POLITY
355
POLITY
ence. a chair which he filled with great reputation. He wrote scholia and notes on many ancient authors — Ovid, Catullus, Statius, Suetonius, Pliny the Younger, and the Scrip/ores Historice A vr/ustw ; he translated into Latin the history of Herodian, the manual of Epictetus, the aphorisms of Hippocrates, some dialogues of Plato, and other works from the Greek. The Miscellanea of Poli- ziano, published at Florence in 1489, consist chiefly of observations he had made on the ancient authors, which he arranged for the press at the request of Lorenzo. Merula made an attempt to depreciate this work, which led to an angry controversy between the two scholars, in the midst of which Merula died. Poliziano had also a violent controversy with Bartolomeo Scala. Polizi- ano was conceited and vain, and very irritable, and his temper led him into an unbecoming altercation with Madonna Clarice, Lorenzo's wife, because she interfered in the education of her children, a thing which Polizi- ano seemed to think preposterous in a woman ; and at last his behavior to her was so impertinent that she turned him out of her house in the country, and wrote to her husband at Florence to inform him of what she had done. Lorenzo, perceiving that a reconciliation between the offended woman and the irascible scholar was impracticable, gave Poliziano apartments in one of his houses at Fiesole, where he wrote his Latin poem Rusticus. During Lorenzo's last illness, Poliziano at- tended the death-bed of his patron, who gave him to- kens of his lasting affection. Poliziano wrote an affect- ing monody on Lorenzo's death, and not long after died himself, in September, 1494, and was buried in the church of San Marco, agreeably to his request. — English Cyclop, s. v. See Moller, De Politiano (Altorf, 1698); Werner, Politianus (Magdeb. 1718); Mencken, Hist. Vita. A. Politani ( Leips. 1736, 4to) ; Bonafous, De Poli- tani Vita et Operibus (Paris, 1845, 8vo) ; Greswell, Me- moirs of Politiano ; Roscoe, Lives of Lorenzo ch Medici and of Leo X ; Tiraboschi, Storia delta Litter at. Hal.; Christian Schools and Scholars (Lond. 1867, 2 vols. 8vo), ii, 321 sq., 329 ; Lawrence, Historical Studies (N. Y. 1877, 8vo), p. GG.
Polity, Civil, of the Jews. See Government.
Polity (Gr. TroXiTtia) is the term generally used to signify government or forms of government and admin- istration in the Christian Church. Church polity may be considered in reference to its historical development during successive centuries, and also in reference to the various systems of government heretofore and now rec- ognised in different branches of the Church.
Historical Development. — Nothing is more obvious from the New -Testament record than the simplicity which characterized the primary organization of the Church. In this particular Christianity was in marked contrast with Judaism. Without temple, tabernacle, or altars, without priests or Levites, and almost without ceremonies, it made known at once its character and purposes as spiritual and not carnal, as, in fact, a king- dom of God "not of this world." The first form of Church organization was that in which the Lord Jesus Christ was present as the visible Head of a body of be- lievers. At this stage the ordinances were established by direct appointment of the Saviour himself, who also gave the great command to his disciples to "Go teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost, teaching them to ob- serve all things whatsoever I have commanded you."
Following the crucifixion, the resurrection, and as- cension of the Lord Jesus, the Church had for a short period a second form of organization, in which the apostles were the only officers to teach and guide the followers of the Saviour. It was at this period that the promised gift of the Holy Ghost was miraculously im- parted and signalized by a great awakening at Jerusa- lem, in which "the Lord added to the Church daily such as were saved." This period of increase was fol- lowed by the appointment of deacons or officers of help,
who were especially chosen to relieve the apostles of their minor duties of a semi-secular kind, that they might give themselves "to prayer and the ministry of the Word." Notwithstanding their primary duties, some if not all of the deacons also devoted themselves to the preaching of the Word, as may be seen from the examples of Stephen and Philip. For a few years fol- lowing there appear to have been no other officers in the Church besides the apostles and deacons. The next phase of Church administration is that in which elders were appointed. As no specific account, is given of the mode of their first appointment, we are left to infer that it may have occurred as a natural designation of respect for seniority either among the deacons or the influential members of the Church, somewhat after the analogy of eldership among the Jews. Certain it is that as churches multiplied, the apostles recognised, pos- sibly appointed, and actually ordained elders who from the first had greater or less functions of government, and were also active agents of evangelization. Elders were known at Jerusalem about A.D. 41, or eight years after the Pentecost. A few years later they were or- dained generally in all the churches (Acts xiv, 23). In the council at Jerusalem they were associated with the apostles and brethren (xv, 4, 6, 23). The elders of the New Testament appear to have been evangelists, teach- ers, and pastors, and in a collective capacity to have or- dained ministers of different grades.