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tion, therefore, not of principle but of expediency-whether it would be advisable to apply to England the policy pursued in Syria, in Armenia, and in Russia: whether the disadvantages are such as to outweigh the advantages. I shall consider this point by-and-bye.

We are told that Uniat Churches have been failures. Roman Catholics, Sir, can scarcely regard that as a failure which has brought whole generations of Christians into the way of salvation. They can hardly regret a policy which has extended all the blessings of the Visible Church of God for periods of time varying from six to three centuries to large bodies of "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel." In a certain sense, indeed, some of these efforts after Unity have not been successful in the long run-notably so in the case of the Russian Unia. But in every case the collapse has been due to political rather than to religious causes. We, in England, are not likely to be similarly influenced. The State grants perfect freedom to all forms of religion but the Established. Its aim and object is to make that an Erastian and Latitudinarian body-a mere department of the State. Coercion is not likely to be brought to bear upon an English Unia; nor is the Church of England, under the manipulation of Lord Penzance and the Supreme Court of Appeal, likely to offer us any attractions to retrace our steps. I am, with respect, your faithful Servant, CHARLES WALKER.

Brighton.

Reviews and Notices of New Books. DELIVERY AND DEVELOPMENT OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. The Fifth Series of Cunningham Lectures. By Robert Rainy, D.D., Professor of Divinity and Church History, New College. Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark.

D

[SECOND AND CONCLUDING NOTICE.]

R. RAINY has steered clear of the shallow confusion so common among his co-religionists between dogmas and dogmatism. He perceives that doctrines or "determinations of what men are to hold true"-are involved in the very idea of revelation; and that as well, because theological, like all other knowledge, must be a science, of which systems and doctrines are the result, as from the duty of individual believers and of the Church towards divine revelation to ascertain what teaching is binding on us to receive. This implies, as he expresses it, putting the teaching into our own human words, which are the echo of the divine voice, not a mere rehearsing of the words of Scripture. And this function appertains peculiarly to the Church, although of course on Protestant principles she is "neither perfect nor infallible," but only "embodies on a larger scale the relation of the believing mind to Scripture," and her testimony is not the rule of faith. It is allowed, however, that her indirect influence gives to her teaching a sort of practical infallibility, for Christians are, in fact, trained in accordance with the prevalent belief, and receive with the Scriptures what the Church regards as the true interpretation of Scripture, to reject which altogether "is apostasy unless the Church herself is apostate." The extent of this Church teaching may grow from age to age, or may-at least conceivably-diminish; it may be multiplied or abridged. The dimunition we presume, would imply previous error, but we are cautioned against supposing that positively wrong and unscriptural views even on subordinate points can have prevailed throughout the Church. Dr. Rainy is most happy in dealing with those who -like Principal Tulloch, to judge from his able contributions to the Contemporary Review-deny all necessity for dogma. Such persons he very justly insists, if Christian believers, do really hold doctrines because it is impossible to get on without them; but the argument comes consistently from those only who, like the accomplished author of Literature and Dogma, are hostile to all positive belief whether in Christianity or in theism. Nor will it avail to urge the favourite distinction of objectors between doctrine and fact-on which, we may observe, Principal Tulloch bases the amazing paradox that the Apostles' Creed is not a dogmatic formularly at all. Doctrine and fact inevitably run into

one another :

Thus, that a certain Child was born at Bethlehem, grew to manhood, and performed such and such remarkable works, is fact: that He was the

Son of God (which no doubt is a fact) is also doctrine. That He died
upon a cross is fact; that that death was for our sins is doctrine.
We need hardly add that every fact asserted in the Apostles'
Creed is either directly or indirectly doctrine also.

