sure; and so it may safely be asserted, that in all formal* respects the Anglican See of Jerusalem has been as solemnly erected as any of our modern Bishoprics; and lastly, the authority which concurred to make Dr. Alexander a Bishop, made him a Bishop of the Church of England, and, by his suffragancy to the See of Canterbury, placed his Diocese for ecclesiastical purposes within the Metropolitical Province.

Now, if the above conclusion be correct, the maxim, “Extra territorium jus dicenti impunè non paretur," cannot, I think, hold in the case we are considering. Bishop Alexander's See is, I maintain, for ecclesiastical purposes, as much within the jurisdiction of Canterbury as any English or Colonial Bishopric; and whether the statute and common law relating to our Church can or cannot be held to bind out of the dominions of the Crown, the canons of a province, according to ecclesiastical jurisprudence, certainly have external authority in every suffragan diocese belonging to it; and, moreover, of these canons the Bishop is, in each case, the especial guardian. If, therefore, the clergy in Bishop Alexander's jurisdiction violate any of the rules of the Church, it will be his duty to correct them for the offence; and if he, or any one else in his position, is negligent in so doing, or violates them himself, resort may be had to the Archbishop of Canterbury's provincial authority in the same way as might be done in the case of an English suffragan.

That the difference of circumstances between Bishop Alexander's diocese and one situated in England will dispense with

* [It should be observed that my argument supposes the form in which this Bishopric has been erected to be that usually employed by the Church, without any reference to civil legislation as such.]

† Heylin evidently thought that the Bishop of London's jurisdiction over congregations abroad had a similar effect.-Vide Life of Laud, p. 260.

And this particularly in regard to Liturgical Conformity with the Provincial Church, unless there is ancient custom to the contrary.- See Lyndwood, pp. 102-104.

It will be remembered that I have all along relied, not upon the civil, but upon the ecclesiastical authority of the rubrics and canons which I have cited. Of course, when Parliament or the Common Law sanctions them, or any thing contained in them, they have additional force where Parliament or the Common Law have jurisdiction.

some portions of the Anglican canon law is, of course, evident, since (as in the case for instance of the beneficiary system), the subject-matter of the law may not exist. But the general principle of legislation for our colonies and for the Churches within them, supplies limits to this relaxation. The laws remain which local circumstances have not rendered inapplicable; the rest are dormant or dispensed with. But the Jerusalem diocese cannot be said to have any local circumstances, which relate to the terms of communion and ordination, which the dioceses in India and Australia have not likewise. And yet, I believe, that in no particulars respecting communion, and in only two respecting orders, (viz. the oath of allegiance where the candidates are foreign subjects, and the necessity of titles),* has our Church in any part of the world formally departed from the general law. In fact, as regards foreign Protestants, there can be no local circumstances which do not plead as strongly in favour of a relaxation of the canons and rubrics at home as at Jerusalem, for foreign Protestant communions have been tolerated, and have existed, in England, from the time of the Reformation downwards; and yet no one maintains that an English Bishop may set aside the laws of the Church in their favour: while, if it be urged, that they need civil protection at Jerusalem, the evident answer is, let civil means be employed for it, and let the Prussian Evangelical Church obtain for itself the same distinct toleration at Jerusalem which our laws allow it here.

These various arguments then, respecting the ecclesiastical position of Bishop Alexander, go to the entire destruction of the theory propounded in the Prussian document above referred to; and, moreover, suggest the means by which their own soundness may be tested, viz. by raising the question formally in the Ecclesiastical Court of Canterbury, or before the Archbishop in person. This, of course, may readily be done by any one who can procure evidence of an offence com樂 [This is erroneously stated. The Act 4 Geo. 4, c. 71, allows an exemption from all oaths and subscriptions to such persons, not being British subjects of or belonging to Great Britain or Ireland, as are ordained by the Bishop of Calcutta, "for the cure of souls within the limits of the said Dio

cese of Calcutta only." This provision, however, has no reference to communion with other religious bodies.]

mitted within the new diocese ; and if a formal decision should establish the views which I have suggested, then we may be at ease as to our Church being involved in this foreign scheme; for even if the party offending should not submit to the Court, or to its sentence, and the Turkish Government should decline to give effect to an English decree,* he might not the less really and publicly be cut off from and rejected by our Church.

And if, on the other hand, it should be determined in law that Bishop Alexander is not subject to the English Metropolitan, or governed in his Diocese by the constitution of the English Church; or if, before a legal decision can be obtained, it should be publicly proclaimed from authority in this country that such is the basis of the new Bishopric, then it will be at once evident that, whatever title may have been given to Bishop Alexander, he can in no real sense be deemed a Bishop of our Church, nor can his acts in any way implicate us, or affect our credit in the face of Christendom.† He must then be held to be an independent Bishop, not in connection with any Catholic body-a fragment struck off from the rock of the Church. Into the communion of such a Bishop no orthodox Churchman abroad will enter, no orthodox Clergyman will submit to his jurisdiction; his orders will not be re

* The Porte has lately deposed a Greek Patriarch at the request of our Government; surely it would not be less courteous in the case of an English Bishop.

