II. Such, then, was the promise as spoken in the first instance. In the literal sense of the words this fulfilment of them can hardly occur again.

No other book of equal authority with the New Testament has ever issued from mortal pen. No epoch has spoken on Universal moral questions with a voice so powerful as the application. Apostolic age. Shakespeare, Milton, Bacon, and Hegel may be of a wider range. Yet they do not rise to the moral dignity of the best parts of the New Testament. When we leave the purely personal and historical application of these words, then, as in all our Lord's words and precepts, the whole point of the words is, that they are spoken, not to any one person or order of men, or succession of men, but to the whole Christian community of all time-to any in that community that partake of the same spirit, and in proportion as they partake of the same moral qualities as filled the first hearers of the gospel. When it is sometimes alleged that the promise to Peter was exclusively fulfilled in the Bishops of Rome, who, centuries afterwards, were supposed to have been his successors, it would be just as reasonable, or we may say just as unreasonable, as to say that all the Bishops of Ephesus were specially loved by Jesus because they were supposed to have succeeded St. John at Ephesus. What the most learned and the most gifted of all the Fathers, Origen,* said of the promise to St. Peter in the sixteenth chapter of St. Matthew is at once the best proof of what was believed about it in early times, and also the best explanation of its application to later days: "He who is gifted with self-control enters the gate of heaven by the key of self-control. He who is just enters the gate of heaven by the key of justice. The Saviour gives to those who are not overcome by the gates of hell as many keys as there are virtues. Against him that judges unjustly, and does not bind on earth according to God's word, the gates of hell prevail; but against whom the gates of hell do not prevail, he judges justly. If any who is not Peter, and has not the qualities here mentioned, believes that he can bind on earth like

* Origen on Matt. xvi. 19. Comp. ibid. De Orat. c. 28. An instructive col lection of similar expressions from St. Augustine is given in an interesting dissertation on the ancient Making of Bishops, by the Rev. Dr. Harrison, vicar of Fenwick.

Peter, so that what he binds is bound in heaven, such an one is puffed up, not knowing the meaning of the Scriptures."

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That which is clear in the case of the promise to Peter is still more clear in the case of the promise in Matt. xviii. 18, and John xx. 23. It is obvious from the text in John xx. 23, that there is no special limitation to the Twelve. For at the meeting spoken of some of the Twelve were not there; Thomas was absent, Matthias was not yet elected, Paul and Barnabas were not yet called. And also others were there besides the Eleven, for in the corresponding passage in Luke xxiv. 36-47, it would appear (if we take the narratives in their literal meaning) that the two disciples from Emmaus, who were not apostles, were present, and the evangelist here, as throughout his whole Gospel, never uses any other word than disciples.' What is thus clear from the actual passage in John xx. 23, is yet more clear from the context of Matt. xviii. 18. There, in the verses immediately preceding, phrase is heaped on phrase, and argument on argument, to show that the power of binding and loosing was addressed, not to any particular class within the circle of disciples, but to the whole body in its widest sense. Our Lord is there speaking of the forgiveness of offences. He requires the contending parties, if they cannot agree, to hear the CHURCH-that is, the whole congregation or assembly; to appeal, as it were, to the popular instinct of the whole community; and He goes on to say that, if even two agree on a matter of this kind, wherever two or three are gathered together in His name, there is He in the midst of them. These passages, in fact, form no exception to the universal rule of our Lord's discourses. Here, as elsewhere, as He said Himself, "What I say unto you, I say unto all." "Peter," as St. Augustine says, "represents all good men, and the promise in St. John is addressed to all believers everywhere." "These words," says a living divine, "like the eyes of the Lord, look every way, and may include all forgiveness, whenever or wheresoever any sins are remitted through the agency of men." ."* They belong to the same class of precepts as "Let your loins be girded and your lights burning," 99 66 Ye are the salt of the earth," "Ye are the light of the world."

* Pusey on Absolution, p. 32.

All have a share in their meaning, all have a share in their force, in proportion as we have received from Heaven any portion of that inspiration whereby we seek "to do and to think the things that be good." *

It was only when the minds of men had become confused by the introduction of limitations and alterations which had no connection with the original words that these promises and precepts began to change their meaning. The "Church," which once had meant the people, or the laity, came to mean the clergy. The declaration, "Ye are the light of the world," was understood to mean only those who were in holy orders. The promise to Peter came to be strangely confined to the Italian Prelates who lived on the banks of the Tiber. The words of St. John's Gospel, which had originally been intended to teach the mutual edification and independent insight into divine truth of all who were inspired by the Spirit of Christ, became limited to the second of the three orders of the Christian ministry. But these are merely passing restrictions and mistakes. The general truth of the words themselves remains unshaken and still applicable to the general growth of Christian truth.

