ceivable, as being a distinction between the church and its constituent members. In the Latin translation, called the Vulgate, the date of which, or a great part of which, if I mistake not, is about the beginning of the fifth century, the Greek word is commonly retained, having been long before naturalized among Christians. Accordingly they rendered those phrases in the Old Testament, omnis ecclesia Israel, and ecclesia Dei.

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I know not for what reason our English translators have never admitted the word church into their version of the Old Testament, notwithstanding the frequent use they have made of it in their translation of the New. They have always rendered the Hebrew word above-mentioned by the English words congregation, assembly, or some synonymous term. I do not mean to say, that, in so doing, they have mistranslated the word. Either of these English names is, perhaps, as well adapted to express the sense of the Hebrew, as the appellatives of one language commonly are to convey the ideas suggested by those of another. But these English words were altogether as fit for expressing the sense of the word xxλŋ in the New Testament, as of the word in the Old, the former being the term by which the latter had been rendered almost uniformly in the Septuagint, and which had been employed as equivalent by all the Hellenist Jews. What I blame, therefore, in our translators, is the want of uniformity. They ought constantly to have rendered the original expression either church in the Old Testament, or congregation in the New. Terms so perfectly coincident in signification as those Hebrew and Greek names are, ought to have been translated by the same English word. There is one advantage, at least, resulting from such an attention to uniformity, which is this, that if the application of the word should, in a few passages, be dubious, a comparison with the other passages wherein it occurs often serves entirely to remove the doubt. They are the more inexcusable in regard to the present instance, that they do not refuse the title of church to the Israelitish commonwealth, when an occasion of giving it occurs in the New Testament, though they would take no occasion in the Old. Thus they have

rendered the words of Stephen, who says, speaking of Moses, Acts vii. 38. "This is he that was in the church in the wilderness."

But in the use neither of the Greek word in the New Testament, nor of the correspondent Hebrew word in the Old, do we find a vestige of an application of the term to a smaller part of the community, their governors, pastors, or priests, for instance, as representing the whole. The only passage, as far as I can learn, that has been with any appearance of plausibility alleged for this purpose, is Matt. xviii. 17. where our Lord, in the directions he gives for removing offences between brethren, enjoins the party offended, after repeated admonitions in a more private manner have proved ineffectual, to relate the whole to the church, uñɛ în ɛxxdnota: and it is added, "If he neglect to hear the church, let him be to thee as a heathen and a publican." Now I ask, by what rule of sound criticism can we arbitrarily impose here on the word church the signification of church representative, a signification which we do not find it bears in one other passage of scripture? To affirm, without proof, that this is the sense of it here, is taking for granted the very point in question.

But we have more than merely negative evidence that the meaning of the word is here, as in other places, no more than congregation, and that the term ought to have been rendered so. Let it be observed, that our Lord gave these directions during the subsistence of the Mosaic establishment; and if we believe that he spoke intelligibly, or with a view to be understood, we must believe also, that he used the word in an acceptation with which the hearers were acquainted. Dodwell himself saw the propriety of this rule of interpreting, when he said, “ ، It very much confirms me in my reasonings, when I find an interpretation of the scriptures not only agreeable to the words of the scriptures, but agreeable also to the notions and significations of words then received. For that sense which was most likely to be then understood, was, in all likelihood, the true sense intended by the Holy Ghost himself; otherwise there could be no security that his true sense could be conveyed to future ages, if they had been

* Distinction between Soul and Spirit, &c. § 7.

themselves mistaken in it to whose understanding the Holy Ghost was then particularly concerned to accommodate himself." Now all the then known acceptations, as I showed before, of the name xxλŋσiα, were these two, the whole Jewish people, and a particular congregation. The scope of the place sufficiently shows it could not be the former of these senses; it must therefore be the latter. What further con

firms this interpretation is, that the Jews were accustomed to call those assemblies which met together for worship in the same synagogue by this appellation; and had, if we may believe some learned men conversant in Jewish antiquities, a rule of procedure similar to that here recommended, which our Lord adopted from the synagogue, and transplanted into his church.

