Review of Dr. R. J. Breckinridge's Letters, on the Rights of Ruling Elders: From the Princeton Review, April, 1844 (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

Dod, Albert Baldwin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1332190480 ISBN 13: 9781332190485

Publisher: Forgotten Books, 2018

Synopsis

Excerpt from Review of Dr. R. J. Breckinridge's Letters, on the Rights of Ruling Elders: From the Princeton Review, April, 1844

It remains to be seen whether the valour exhibited in such a cause will meet with its reward or not.

In the pamphlet, the title of which we have placed at the head of this article, we have the substance of two argu ments upon the ordination and quorum question, delivered before the Synod of Philadelphia by Dr. R. J. Breckinridge, a conspicuous defender of what he deems the rights and privileges of Ruling Elders. It Will be remembered that the General Assembly of 1842 decided by a unanimous vote that it was not within the intent of our constitutional rule tipon that subject, that ruling elders should join in the im position of hands in the rite of ordination. This vote was subsequently re-considered, and the subject was referred to the next Assembly. The last Assembly after a fitll argu ment of the case decided by a vote of 138 to 9 that the constitution of our church does not authorize ruling elders to impose hands in the ordination of ministers. This was the deliberate judgment of the church expressed through its highest court, upon a question not hastily brought before it, nor hastily decided. If the church is capable of forming its mind upon the meaning of its own elementary principles and methods of proceeding, we have that mind distinctly expressed in this decision. If the unanimous decision of one Assembly, and the nearly unanimous decision of another, after a year's reflection, ought not to be final, so as to be an end of controversy, we can discern no means by which such a question can ever be definitively settled and for aught that we can see, our church must be reduced to the humiliating attitude of ever learning what her own simplest rudiments are, and never coming to the knowledge of the truth.

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Excerpt from Review of Dr. R. J. Breckinridge's Letters, on the Rights of Ruling Elders: From the Princeton Review, April, 1844 It is truly mortifying that the Presbyterian Church, at this period of her history, instead of leaving the first principles of the doctrine of Christ and going on unto perfection, should be employed in the juvenile task of laying again the foundation of the "doctrine of laying on of hands." We are utter disbelievers in the vaunted efficacy of a perpetual recurrence in the spirit of sceptical inquiry, to the first principles of our organization. The distinctive features of the Presbyterian form of church government have been known and settled for ages; and yet there are some who would persuade us that all who have hitherto embraced this system have used it, as common people do their watches, without comprehending at all the true principles of its construction; and who seek therefore to divert the energy of the church from reaching forward unto those things that are before, and waste it in the re-examination of foundations that were long since well and securely laid. It is a great evil, when a church, instead of acting with the genial vigour of a well settled faith in the established principles of her organization, is agitated with a perpetual inquiry as to what her principles really are. If the Presbyterian Church of this country after a century of well-defined practice under a written constitution, needs to be instructed in such elementary matters, as who ought to perform the work of ordination to the ministry, and what constitutes a quorum of her ecclesiastical courts, we see no reason to hope for any progress in all time to come. If these matters have not been already settled beyond a reasonable doubt, we see not how they can now be settled, so as to prevent them from becoming the means of future agitation. It forms a part of the mortifying character of the present agitation of our church, that it should touch upon questions that are in t

Edition details

• Publisher: Forgotten Books
• Publication date: 2018
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1332190480
• ISBN 13: 9781332190485
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 36