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Untitled Article
On the Nineteenth Article of the Church of England . ( Library of Ecclesiastical Knowledge , No . 26 . ) Westley . 1832 . The numbers of this publication have of late been an almost unbroken series of attacks upon the Established Church , often vigorous , often coarse , and often inconsistent . All these epithets apply to the present number . It shows that the church is unchurched by its own articles .
The definition in Art . XIX . is seized with a strong hand , and it comes thundering like a battering-ram against the walls till the whole fabric is demolished . Thus , to use the choice phraseology of the writer , and establish our second allegation , the Episcopalians are made * to damn their own church . Such is his mode of showing ( to cite another specimen of his taste ) his ' faithful adherence to the rights of the celestial Ccesar *
It seems , and yet it is very obvious , to have been wholly unsuspected by the writer , that his use of the Episcopalian definition of a church , which he unconditionally adopts , might be turned against himself , and so doughty a champion be slain with his own sword . * The visible church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men , in the which the pure word of God is preached , and the sacraments administered , according to Christ ' s ordinance in all those things that of necessity are
requisite to the * same / Now it is true that here is no mention of legal establishment , nor of a liturgy ; but it is also true that there is no mention of a confession of the Trinity , nor of any other creed to be imposed upon the c faithful men * who may congregate to hear the preaching of the * pure word / and attend the administration of the sacraments 6 according to Christ ' s ordinance . ' Yet it would be to little purpose that the most faithful followers of Christ , if they would not
confess to more than he taught , should present themselves for communion to a congregational church . They might knock ; but it would not be opened unto them . Faithfulness would be sent back to learn his catechism . The congregational church , in its administrations , deals with honest men according ; to the ordinance of Dr . Caius . ' Vat shall
de honest man do in my closet ? Dere is no honest man dat shall come into my closet . ' Let the * Evangelical Dissenters , ' by whom these tracts are put forth , look to themselves * Let them cease to barricade the Lord ' s table with their creeds . Let them throw it open , as he left it ; and then they may wield the sword of Goliah against the establishment without cutting their own fingers .
A little bit of Jesuitry occurs at p . 49 , which savours much more of the advocate , making out a plausible case anyhow , than of the fair disputant . * A visible church of ChriBt , then , is a congregation . We say a church , for though the English uses the definite article and speaks of the church , the Latin , which was composed at the same time , and is of equal authority , may be rendered a church / It is difficult to imagine how any man could write this without being conscious of the trick he
was attempting to put upon the understandings of his readers . We will say nothing of the historical and chronological curiosity of the original and the translation having been both 4 composed at the same time ; ' if bo , it was a singular event ; but let that pass . It may readily be admitted that 'the Latin is of equal authority with the English translation . But it also happens , in this case , that the English translation is of equal authority with the Latin original ; the articles having been subscribed in both languages . The interpretation is thus fixed .
Untitled Article
282 Critical Notices . —Nineteenth Article of the English Church .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1832, page 282, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1810/page/66/
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