 1720, divisions broke out among them, which threatened to prove more fatal to their church than any persecution to which they had yet been subjected. For reasons which will be seen afterwards, it is proper to trace those divisions from their source.

No native of Britain, who knows any thing of the history of his country, can be ignorant, that Dr Sancroft, the archbishop of Canterbury, and five other bishops, were at the Revolution deprived of their fees by an act of parliament; because, like the Scotch bishops, they could not bring themselves to transfer to King

Episcopacy. King William and Queen Mary that allegiance which they had so lately sworn to King James. As those prelates were extremely popular for the vigorous opposition which they had given to some of the Popish projects of the late king, and as a number of inferior clergymen, of great eminence for piety and learning, were involved in the same fate with them; it need not excite great surprise, that a sweeping deprivation, which, in all its circumstances, was perhaps without a precedent in ecclesiastical history, produced a schism in the church of England. The deprived clergy, considering the bishops who were placed in the sees thus vacated as intruders, and all who adhered to them as schismatics, opened separate chapels under the authority of the primate and his nonjuring suffragans; and contended, that they and their adherents constituted the only orthodox and catholic branch of the church in England.

Both churches, however, made use of the same liturgy; and during the lives of the deprived prelates, there was no other apparent difference in their worship than what necessarily resulted from their paying allegiance to different sovereigns. But this uniformity was not of long duration. The bishops, who had been possessed of sees before the Revolution, were scarcely dead, when their successors, being under no civil restraint, found, in the principles which they had brought with them from the establishment, the means, not only of dividing their own little church, but likewise of sowing the seeds of dissension among their brethren in Scotland.

It has been observed elsewhere*, that in the church of England there are three opinions respecting the nature and end of the Lord's Supper, which, in opposition to each other, have been all patronised by men of great eminence for theological learning. It appears, indeed, from the first liturgy set forth by authority in the reign of King Edward VI. that the reformers of that church from the errors of popery unanimously held the Lord's Supper to be a eucharistical sacrifice; and this opinion, which has been adopted by great numbers in every age since, seems to have been the most prevalent of the three among those clergy who were deprived of their livings at the Revolution. It is indeed countenanced by several passages in the present order for the administration of the Lord's Supper; and therefore, though there are other things in that order which cannot be easily reconciled to it, archbishop Sanckroft and his suffragans, whatever their own opinions might be, chose not to widen the breach between themselves and the establishment, by deviating in the smallest degree from the form in which they had been accustomed to celebrate that sacrament. Their successors, however, in office, were men of different dispositions. Considering themselves as totally unconnected with the state, and no longer bound by the act of uniformity, one party, at the head of which was bishop Collier, the celebrated ecclesiastical historian (A), judged it proper to make such alterations in the communion office as might render it more suitable to their own notions of the Lord's Supper, and bring it nearer, both in matter and form, to the most ancient liturgies of the Christian church.

Of the proposed alterations, some were perhaps proper in their circumstances; whilst others, to say the best of them, were certainly needless, if not inexpedient. They were accordingly all opposed by another powerful party of nonjurors; and the questions in dispute were referred, first to Dr. Rose, the deprived bishop of Edinburgh, and afterwards to Dr. Atterbury and Dr. Potter, the bishops of Rochester and Oxford. What judgment the two English prelates gave in this controversy we know not; but that of bishop Rose did him much honour. Declining the office of umpire between the parties, he recommended mutual forbearance and occasional communion with each other, according to either form; and employed a gentleman, well versed in ecclesiastical literature, to prove that such a compliance of bishops with each other's innocent prejudices was not uncommon in the purest times.

These disputes among the English nonjurors, and the appeal which was made to Dr. Rose, drew more closely than hitherto it had been drawn, the attention of the Scotch Episcopal clergy, not only to their own liturgy, which had been authorised by King Charles I. but likewise to the most ancient liturgies extant, as well as to what the fathers of the first three centuries have taught concerning the nature of the Lord's Supper. The consequence was, that such of them as were scholars soon discovered, that the Scotch communion office approached much nearer to the most ancient offices than the English; and a powerful party was formed for reviving the use of it in Scotland.

