Excerpt from A Sketch of the History of Erastianism: Together With Two Sermons on the Reality of Church, and on the Principle of Church Authority To conduct this inquiry with advantage, we must first consider in what Church authority consists. It, resolves itself into two parts-the first relating to persons, the second to things. Since the Church is a society, it belongs to Church authority to give men commission to exercise public functions - the function, 21. E., of ministering Sacraments and Sacramentals. This power depends - first, upon ordination; and, secondly, upon the continuance of the commission bestowed in ordination. Thus arise Orders and Mis sion. Again, it belongs to Church authority to settle what persons shall be allowed to partake in the ordi nances thus administered, i. E., to regulate admission to communion. And further, among those who have commission to minister, some must be selected who shall be presented to the authorizing power for em ployment in this or that 131m. This is the right of patronage. So that the exercise of Church authority has reference to Orders, Mission, Communion, and Patronage. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.