The practical lesson of the passages is that which has been already indicated-namely, that the enlightening, elevating power of the Christian conscience is not confined to any profession or order, however sacred; is exercised not in virtue of any hereditary or transmitted succession, but in virtue of the spiritual discernment, the insight into truth and character, which has been vouchsafed to all good men, to all Christians, in proportion to their goodness, and wisdom, and discernment. This, as Origen says, is the true power of the keys; a power which may be exercised, and which is exercised, sometimes by the teaching of a faithful pastor, sometimes by the presence of an innocent child, sometimes by the example of a good mother, sometimes by the warning of a true friend, sometimes by the silent glance of just indignation, sometimes by the reading of a good book-above all, by the straightforward honesty of our

* Even those early Christian writers who restrict these words to a particular act, restrict them to baptism; and baptism, according to the rules of the ancient Church, can be performed by any one.

own individual consciences, whether in dealing with ourselves or others.

It may be worth while here again to recall the obvious processes by which the amelioration of mankind has taken place. We see it clearly on the large scale of history. Effect of the Doubtless there have been long periods when the laity. chief enlightenment of the world has come from the clergy. In most Protestant and in some Catholic and Greek Churches the clergy, as a class, perhaps still do more than any other single class of men to keep alive a sense of goodness and truth. But there has never been a time when the laity have not had their share in the guidance of the Church; and in proportion as Christian civilization has increased, in proportion as the clergy have done their duty in enlightening and teaching others, in that proportion the Christian influence, the binding and the loosing power of all good and gifted men, has increased in that proportion has the principle implied in these passages received a deeper, wider signification.

There have been ages when the clergy were coextensive with the educated class of mankind, and were thus the chief means of stimulating and purifying the moral standard of their age. But at all times, and specially since other professions have become "clerks,”—that is, scholars and instructors,—the advancement of learning, the opening of the gates of heaven, has been as much the work of the Christian Church—that is, of the laity as of the priesthood. By the highest rank of the whole profession of the clergy-the Pontificate of Rome -the key of knowledge has been perhaps wielded less than by any other great institution in Christendom. Of the 256 prelates who have filled the bishopric of Rome, scarcely more than four have done anything by their writings to enlarge the boundaries of knowledge and to raise the moral perceptions of mankind-Leo the Great, Gregory the Great, and (in a higher degree) Benedict XIV. and Clement XIV. Occasional acts of toleration towards the Jews, the rectification of the calendar, and a few like examples of enlightenment may be adduced. But, as a general rule, whatever else the Popes have done, they have not, in the Biblical sense, bound or loosed the moral duties of mankind.

And, again, as to the clergy generally, the abolition of slav

ery, though supported by many excellent ecclesiastics, yet had for its chief promoters the laymen Wilberforce and Clarkson. What these virtuous and gifted men bound on earth was bound in heaven, what they loosed on earth was loosed in heaven, not because they had or had not been set apart for a special office, but because they had received a large measure of the Holy Spirit of God, which enabled them to see the good and refuse the evil of the times in which they lived.

If the aspirations of one half of medieval Christendom after goodness were guided by the clerical work of Thomas à Kempis, another half must have been no less elevated by the lay work of the divine poem of Dante. If the revelation of God in the universe was partly discovered by Copernicus the ecclesiastic, it was more fully disclosed by the labors of Galileo the layman, which the clergy condemned. If the religion of England has been fed in large part by Hooker, by Butler, by Wesley, and by Arnold, it has also been fed, perhaps in a yet larger part, by Milton, by Bunyan, by Addison, by Cowper, and by Walter Scott.

If we study the process by which false notions of morality and religion have been dispersed, and true notions of morality and religion have been introduced, from Augustus to Charlemagne, from Charlemagne to Luther, from Luther to the present day (as unfolded in Mr. Lecky's four volumes), we shall find that the almost uniform law by which the sins and superstitions of Christendom have been bound or loosed has been, first, that the action of some one conscience or some few consciences whether of statesmen, students, priests, or soldiersmore enlightened, more Christ-like, than their fellows-has struck a new light, or unwound some old prejudice, or opened some new door into truth; and then, that this light has been caught up, this opening has been widened by the gradual advance of Christian wisdom and knowledge in the mass.

What is called the public opinion of any age may be in itself as misleading, as corrupt, as the opinion of any individual. It must be touched, corrected, purified by those higher intelligences and nobler hearts, which catch the light as mountain summits before the sunrise has reached the plains. But it is only when the light has reached the plains, only when public opinion has become so elevated by the action of the few, that