Had those men aimed at nothing farther, it is probable they would have met with very little opposition. Their opponents, who, in general, were less learned than they, were so strongly attached to the house of Stuart, that they would have adopted almost any thing sanctioned by the royal martyr's authority; but the advocates for the Scotch office knew not where to stop. They wished to introduce some other usages of the primitive church; such as the commemoration of the faithful departed, and the mixture of the eucharistical cup (See Supper of the Lord, n^o 2. and 3. Encycl.); and their brethren, perceiving no authority from Charles I. for these things, and being accustomed to consider them as Popish practices, a violent controversy was ready to burst forth about what every enlightened mind must consider as matters of very little importance.

That the eucharistical cup was in the primitive church mixed with a little water, is a fact incontrovertible; that the practice was harmless and decent, it is wonderful that any man should deny: but that such a mixture is essential to the sacrament, we cannot believe, for the reasons assigned in the article referred to; and therefore it ought surely to have been no object of contention.

That the faithful departed were commemorated in the primitive church long before the invention of purgatory, is known to every scholar; that in those days such a commemoration tended to invigorate the faith and the charity of Christians, it would, in our opinion, be very easy to prove; and that at present every Christian prays in private for his deceased friends, we have proved

Episcopacy proved elsewhere by arguments, of the confutation of which we are under no apprehension (See Greek-church in this Supplement): but we see not the necessity of introducing such prayers into public worship at any period; and we perceive impropriety in doing it at a period when, from various circumstances, they may cause weak brethren to err. But those who pleaded for the revival of this practice in the beginning of the current century, were blinded by their very erudition (a); and those who opposed it seem not to have been acquainted with the workings of a benevolent and devout mind, or indeed to have known in what the essence of a prayer consists.

The ancient usages, however, were not the only subjects which, on the death of bishop Rose, furnished matter for controversy among the Scotch Episcopalian. That excellent prelate, together with the deprived archbishop of Glasgow, and the deprived bishop of Dunblain, had, from time to time, as they saw occasion, raised to the Episcopal dignity some of the most deserving Presbyters of the church; but it was resolved, for what reason we do not very well know, that none of the new bishops should be appointed to vacant dioceses during the life of any one prelate who had possessed a legal establishment; so that bishop Rose, who survived all his brethren, was for several years the ecclesiastical governor of the whole Episcopal church in Scotland. On his death, therefore, though there were four bishops in Scotland, and two Scotch bishops residing in London, there was not one of those prelates who could claim to himself the authority of a diocesan over any portion of the Catholic church. This they at first unanimously acknowledged; and one of them, in the name of himself and his brethren, recommended to the clergy of the diocese of Edinburgh to elect, after the primitive plan, a successor to their late venerable diocesan. The advice was followed; the election was made, and approved by the bishops; and Dr Fullarton, the Bishop

chosen, became bishop of Edinburgh, by the same means Episcopacy, and the same authority as, in the primitive church, St Cyprian became bishop of Carthage, or Cornelius bishop of Rome.

The clergy in other districts, following the example of those in Edinburgh, diocesan Episcopacy was about to be revived throughout all Scotland upon principles purely ecclesiastical, when some of the bishops, whom Dr Rose had left behind him merely for preserving the Episcopal succession, conceived a new and very extraordinary constitution for the Scotch Episcopal church. Whether they were envious of their colleagues, and of-⁷ Coll-⁷ge of fended that none of the elections had fallen upon them; bishops, whether they were so ignorant as not to know that diocesan Episcopacy had subsisted long before the conversion of the Roman empire, in absolute independence on the state; or that they were actuated, as there is reason to suspect, by some political principle which they could not with safety avow;—so it was, that they opposed diocesan Episcopacy of every kind, and proposed to govern the whole Scotch church by a college of bishops. Against this unprecedented scheme the more learned bishops opposed all their influence; and being exceedingly disagreeable to the inferior clergy, it was very soon abandoned by its authors themselves, who, after some acrimonious controversy, were glad to come to an agreement with their diocesan brethren.

Of this agreement, or concordate as it was called, the ⁸ Thole divisions were the principal articles: 1. "That the sons ^heal- Scotch or English liturgy, and no other, might be ^{indifferently} used in the public service; and that the peace of the church should not be disturbed by the introduction of any of the ancient usages which had lately excited such dissensions. 2. That no man should thenceforward be consecrated a bishop of the Scotch church without the consent and approbation of the majority of the bishops. 3. That the bishops, by a majority of voices, should choose one of their number to preside.