Our readers will have seen already that Dr. Rainy adopts
the principle of doctrinal development, and one of his longest
lectures is especially devoted to the subject. He considers it
necessary à priori from the aspects of the case, and proved
à posteriori from the evidence of history, and follows Dr.
Newman in pointing to the illustration afforded by the con-
troversies about the divinity of Christ. From the first the
Church virtually and instinctively held truths which had not
been explicity developed; she had "a real position," which
was founded indeed on Scripture, but Scripture interpreted
and understood from her own point of view. The immediate
motive causes of the actual process he regards as arising from
the collision of the revealed faith with the mass of pre-existing
opinion in the world, and then from the impact of heresy
to which must be added at a later date the desire for a cohe-
rent system of doctrine, which chiefly influenced the School-
men. So far the author does not materially differ from
Catholic writers in their estimate of development; but a
fundamental difference is brought to light when he comes to
deal with the creeds which are the results of the process. He
has indeed, as must already have become evident, as little
sympathy as Mr. Leslie Stephen with that impossible fiction.
of the braiu-"an unsectarian," i.e. undogmatic, "Christi-
anity." But his assertion of the dogmatic principle is fatally
hampered by the attempt to concilitate it with the Protestant
principle of private judgment. And the chapter on the
Creeds, though it is one of the best written in the book, is
throughout a laboured balancing of the claims of two rival
systems, which can only land us in a self-contradiction at
last. The argument for the necessity of creeds is forcibly
stated, but clogged by concessions which the author does not
perceive to be fatal to its consistency, for disputers about
doctrine, one side or both, we are reminded, must be in the
wrong, and culpably in the wrong, and it seems to be allowed
that the decisions pronounced before the separation of East
and West were at least practically final; they were
"eccle-
siastically valid on the principles recognized by both parties
before the disputes arose." Still they were not infallible, and
there was no decision which could plausibly be called œcu-
menical on the disputes which led to the division of East and
West. Still less can the decisions of a Protestant Church
bind the conscience; yet such decisions there must be, for the
Church, as an organized society, must have a mind of her
own and express it, and that statement is a creed.
might have been desirable even apart from the existence of
errors and heresies, but, in presence of fundamental diversi-
ties of belief, it becomes indispensable, though the Congre-
gationalists may form an apparent exception; but then they
do not form an organized Church at all. The question is
within what limits the Church ought to impose her creeds,
seeing that they powerfully tend to bias men's judgments,
and yet may mislead them. The practical conclusion seems to
be that they must be imposed on the ministers of the Church,
but not on the laity, and these confessions may include points
which are not held to be fundamental, but give rise to great
practical perplexity, as is notoriously the case with many
points determined in the Reformed confessions. Of course
this Lesbian rule suggests the notion-widely held in a sort
of loose way in the present day-that Churches are mainly
"societies so arranged that particular phases or types of
Christian doctrine in which men are agreed may be cultivated,
each in its own ecclesiastical compartment." But Dr. Rainy
has too much discernment to accept a view which is at bottom
incompatible with the idea of divine revelation altogether, and
insists that no particular Church may proceed in its decisions
on any principles but those which apply to the universal
Church. Still after all "loyalty to God's supreme word "
requires that all creeds should be regarded as provisional only,
and without this reservation, which must not be a mere for-
mality, but must be honestly recognised and acted upon,
defence of creeds on Protestant principles becomes impossible."
As far as we can make out from the author's somewhat ambi-
guous language, his own feeling is strong against a revision of
creeds; but he feels bound, as a Protestant, to insist on the
duty of familiarising our minds with the topic, and to protest
against forming a habit of mind which would make the ideą

This

"the

of revision seem strange and monstrous. The inconsistency of his theory must be obvious to any one who looks at it ab extra, but we readily admit that the fault lies not with the author, but with the system. He argues with unanswerable force that Christian belief without creeds is impossible; and that creeds on Protestant principles cannot be more than provisional, because they may be partially at least erroneous. That he has failed from his own point of view to harmonise these conclusions need surprise nobody. What is stranger is that he hardly seems conscious of the contradiction. It may be said that the book is written from the Protestant standpoint, and that we have reviewed it from the Catholic. That is true; but the writer has expounded his own point of view with such remarkable clearness and quite exceptional candour, as to invite, and almost compel, such a method of criticism. His work is an able and elaborate attempt to place the World on the tortoise.

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A

kindness." As your Father which is in heaven. For He with a perfect love loves all men. Upon all He sheds the beams of His beneficence, advantage from any one, but out of pure love desires to communicate as it were a perennial sun of kindness, Who expects not to derive any His benefits to others, that thus He may contend with the wickedness and ingratitude of man; for few indeed are they who love Him, their benefactor, in return as they should do. The word as signifies likeness, not equality; for we cannot come up to the perfection of God, for that infinitely transcends all our perfection; but we ought to imitate it as far as we are able. (Pp. 243-5.)

