men equally desirous with ourselves of discovering truth, and who had, in some cases, better opportunities than we now have.
With regard to the order and government of the primitive church, we may doubtless follow their authority with perfect security; they could not possibly be ignorant of laws executed, and customs practised, by themselves; nor would they, even supposing them corrupt, serve any interests of their own, by handing down false accounts to posterity. We are, therefore, to inquire from them, the different orders established in the ministry from the apostolick ages; the different employments of each, and their several ranks, subordinations, and degrees of authority. From their writings we are to vindicate the establishment of our church, and by the same writings are those who differ from us, in these particulars, to defend their conduct.
Nor is this the only, though perhaps the chief use of these writers: for, in matters of faith, and points of doctrine, those, at least, who lived in the ages nearest to the times of the apostles, undoubtedly deserve to be consulted. The oral doctrines, and occasional explications of the apostles, would not be immediately forgotten, in the churches to which they had preached, and which had attended to them, with the diligence and reverence which their mission and character demanded. Their solutions of difficulties, and determinations of doubtful questions, must have been treasured up in the memory of their audiences, and transmitted for some time from father to son. Every thing, at least, that was declared by the inspired teachers to be necessary to salvation, must have been carefully recorded; and, therefore, what we find no traces of in the Scripture, or the early fathers, as most of the peculiar tenets of the Romish church, must certainly be concluded to be not necessary. Thus, by consulting first the Holy Scriptures, and next the writers of the primitive church, we shall make ourselves acquainted with the will of God; thus shall we discover the good way, and find