(a) Paradoxical as this assertion may at first sight appear, nothing is more certain than that erudition, and even science, if partially cultivated, is as likely to blind as to enlighten the understanding. When a man devotes all his time, and all his attention, to one pursuit, he contracts such a fondness for it, as gradually to consider it as the only valuable pursuit, which will infallibly lead to truth, and to nothing but truth; and in this disposition of mind, he is ready to embrace the most extravagant absurdity to which it may conduct him. Of this the reader will find one very striking instance in page 547 of this volume, where the celebrated Euler appears so devoted to his darling analysis, as to place implicit confidence in it, even when he himself seems sensible that it had led him to a conclusion contrary to common sense, and the nature of things. That Dr Bentley was a very eminent philologist, is universally known; that his emendatory criticisms on the Classics are often happy, no man will deny; and yet, misled by his favourite pursuits, he never pronounces more dogmatically than when the dogma which he utters is untenable. We appeal to his criticisms on Milton. Perhaps there is not a man alive who will refuse to Dr Warburton the praise of learning and ingenuity. The address with which he detects the double doctrines of the ancient philosophers, is sometimes almost astonishing; yet, misled by his own ardour in this pursuit, he discovers hidden meanings everywhere, and has found a rational system of religion in some of the ancient mysteries, where there is every reason to believe that nothing in reality was to be found but atheism and vice. Just so it is with the ardent reader of the Christian fathers. If he devote all his time to the study of their writings, he not only becomes enamoured of his employment, but acquires gradually such a veneration for the character of his masters (and venerable they undoubtedly are) as renders him afraid to question any thing which they advance, and unable to distinguish between their testimony, which is deserving of all credit, and their reasonings, which are often inconclusive. We trust it is needless to disclaim any wish to discourage, by this note, the study either of the Christian fathers, the Greek philosophers, philological criticism, or the modern analysis; we only wish to dissuade men of letters from devoting their whole time to any one pursuit whatever; for they may depend upon it, that such partial studies contract the mind. One of the most eminent mathematicians at present in England is reported to have declared his contempt of the Paradise Lost, because he found in it nothing demonstrated!

Episcopacy preside in the meetings of his brethren, and to convocate such meetings when he judged them necessary: that this president should be styled Primus Episcopus, or more shortly Primus; but that he should not possess metropolitical power, or claim any kind of jurisdiction without the bounds of his own diocese or district. 4. That upon the vacancy of any diocese or district, the presbyters should neither elect, nor submit to, another bishop, without receiving a mandate by the Primus, issued with the consent of the majority of his colleagues."

This concordate was in 1731-2 subscribed by all the bishops then in Scotland, who immediately became diocesan, and thought no more of the college system. It was afterwards, with a few additions, for ascertaining more precisely the prerogatives of the Primus; for regulating the conduct of synods; for exempting bishops from the jurisdiction of other bishops, in whose districts they might chance to reside; and for preventing inferior clergymen from deserting their congregations, or removing from one district to another, without the consent of the bishops of both—thrown into the form of canons; and these canons have continued to be the code of the Scotch Episcopal church down to the present day.

9
Political opinions.

The members, and more especially the clergymen of this church, had always been considered as unduly attached to the family of Stuart; and though there was undoubtedly at first some ground for that suspicion, the writer of this article knows, from the most incontrovertible evidence, that it was continued too long, and carried by much too far. Jacobitism was imputed to the society as its distinguishing tenet; but the members of that society have at all times contended, that their distinguishing tenets were the apostolical institution of Episcopacy, and in the exercise of those powers which are purely spiritual, the independency of the church upon the state. In politics, indeed, they have unanimously maintained, that the only ruler of princes or legislatures is God, and not the people. They are, of course, no friends to the fashionable doctrine of resistance, which they believe to be not only condemned in express terms by Christ and two of his apostles, but to be also the source of that anarchical tyranny which is at present deluging Europe with blood. They consider a limited monarchy, like that of Britain, as the most perfect form of civil government which the world has ever seen; an hereditary monarchy is infinitely preferable to one that is elective: and with respect to the title of the monarch, when they take a retrospective view of the origin of all civil governments, they cannot but look upon a permanent and unquestioned establishment as an indication of the plan and determination of Providence furnishing the best right to a crown which any modern sovereign can claim.