Another collateral and corroborative evidence, that by xzλŋota is here meant not a representative body but the whole of a particular congregation, is the actual state of the church for the first three hundred years. I had occasion formerly to remark, that, as far down as Cyprian's time, which was the middle of the third century, when the power of the people was on the decline, it continued to be the practice, that nothing in matters of scandal and censure could be concluded without the consent and approval of the congregation. And this, as it appears to have been pretty uniform, and to have subsisted from the beginning, is, in my opinion, the best commentary which we, at this distance, can obtain on the passage.

If any impartial hearer is not satisfied on this point, I would recommend it to him, without the aid of any commentator on either side of the question, but with the help of proper concordances, attentively to search the scriptures. Let him examine every passage in the New Testament wherein the word we render church is to be found; let him canvass in the writings of the Old Testament every sentence wherein the correspondent word occurs; let him add to these the apocryphal books received by the Romanists, which, as they were either originally written or translated by Hellenists, amongst whom the term xxλ was in frequent use, must be of some authority in ascertaining the Jewish acceptation of the word; and if he find a single passage, wherein it clearly means either

the priesthood, or the rulers of the nation, or any thing that can be called a church representative, let him fairly admit the distinction as scriptural and proper: Otherwise he cannot admit it, in a consistency with any just rule of interpretation. I observed, in a preceding lecture, that the term ɛxxλnoia is, in some passages, applied to the people, exclusively of the pastors. The same was remarked of the word xλngo, (not as though these terms did not properly comprehend both, but because, in collectives, the name of a whole is often given to a great majority); but I have not discovered one passage wherein either εκκλησια Οι κληρος is applied to the pastors, exclusively of the people. The notion, therefore, of a church representative, how commonly soever it has been received, is a mere usurper of later date. And it has fared here, as it sometimes does in cases of usurpation, the original proprietor comes, though gradually, to be at length totally dispossessed. Should any man now talk of the powers of the church, and of the rights of churchmen, would the hearers apprehend that he meant the powers of a Christian congregation, or the rights of all who are members of the Christian community? And if they should come to learn that this is his meaning, would they not be apt to say, "It is a pity that this man, before he attempt to speak on these subjects, does not learn to speak intelligibly, by conforming to the current use of the language?" It is therefore not without reason that I affirm, that the more modern acceptation, though an intruder, has jostled out the rightful and primitive one almost entirely. But as every man, who would be understood, is under a necessity of employing words according to the general use of the time present,

Quem penes arbitrium est, et jus, et norma loquendi ; when I employ for the future any of the words affected by this remark, I am always, unless where the connexion indicates the contrary, to be understood as using them in the sense in which they are now commonly received. Only, by the deduction that has been given of the origin of this change, we may perceive, that from what is said in relation to the church in scripture, nothing can justly be concluded in sup

port of church authority, or the privileges of churchmen, in the sense which these terms generally have at present.

The distinction just now taken notice of, in concurrence with the interferences between the civil magistrate and the minister of religion, or between the spiritual tribunals (as they were called) and the secular, gave rise to another distinction in the Christian community between church and state. When the gospel was first published by the apostles, and the apostolic men that came after them, it was natural and necessary to distinguish believers from infidels living in the same country, and under the same civil governors. The distinction between a Christian church or society, and a Jewish or an idolatrous state, was perfectly intelligible. But to distinguish the church from its own members-those duly received into it by baptism, and continuing in the profession of the faith-we may venture to affirm, would have been considered then as a mere refinement, a sort of metaphysical abstraction. For where can the difference lie, when every member of the state is a member of the church, and, conversely, every member of the church is a member of the state? Accordingly, no such distinction ever obtained among the Jews, nor was there any thing similar to it in any nation before the establishment of the Christian religion under Constantine.

But what hath since given real significance to the distinction is, in the first place, the limitation of the term church to the clergy and the ecclesiastical judicatories; and, in the second place, the claims of independency advanced by these, as well as certain claims of power and jurisdiction, in some things differing, and in some things interfering, with the claims of the magistrate. For however much connected the civil powers and church governors are in Christian states, still they are distinct bodies of men, and in some respects independent. Their very connexion will conduce to render them rival powers, and, if so, confederate against each other. When this came actually to be the case, considering the character and circumstances of the times, it will not be matter of great astonishment, that every thing contributed to give success to the encroachments of the latter upon the former.