laudable Practice

Do you think that you are truly called, according to the will of our Lord Jesus Christ, and according to the canons of this Church, to the ministry of the same? In reflecting upon the second question in the Ordering of Deacons, William White's Commentaries Suited to Occasions of Ordination (1833) addresses the apostolic nature of the Church from which the candidate receives holy orders: To justify the candidate in believing that he is called according to the will of Christ, he should be convinced, after due inquiry, that the Church to which he looks for ordination, is a true apostolick Church, deriving its authority from that founded by the apostles. For since they did confessedly found a communion, and since it did confessedly transmit its ministries, there seems no possible right to the name of a Christian Church at present, but in succession from the originally established body. What then is the result, but that an opinion, formed under due care, is a prerequisite of admission ...

From Bramhall's Protestants' Ordinations Defended , a description of what he calls elsewhere "the grace of holy Orders". He begins by noting how the Church of England regards Holy Orders as instituted by Christ; that the Anglican ordination rite embodied this belief; that it was a theology and practice shared with the Churches of the East; and that, while the Tridentine formula and porrectio instrumentorum were entirely unnecessary, their substance regarding the Eucharistic sacrifice was to be found in the Anglican ordination rite. They teach, that Ordination is a Sacrament; and we do not much oppose it. It is either weakness or frowardness, to wrangle about the name, when men agree upon the thing. We do believe, that Ordination is a sacred rite or action instituted by Christ, wherein, by the imposition of hands, the holy Orders of Bishops, Priests or Presbyters, and Deacons, are conferred ... Neither do we say this only, but we prove it manifestly. First, by the ins...