Mr. Roscoe.—"Then you must admit that the writers of the Scriptures, who wrote under the plenary inspiration of the Holy Spirit, acted a very injudicious part, and have set us a very improper example, as they have placed the fact of their personal insufficiency, and their entire dependence on their invisible Lord, in a prominent point of view. Indeed, the consequences of such an admission would be alarming, as in that case we should be compelled to pass a censure on the wisdom of the Divine Spirit for allowing such facts to be placed on record, if they are calculated to produce a pernicious effect on the popular mind. It is evident to me, from your last remarks, that you, in common with all the clergy of the anti-evangelical school, have imbibed some very fatal errors, which must render your ministrations worse than useless; must, in fact, render them pernicious, because deceptive, both to yourselves and to your people."
Rev. Mr. Roscoe.—"And do you really think so? This certainly is a very grave imputation on our order, and one which ought not to be advanced unless you can maintain its correctness, with an array of very clear evidence. Why, you now insinuate that we are self-deceived, and are deceiving others. What proof can you bring of this?"
Mr. Roscoe.—"Your first error, and it is a capital one, is the self-sufficiency of the clergy to accomplish the design of their appointment. This may be true, if we view them merely as appointed by human authority to conduct a prescribed service and administer the sacraments. This you can do. But the more spiritual functions of the ministry you cannot perform by virtue of a self-sufficient power."
Rev. Mr. Roscoe.—"To what spiritual functions do you refer?"
Mr. Roscoe.—"Why, to the conversion and spiritual renovation of sinners, and the administration of effective consolation to a wounded spirit. If any order of ministers, under the Christian dispensation, ever possessed the power of doing this, we must admit that the apostles of our Lord possessed it in a pre-eminent degree. But they disclaimed the possession of such a self-sufficient power, and acknowledged their absolute dependence on the concurring grace of God, and the fervent and effectual prayers of their pious lay brethren. The apostle Paul, when trying to allay the ferment which the spirit of contention had raised in the church of Corinth, and to detach the people from the popular idols of their admiration and confidence, speaks out boldly and explicitly on the question of ministerial insufficiency and dependence: 'For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal? Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase' (1 Cor. iii. 4-7). We know that opinion has a powerful influence in the formation and development of character, and in no order of men does it operate with more direct and constant force than on the clergy; hence, if a clergyman thinks he is invested with a plenitude of power to accomplish the design of his appointment, he will live in a state of comparative, if not absolute independence of God: he will not be a man of prayer; I mean, he will not wrestle in prayer with God, to render his public ministry successful in the conversion of sinners; such a thing will not come into his mind. He thinks of himself more as a priest in the church, than as a minister of Christ, labouring for the spiritual good of the people. His self-sufficiency, which keeps him independent of God, tends to inflate him with spiritual pride; he becomes arrogant, and expects that the people will place themselves in submissive subjection to his authority—believe what he dictates, and celebrate what he prescribes. But when, like Paul and the rest of the apostles, a clergyman has a piercing conviction of his insufficiency to execute the trust committed to his charge, he will never enter a pulpit to preach till he has been in his closet with God—praying for assistance from him, and for the putting forth of his Divine power, through the medium of his otherwise ineffective agency. His opinion of himself, his feelings, and his retired devout exercises, all harmonize with the following quotation, which I will now read to you: 'Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart. Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth but the spirit giveth life' (2 Cor. iii. 3, 6). And while such a clergyman will depend on God for the success of his labours, rather than on any conceived self-sufficiency, he will also, in imitation of the apostles, place a subordinate degree of dependence on the fervent prayers of his believing brethren. 'Finally, brethren,' says Paul, who could work miracles to attest the Divine origin of the message he delivered to the people, 'pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified, even as it is with you' (2 Thess. iii. 1)."
Rev. Mr. Roscoe.—"And what is the second error which you think we hold?"
Mr. Roscoe.—"Why, you teach the people to depend on you for spiritual blessings, instead of directing them to look to God, from whom cometh every good gift, and every perfect gift; hence, they come to church, go through the order of the service, and withdraw when it is over, more like self-moving machines, whose movements are regulated by laws imposed on them by human skill and authority, than like intelligent beings, who feel their responsibility to God, and their dependence on him. And this is the great practical evil which is inflicted on the people, by the clergy assuming to themselves a sufficiency of power to accomplish all the purposes of their ministry—their hearers are not a praying people. Now, to me nothing is more obvious, if I take the meaning of the uniform language of the Bible, than this great important fact, that prayer on the part of a minister and his hearers, is made essential to their spiritual prosperity and happiness. Hence, after the promise of a new spirit and a new heart was given, to excite the eager expectation of the people of Israel: 'Thus saith the Lord God, I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them' (Ezek. xxxvi. 37). Hence the importance and necessity of prayer. Can we expect forgiveness unless we pray for it? and is not the moral renovation of our nature of equal importance? and if, in the economy of salvation, we are to be sanctified by the Spirit of God as well as justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, are we to be reprobated as deluded when we invoke his purifying agency? Let us look around us, and what shall we see? What!—a scene not less affecting than that which struck the eye of the prophet when he received his commission from above to enter the mystic valley of death. It was full of bones: 'And, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.' He was asked, 'Can these dry bones live?' and he answered, 'O Lord God, thou knowest.' What did he do? He prophesied as he was commanded; and when thus engaged, the Spirit of the Lord came upon them, and they lived. If, then, the ministers of grace wish to accomplish the great moral design of their appointment, and acquire the deathless honour of rescuing sinners from that state of guilt, degeneracy, and misery in which they are involved, let them preach the gospel in a clear and in a faithful manner, teaching them that every good thought, every holy desire, every sacred principle, must proceed directly from the Father of mercies, and God of all grace; and that, while they are employed as his servants, in administering the revelation of his will, if any good results from their labours, it must be in answer to the humble and fervent prayers of those who proclaim and those who hear the truth."
Rev. Mr. Roscoe.—"The clergy have fallen very low in your estimation."
Mr. Roscoe.—"The Tractarian clergy have. They sink themselves by their arrogance, and lofty assumptions of official dignity and power; they are haughty and overbearing, and have no resemblance in their spirit, or in their style of speech, to the prophets of the Old Testament or the apostles of the New; and if not an importation from Rome, they are in training to serve at her altars, and advocate her assumed infallibility."