In their "Letter to the faithful in CHRIST JESUS," the Archbishops, Bishops Metropolitan, and other Bishops of the Holy Catholic Church, in full communion with the Church of England," assembled at the Lambeth Conference, in 1878, "commend to the faithful" the following:

The fact that a solemn protest is raised in so many Churches and Christian communities throughout the world, against the usurpations of the See of Rome, and against the novel doctrines promulgated by its authority, is a subject for thankfulness to ALMIGHTY GOD. All sympathy is due from the Anglican Church to the Churches and individuals protesting against these errors, and laboring, it may be, under special difficulties from the assaults of unbelief as well as from the pretensions of Rome.

JOHN H. ELLIOTT.

Our Church Name should be Changed.

THE name "Protestant the Church in this country,

HE name "Protestant Episcopal" is a serious hind

and hence to the salvation of souls. It is narrow, incomprehensive, minimising, misleading, and extremely pernicious.

The term "Protestant" is an undefined negation, and, as thus used, implies the false hypothesis that such negation is an essential characteristic of the Church; whereas, her real mission is the proclamation and teaching of positive, aggressive Truth, and the ministering of the Sacraments. True, our Holy Mother protests against all error, whether it be Romish, sectarian, or otherwise, but the affirmation of Truth is, to that extent, the rejection of error. Schismatic Rome protests against and denounces certain errors, and so do the hundreds of schismatic sects; yet no ecclesiastical body on earth, of any considerable magnitude, except our own, has belittled itself by assuming a "Protestant " negation for a name.

They were first called "Protestants" who, at the Diet of Spires, desired to subordinate ecclesiastical matters to the dominion of Princes, and who also favored liberty of change in the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Church. Being defeated, they entered "protest," which was read in public April 19, 1529. "And this," says Sleidan, "is the origin of the name, 'The Protestants.'" [Sleidan de Statu Relig., 2d ed., 1559, p. 68. See also Blunt's Dictionary of Sects, Heresies, etc., 1874, p. 447, and Blunt's Dict. of Doctrinal and Historical Theology, 1872, pp. 595-6.]

"Protestants" of our Communion seem The ultra determined, if possible, to subordinate the Catholicity of the Church to the pernicious platitudes of "Protestantism," at least so far as the false teaching of a false name can accomProtests properly come from plish such subordination. minorities, not from majorities. The name "Protestant,"

in its ecclesiastical sense, is generally understood by those who accept the designation as applying to one who rejects the attempted usurpations and the false teachings of the Papal See. It implies that Rome has succeeded in fastening her usurpations and false teachings not only upon the Church Catholic, but upon a majority of all professing Christians as well, calling forth a minority "protest;" which implication is simply not warranted by the facts. The Christians of the world who reject and have all along rejected the errors and assumptions of Rome far outnumber the adherents of the Papal See. Rome is in the minority, and it is strictly in order for her to "protest," if she likes, because the majority have repelled her efforts to have her own way. To "protest," as our ultras do, is practically to concede that Rome has become the mistress of the Christian world; which is not now and never has been the case. To concede to her the name "Catholic," as they who are so fond of being called "Protestants" continually do, is of the essence of stupidity. "Catholic " means universal. A Catholic is one who adheres to Apostolic Order and to the "Faith once for all delivered to the Saints;" one who adheres to the “quod semper, ubique, et ab omnibus" of the Christian world. The Romanists have departed from this Faith, as proclaimed by the Undisputed General Councils of the Church, and hence have become schismatic and anti-Catholic. And yet our self-sufficient friends of Puritan instincts will persist in calling the Church of Rome the "Catholic" (i. e., universal) Church, and her adherents "Catholics," while they themselves are content to pass under the belittling and ridiculous designation of "Protestants." The effect of this absurd surrender to falsehood is to aid in advancing the Papal cause. More than this, the climax is reached when we contemplate the humiliating self-stultification of which this class of people are guilty in declaring before Almighty GOD, in solemn Creed, their belief in "One Catholic and Apostolic Church," with the mental reservation that they mean "One Protestant Episcopal Church."

The prefix "Episcopal," in the present Church name, of

102

course qualifies the meaning of the word "Church," and and signifies that our Church holds to Episcopacy. It implies that there can be a Church, in all essentials, without Bishops-just what is insisted upon by several hundred sects that have sprung up within a little over 300 years; hence, our very name furnishes a self-abnegation and a concession to schism. S. Ignatius, a disciple of S. John and companion of the Apostles, in his epistle to the Trallians, said of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons that "without these there is no Church." For more than 1,500 years after CHRIST there was never an organisation of Christian men, calling themselves a "Church," not under the government of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. From the time of our LORD, the Universal Church has always held to the essentiality of the three Orders of the Ministry, while the denial of the Divine authority and functions of Bishops, as Governors of the Church of GOD on earth, is one of the products of schism since the Reformation. In strict propriety, one might as well contemplate a State without a Chief, or a Court without a Judge, as a Church without a Bishop. Notwithstanding all this, there are those of our own household who seem more than willing to concede legitimacy to schismatic organisations, and to accord to "Church" among each of them the dignified status of a "Church" the manifold kinds and denominations of "Churches," socalled, of which ours is meekly permitted to be designated as the "Protestant Episcopal” kind.

In view of the many so-called "Churches" of these latter days, of course, it is legitimate enough to use the designation" Episcopal," in non-technical language or in common speech to distinguish those that adhere to Apostolic Order from those that do not; but deliberately and by design to fasten it on our Church name is quite a different thing.

True, Episcopacy is one of the various notes and characteristics of the Church. But it is only one and there is no sound reason why that one should be emphasised to the exclusion of all the others.

Our blessed LORD, by Himself and through His Apos

tles, established His One Church here on Earth-not several hundred Churches. The Church is the Spouse of CHRIST. "IS CHRIST divided?" Did our LORD intend that His followers should separate into organised factions, declaring that, "I am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas; and I of CHRIST." [I Cor. i: 12.] "There is One Body, and One Spirit . . . One LORD, One Faith, One Baptism." [Eph. iv: 4, 5.] "We, being many, are One Body in CHRIST, and every one members one of another." [Rom. xii: 5.] "For by One Spirit are we all baptised into One Body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free." "Ye are the Body of CHRIST, and members in particular." "There should be no schism in the Body." [I Cor. xii: 13, 25, 27.]

Now, if ours is the true Branch in this country of this One Body-of this "One Catholic and Apostolic Church" of CHRIST, as we believe, and indeed, as we know to be the case, how can we-how dare we-permit her dignity to be marred by a nickname-a nickname, moreover, that involves untruth and stultification? Our Holy Mother is the Bride of CHRIST. She is not a plaything to be toyed with at pleasure. She is not a merely human organisation to be manipulated at will. She is the Church of the Divine Master-His Body of which we are "members in particular." She is not ours except in the sense of membership. She is JESUS CHRIST'S, the LORD'S; and we have no right to discredit her, by a minimising name or otherwise. We have no right to hide her light under a "Protestant Episcopal" bushel. It is not within our province to lower her standard. If we do so, we are guilty of the veriest presumption and of gross outrage, if not of absolute sin. We are soldiers of the Grand Army with the banner of the Cross uplifted. In hoc signo vinces. We are under solemn pledge not to be "ashamed to confess the Faith of CHRIST crucified, and manfully to fight under His banner, against sin, the world, and the devil, and to continue CHRIST's faithful soldiers and servants unto our life's end." If we "confess the Faith of CHRIST crucified," ex necessitate rei, we must confess and proclaim and assert