But the reason of the case is of more weight than the decisions of councils. It sometimes happens, that persons become Christians, without the direct labors of a minister. If, for example, by the agency of the Scriptures and tracts, which missionaries are now sending into the Chinese empire, a number of persons in a neighborhood should become converts, would it not be their privilege and their duty, if they were sufficiently instructed respecting the nature of the church and of its ordinances, to appoint one of their number to baptize the rest, to form themselves into a church, and to partake of the Lord’s Supper? Must these believers wait, till a missionary could come to baptize them, and to organize a church? The great ends for which the church and its ordinances were appointed,—the spiritual edification of believers, and the spread of truth,—would require that these Christians should enjoy them. If it were indispensable, that the administrator be a minister, there would, in such a case, be no insuperable difficulty. The duty of the converts to assemble, to pray, and to exhort each other, would be clear. Their voluntary agreement thus to meet, to maintain mutual watchfulness, and to enjoy the ordinances of the Gospel, would constitute them a church. They might call one of their number, possessing, in their judgment, suitable gifts, to the office of the ministry, and this election by the church would be the only human sanction which such a minister would need, to authorize him to preach the Gospel, and to administer the ordinances.[207] This position cannot be denied, without resorting to the doctrine of a regular apostolical succession. If the church has no power to originate a ministry, by investing with the sacred office those to whom, in her judgment, the Saviour has given the inward vocation, the ministry might become extinct. Those who insist on an apostolical succession, are obliged to trace their ministry through the channel of the papal clergy. They are forced to admit, that the Pope is a true bishop, and the Catholic community a Christian church. Archbishop Laud confessed, that “it is through her that the bishops of the Church of England, who have the honor to be capable of deriving their calling from St. Peter, must deduce their succession.”[208] If the race of English prelates had become extinct, as might have happened, had Cromwell’s life been prolonged a few years, the Church of England would have been reduced to the embarrassing dilemma, of consecrating bishops by her own authority, and thus dissolving the charm of succession, or of sending an humble embassy to Rome, to crave from his Holiness the communication, anew, of the mysterious virtue.