We must not, however, imagine, that his distress of mind, and the reluctance which he discovered to comply with the call which he had received, proceeded from consciousness of its invalidity, through {55} the defect of certain external formalities which had been usual in the church, or which, in ordinary cases, may be observed with propriety in the installation of persons into sacred offices. These, as far as warranted by scripture, or conducive to the preservation of order, he did not contemn; and his judgment respecting them may be learned from the early practice of the Scottish reformed church, in the organization of which he had so active a share. In common with all the original reformers, he rejected the necessity of episcopal ordination, as totally unauthorized by the laws of Christ; nor did he even regard the imposition of the hands of presbyters as a rite essential to the validity of orders, or of necessary observance in all circumstances of the church. The papists, indeed, did not fail to declaim on this topic, representing Knox, and other reformed ministers, as destitute of all lawful vocation. In the same strain did many hierarchical writers of the English church afterwards learn to talk, not scrupling, by their extravagant doctrine of the absolute necessity of ordination by the hands of a bishop who derived his powers by uninterrupted succession from the apostles, to invalidate and nullify the orders of all the reformed churches, except their own; a doctrine which has been revived in the present enlightened age, and unblushingly avowed and defended, with the greater part of its absurd, illiberal, and horrid consequences. The fathers of the English reformation, however, were very far from entertaining such contracted and unchristian sentiments. When Knox afterwards went {56} to England, they accepted his services without the smallest hesitation. They maintained a constant correspondence with the reformed divines on the continent, and cheerfully owned them as brethren and fellow‑labourers in the ministry. And they were not so ignorant of their principles, nor so forgetful of their character, as to prefer ordination by popish prelates to that which was conferred by protestant presbyters.[81] I will not say that our Reformer utterly {57} disregarded his early ordination in the popish church, although, if we may credit the testimony of his adversaries, this was his sentiment;[82] but I have little doubt that he looked upon the charge which he received at St Andrews as principally constituting his call to the ministry.