[It must be remembered, that in thus speaking of Bishop Alexander's position, I assume the case, not only of his violating particular Canons, but of his denying the jurisdiction of the Metropolitan Court. As long as the Bishop at Jerusalem is under that Court, his violations of law may be restrained. If he should reject both the English Canons and the English jurisdiction, how can he remain an Anglican Bishop? And if not an Anglican Bishop, sent to Jerusalem for the purposes of the Anglican Communion, I for one can look upon him only as an intruder upon the eastern Bishops, and as such, not to be acknowledged by orthodox churchmen.]

I can arrive at no other conclusion respecting the coercive powers of the Act of Parliament enabling Bishop Alexander to exercise "spiritual jurisdiction" over English Clergy abroad, than that either they are inoperative, or must depend for their effect upon some portion of the theory which I have advanced. And as to the obligation in conscience, it is plain that, if Bishop Alexander can reject the Canons, the other clergy may, with much better grace, reject an Act of Parliament.

ceived in England;* the marriages and other rites solemnized by his Clergy will be open to serious doubts in our Ecclesiastical Courts: and that these things may not be hid from the world, it will (as I conceive) be the wisdom, if not the duty, of the sister Churches in England, Ireland, Scotland, the Colonies, and America, to proclaim at once and aloud their repudiation of a Prelate, who will have professed openly his design to reject the order of the Church which gave him mission, and whose title and privileges he assumes.

-

Here, then, we have at length arrived, by long perhaps and devious paths, at a point where two alternative conclusions are open to us, -one which excludes Prussian Protestants as a formal collective body from Bishop Alexander's communion at Jerusalem, another which cuts Bishop Alexander off from the unity of the Anglican Church. Under either conclusion, it seems to me that the position of the Church of England remains unaltered by the erection of this new Diocese, and that on this score we need feel no anxiety. That, if it should be necessary for the clergy and laity at home to declare, either individually or collectively, their renunciation of Bishop Alexander, such a course will be very painful, and may lead to much disorder, of course all must see; but it will be made easier by the consideration that, in so doing, we need not enter into any theological discussion of the character of this or that communion, or the truth of any doctrinal position whatsoever. The ground upon which we shall stand is that of the public order of the Church—that order which every Bishop amongst us enforces upon his clergy, every clergyman upon his flock-that order, a wilful departure from which by any Bishop or clergyman in the English Church is condemned by our Articles and Canons, and must, if tolerated, destroy the first principles of ecclesiastical unity.

* Section 4 of the Act (see Appendix II.) admits the orders conferred by Bishops consecrated under it, into England and Ireland, only "according to the provisions" of 3 & 4 Vict. c. 33; but the latter Act only allows clergy "canonically ordained; and if clergy are ordained at Jerusalem not according to the English Canons, can it be maintained that their orders will be Canonical? The Scotch and American Churches have their own Canons; Bishop Alexander has the English, or none.

And now the chief design of this letter is accomplished, and I will detain you only by a few more remarks, which spring naturally from my subject.

First, then, I hope that in the course of these remarks I have abstained from all unnecessary severity of language. That disagreeable facts, when plainly stated, must have a character of harshness, is of course evident; and in a case like this I am not disposed to sacrifice truth to courtesy ; but many feelings, both of duty and of private regard, make me anxious that those who are engaged in this project should not have occasion to charge me with intentional disrespect. The present state of the Church (would that it were not so!) often imposes upon private individuals a more prominent office than rightly belongs to them; but it absolves no one from discharging that office in a temperate and charitable spirit; and therefore, though the course of my studies may have put me in a position to offer my suggestions freely upon this measure, if I have failed, in the manner of doing so, by arrogance or haste, it becomes me, and I shall be ready, to ask pardon of those whom I have hurt.

And further, as regards the Foreign Communion, whose claim to equality with the Church of England has been so openly put forward, it will be observed that I have nowhere asserted any positive opinion of its religious character; nor have I said a single word which ought to be construed into a denial that the members of it ought, (if a legitimate manner could be found), to be admitted into communion with our Church. That we are within ourselves, at this moment, in so distracted a state, that it is not wise to enter unnecessarily into new and difficult schemes, such as may, rightly or wrongly, cause additional disunion at home, is an opinion which I may fairly entertain and I certainly do not shrink from saying that I had rather that our Church should wait the good providence of God within her present narrow limits, for centuries to come, than that she should gather in whole nations at the expense of even a single Catholic principle. But beyond this I neither affirm nor deny anything in this very difficult question.

Lastly, I would have you look cheerfully upon this Jeru