10
Persecution

Surely these are harmless opinions; and yet the worship of those who held them was, in 1746 and 1748, laid under such restraints as were calculated to produce disaffection where it did not previously exist. Two laws were then enacted against the Scotch Episcopalians; which, under the pretence of eradicating their attachment to the house of Stuart, were so contrived as to preclude such of their clergy as were willing to pay allegiance to the reigning sovereign, and to pray for the royal family by name, from reaping the smallest benefit from their loyal-

ty. The experiment was tried by some of them; of Episcopacy whom one venerable person, who was never suspected of undue attachment to the house of Stuart, is still alive; but he, and his complying brethren, had their chapels burnt, and were themselves imprisoned, as if they had been the most incorrigible Jacobites. This was a kind of persecution which, since the Reformation, has had no precedent in the annals of Britain. A priest of the church of Rome, by renouncing the errors of Popery, has at all times been qualified to hold a living in England; a dissenting minister, of whatever denomination, might at any time be admitted into orders, and rise to the highest dignities of the English church;—but while the laws of 1746 and 1748 remained in force, there was nothing in the power of a Scotch Episcopal clergyman to do from which he could reap the smallest benefit. By taking the oaths to government, he was not qualified to hold a living in England, or even to enjoy a toleration in Scotland; and his clerical character being acknowledged by the English bishops, he could not by those prelates be canonically reordained.

Upon the clergy, however, those laws of uncommon rigour were not long rigorously executed. After a few years, the burning of chapels, and the imprisoning of ministers, were occurrences far from frequent; but the laws to which we allude affected likewise the political privileges of such laymen as frequented the Episcopal chapels; and in that part of their operation, those laws were never relaxed till 1792, when they were wholly repealed, and the Episcopalians in Scotland tolerated like other well affected dissenters from the national establishment.

11
Tolerance

While Episcopacy was the established form of church government in Scotland, the clergy of that church subscribed a confession of faith summed up in twenty-five articles, which the reader will find in the history attributed to John Knox. It is sufficient to observe in this place, that in essentials it differs little from the articles of most other reformed churches; and in every thing which does not immediately relate to passivity, it is moderate and unexceptionable; perhaps more so than the present confession of either of the British churches. During the period which intervened between the Revolution and the year 1792, no subscription was indeed required from Scotch Episcopal clergymen to any summary of Christian doctrine; but at their ordinations, those clergy solemnly professed their belief of all the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments; declared their persuasion that those books contain sufficiently all doctrines necessary to salvation, through faith in Jesus Christ; and were obliged to read daily in their chapels the English book of Common Prayer, which contains the Apostles, Nicene, and Athanasian creeds. But now those clergymen are enjoined by act of parliament to subscribe the 39 articles of the church of England; so that the principles of their faith are well known. No doubt there are differences of opinion among them about the sense of some of those articles; and it is well known that there are similar differences among the English clergy themselves: but there is every reason to believe, that the faith of the Scotch Episcopalians has, in every important point, been at all times orthodox.

We are aware, that they have been represented as unfriendly to the English service; but such a representation

station appears to be either a wilful falsehood, or the offspring of ignorance. The only reformed liturgy that ever had the sanction of a civil establishment in Scotland, is the Book of Common Prayer, and Administration of the Sacraments, and other parts of Divine Service authorised by King Charles I. In that book, the order of administration of the Lord's Supper differs in some particulars from the English order, and is unquestionably better adapted to the opinions of those who consider that holy ordinance either as an eucharistical sacrifice, or as a feast upon a sacrifice. In the one or other of these lights, the Lord's Supper is viewed by a great majority of the Scotch Episcopalians; and of course the Scotch communion office is used in a great majority of their chapels: but it is not used in them all. Their bishops, who, when in England, communicate with the established church, leave the inferior clergy at liberty to use either the English or the Scotch form, as is most agreeable to themselves and to the people among whom they minister; and to silence the clamour of symbolizing with the church of Rome, which was some years ago either ignorantly or maliciously raised against them, they altered the arrangement of the Scotch prayer of consecration, so as not only to bring it nearer to the most primitive forms, but also to make it absolutely inconsistent with the real presence, as taught either by the church of Rome or by the Lutheran churches. On this subject, see Greek-Church, n^o 17, in this Supplement.

Thus have we given a short view of the distinguishing principles of what must surely be considered as a very respectable society of Christians, and the only reformed Episcopal society in that part of Great Britain called Scotland. There are, indeed, chapels in Scotland distinct from the church of which we have been treating, where the English liturgy is read by clergymen who have received Episcopal ordination either in England or in Ireland; but those chapels being all independent of each other, and under the inspection of no bishop, the persons who frequent them seem to be rather Congregationalists than Episcopalians, and certainly do not constitute what can, with any propriety, be called an Episcopal church.