The Bruce Herald. "Nemo me impune lacessit'" TOKOMAIRIRO, SEPTEMBER 26, 1873.

Bruce Herald, Volume VI, Issue 532, 26 September 1873, Page 5

The Bruce Herald. "Nemo me impune lacessit'" TOKOMAIRIRO, SEPTEMBER 26, 1873.

Our readers would not thank us to answer Mr Coffey's last at any length. We do not ■wish, and have no intention to do so. It had been otherwise if Mr Coffey had dealt with our remarks with the Christian candour and intelligence which his position warrants us to expect at his hands. Had he possessed that candour he would not have given that interpretation he gave to the opening remarks of our previous article, but would have read them in the light of the admission made by Dr Nevill, and noted by us in our review of his lecture— that he acknowledged the Christianity of individuals, and their connection with the Church Catholic, who were not connected with churches episcopally governed, while he denied to such churches a place within the Church Catholic. Dr Nevill spoke of churches, and so did we. Speaking of churches- not episcopally governed, he calls them sect3— fragments of churches. If Mr Coffey has in-t forgotten his Latin, he knows that these woids denote— cut off, broken off. If the Wesleyan, Presbyterian, and other churches not possessing bishops, are sects, fragments— they are separated from and form no. part of that from which they are cut or broken off. They do not so regard themselves. They believe themselves to belong to'jand to form a part of the Church Catholic. Dr Nevill proclaims them to be no such thing. He looks upon them, and speaks of them, as separated from the Church of Christ on earth, and if in so doing he does not excommunicate them as churches, then yre do not know what excommunication means. It won't help Mr Coffey to adduce Dr NevnTs admission in reference to *' duly baptised persons," for everyone* knows what that means as used by high churchmenpersons baptised by duly episcopally ordained priests. . We know well what value to attach to the •words quoted by Mr Coffey to set forth the liberality of his bishop. It must be, indeed, very great consolation to any pereon baptised by an Anglican priest, and who may have joined the Wesleyan or the Presbyterian churches, to receive the assurance of Dr Nevill and Mr Coffey— that though they have gone outside " the truest branch ot the Catholic Church, they carry with them the baptismal virtues that belong to that church, but not to such as that they now belong to." It seems that Mr Coffey would have us to exercise a like faith in the succession of bishops, that we exercise in our Lord's descent from David— from Abraham. We have been wont to rest this latter faith on the. testimony of God's Word— on the authority of inspiration. Believing the Scriptures, we believe that our Lord descended from David, that he descended from Abraham. Let Mr Coffey give us a like foundation for believing that Dr Nevill has ministerially descended from Peter or John, and we shall believe in that descent. Unfortunately lov Mr Coffey, neither Peter nor John c?U themselves bishops, or even acted as diocesan bishops ; pn the contrary, they call themselves Pr#s-

bytors as signifying that what of the apostolic ministry should descend to the ministry of future ages should not be modern [episcopates, but the ancient and 3till abiding presbyierate. Hence we have clearer evidence that Mr Coffey, being but a presbyter, is a true descendant of the earliest ministry of the Christian Church, rather than Dr Nevill, who assumes a name by which the Apostles never designated themselves, but which they applied uniformly to the very office of the Preabytorate, held by Mr Ceftey. Something more than si fanciful genealogical tree is needed to our believing in Dr Nevill's succession from Peter or from John as we believe in our Lord's descent from David and Abraham. We regret to find Mr Coffey so badly read in the New Testament as to send us to the parable of tares as a warrant for not rooting out heresies from the Church. Were ho acquainted with our Lord's explanation of that parable he would know that the field in which the tares were sown was not the Church, but the World. No one would suggest to Mr Coffey that the Church should exercise discipline upon the world : its duty is-to bring the world within the Church.by the preaching of the gospel. Its dealing with the tares sown in the world is one thing, its dealing with the tares sown within itself is another. Tares are very abundant, we rather suspect, in the Anglican Church. Evangelicals, high churchmen, .ritualists, and rationalists cannot ail sow the good seed of the gospel — so contrary , are they one to the other, some of them must be sowing tares. Their being so engaged cannot be helping to make that Church what a true Church ought to be— the ground and pillar of the truth. But cf course it must be this in the eyes of Mr Coffey because it is honored with the succession of bishops. Well, one to whom the bishops trace up their descent has left the following directions to the ministers and members of the Christian Church :— " A man that is an heretic after the first and second admonition reject. Now we command you, brethren, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that- ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly and not after the tradition which he received of "All scripture is given by inspiration," says the Apostle Paul. In the " all scripture," as Mr Coffey knows, he included the Pentateuch. Bishop Coleoso, a bishop of the Anglican Church, walks not after this tradition received of the Apostle. Mr Coffoy neither rejects him nor withdraws from him. deeming himself wiser than the Apostle speaking in the name of the Lord Jesus and by his | Holy Spirit. For instead of casting out heresy he would have the Church so comprehensive as to include an Apostle Paul and a Bishop Colenso. The subject is closed.