[641:5] Epist. lxii. p. 221.
[642:1] "De Unit. Ecc." p. 397. See also Lactantius, "De Vera Sapientia," lib. iv. p. 282.
[642:2] Eph. iv. 12.
[642:3] Acts xx. 32.
[643:1] Rev. i. 6.
[644:1] If our authorized version of the English Bible is to be regarded as a standard of correct usage, the word priest cannot be properly employed to designate a Christian minister. In the New Testament, as stated in the text, a minister of the word is never called a priest ([Greek: hiereus]), and the latter term, when used in reference to an official personage in our English Bible, always denotes an individual who offers sacrifice. To call a gospel minister a priest is, therefore, at once to adopt an incorrect expression and to insinuate a false doctrine. The English word priest is derived, not as some say, from the Greek [Greek: presbuteros] through the French prêtre, but from the Greek [Greek: proestôs], in Latin praestes, and in Saxon preost. See Webster's "Dictionary of the English Language."
[644:2] Epist. lxix. p. 264.
[644:3] Thus, Tertullian speaks of the "ordo sacerdotalis." "De Exhor. Cast." c. vii.
[645:1] Cyprian, Epist. lxiii. p. 230; lxiv. p. 239.
[645:2] Cyprian, Epist. lxix. p. 264. Cotelerius, i. 442. The Eucharist is called a sacrifice by Justin Martyr (see his Dialogue with Trypho., "Opera," p. 260) apparently in a figurative sense, but when dispensed by a minister called a priest, such language became exceedingly liable to misconception.