of members from the beginning. Now I observe further, that the word Church, as used in Scripture, ordinarily means this actually existing visible body. The exceptions to this rule, out of about 100 places in the New Testament, where the word occurs, are four passages in the Epistle to the Ephesians; two in the Colossians; and one in the Hebrews. (Eph. i. 22. iii. 10, 21. v. 23—32. Col. i. 18, 24. Heb. xii. 23.)—And in some of these exceptions the sense is at most but doubtful. Further, our Saviour uses the word twice, and in both times of the Visible Church. They are remarkable passages, and may here be introduced, in continuation of my argument.
Matth. xvi. 18. "Upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." Now I am certain, any unprejudiced mind, who knew nothing of controversy, considering the Greek word ἐκκλησία means simply an assembly, would have no doubt at all that it meant in this passage a visible body. What right have we to disturb the plain sense? why do we impose a meaning, arising from some system of our own? And this view is altogether confirmed by the other occasion of our Lord's using it, where it can only denote the Visible Church. Matt. xviii. 17. "If he (thy brother) shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the Church; but if he neglect to hear the Church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a publican."
Observe then what we gain by these two passages;—the grant of power to the Church; and the promise of permanence. Now look at the fact. The body then begun has continued; and has always claimed and exercised the power of a corporation or society. Consider merely the article in the Creed, "The Holy Catholic Church; which embodies this notion. Do not Scripture and History illustrate each other?
I end this first draught of my argument, with the text in 1 Tim. iii. 15., in which St. Paul calls the Church "the pillar and ground of the Truth,"—which can refer to nothing but a Visible Body; else martyrs may be invisible, and preachers, and teachers, and the whole order of the Ministry.
My paper is exhausted. If you allow me, I will send you soon a second Letter; meanwhile I sum up what I have been proving from Scripture thus; that Almighty God might have left Christianity as a sort of sacred literature, as contained in the Bible, which each person was to take and use by himself; just as we read
