SURVEY OF THE PLATFORM OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, EXHIBITED IN THE SCRIPTURES APPLIED TO ITS ACTUAL CIRCUMSTANCES AND CONDITION, With suggestions for its CONSOLIDATION AND ENLARGEMENT; COMPRISING THE SUBSTANCE OF AN ESSAY ON THE DIVINE ORIGIN AND SUCCESSION OF THE CHRISTIAN PRIESTHOOD; ON ITS NECESSITY AS A DIVINE APPOINTMENT; AND ON THE RELATION WHICH IT BEARS TO THE JEWISH PRIESTHOOD; To which was adjudged A PREMIUM OF FIFTY POUNDS, BY The Society for promoting Christian Knowledge and Church Union BY HECTOR DAVIES MORGAN, M. A. f. MINISTER OF CASTLE HEDINGHAM, ESSEX. OXFORD, PRINTED FOR J. PARKER; AND F. C. AND J. RIVINGTON, AND J. HATCHARD, LONDON. BY W. BAXTER, OXFORD. ADVERTISEMENT. THE period, which was limited for the production of the Essay, of which the substance is comprised in the following Survey, allowed no leisure for elaborate composition or extensive research. The subject was familiar to the Author, and he seized the opportunity of collecting from the Scriptures only a view of the constitution of the Christian Church, a design, which he had often meditated, but for which he had made no preparation, and which he proposed to execute in a very differenț form. Since the premium was adjudged, he has availed himself of the advice of friends, on whose judgment he places the strongest reliance, and for whose assistance he returns his sincerest thanks. The original composition has been revised and considerably enlarged; exceptions have been anticipated and repelled, and the argument has been strengthened by a reference to the best writers on Ecclesiastical polity. The order of the first and second |