The Gospels will be completed in five volumes; and we are promised other portions of the Bible, should the success of the present undertaking warrant the outlay necessary for a work of such labour and costliness. If the younger clergy would only procure and study such a volume as this, as a reliable aid in the preparation of sermons, themselves as well as their hearers would be truly blessed. We should much like to see a translation of Maldonatus by the same competent hand.

THE

THE PERSON AND WORK OF THE HOLY GHOST: a Doctrinal and Devotional Treatise. By the Rev. W. H. Hutchings, M.A., Sub-Warden of the House of Mercy, Clewer. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. London: Masters, 1876. THE spiritual famine which the unhappy controversies of the sixteenth century brought about, has in no respect caused greater starvation, and consequent feebleness, than in our doctrinal appreciation of, and devotional attitude towards, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. "The Person and Work of the Holy Ghost!" Was there room for any adequate recognition of His Eternal and Mysterious Being, or His Divine Action through the Sacraments of the Mystical Body of Christ, amidst the jarring controversies of Lutheran logicians and Calvinistic blasphemers which shook to its very foundations the Fact of Pentecost? The Divine guidance of that Body Corporate of which the Holy Spirit is the Life and informing Principle was boldly denied. Erastianism, as a necessary consequence, more or less took the place of Christianity, and men were, otherwise, practically thrown back upon their "inner consciousness" and the mere letterpress of an open-Bible" for their notions of Religion. Our Divines for the most part became mere controversialists ; fighting the rest of Christendom on the one hand, and homebred Dissent on the other. The Church and the Bible were divorced, and each in its turn was pulled to pieces. So, as a matter of course, almost all idea of the Holy Spirit, as a Divine Guide speaking through a definite organ, was ignored. And thus it happens that a return to anything like Catholic appreciation of the Person and Work of God the Holy Ghost must necessarily be based upon foundations which are certainly not ours as a National Communion, and which we can claim only in virtue of being an integral portion of a much more important institution-the Catholic Church. In other words, that learning and spiritual tradition which our sixteenth century innovators spurned and derided, Christian Divines of a less anti-Catholic mould, and of an age more experienced in Christian dogmatics, find it absolutely necessary to fall back upon and embrace.

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In this first instalment of the world-famed work of the great Latin Commentator, Mr. Mossman has given English readers an opportunity for estimating at its true value the above-mentioned Protestant conceit. The varied and solid learning; the intense theological acumen, combined with verbal exegesis of the most comprehensive and practical character; and last, but by no means least, the deep spiritual insight into the more remote and hidden sense of the Gospel Narrative-here displayed in thoroughly idiomatic English, which reads like an original composition rather than a translation-should serve, if anything could do so, to disabuse the Evangelical mind of the justice of the claim made for Divines of its school to be the ne plus ultra of commentators. We congratulate the translator on the result of his work. He has conferred a real boon upon English readers. Lapide's is a thoroughly practical exposition, and contains priceless materials adapted to the use not only of the Clergy and Catechists, but which will also be found highly beneficial, as matter for spiritual reading and meditation, by members of our religious communities, on the one hand, and by men and women living in the world, on the other. We can assure those of our readers who do not know A Lapide that it is no exaggeration to say that one page yields more real knowledge of Scripture than chapters of the often merely inane speculation of the "great Mathew Henrys, the Scotts, the D'Oyleys, or the Mants. In A Lapide, as in Maldo- The materials which Mr. Hutchings bas laid under contrinatus, Estius, and Piconio, there is a realism and evident bution in the preparation of the admirable work under notice faith in Holy Writ which is very refreshing after the word--which we heartily commend to all who wish to become splitting platitudes of Protestantism, and the shallow comments stolen mainly from Germany-of Broad Church

writers.

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The following, taken almost at random, will be acceptable on its own account, and serves to show the grace and flow of this excellent translation :

Be ye therefore perfect. The emphasis here is upon the word ye. Because ye are separated from the heathen, and chosen of God, that ye should be His faithful ones, His friends, His sons, and heirs, therefore imitate the holiness and perfection of your Heavenly Father. Moreover, this perfection mainly consists in charity and love, especially of our enemies. For this is the perfection of life, since the perfection of the country consists in the vision and fruition of God. Christ here tacitly intimates that the way of attaining perfection and eminent sanctity is for any one to exercise himself in love of his enemics, both because this is the highest and most difficult act of charity, as because it is the greatest victory over ourselves. For he who does this generously vanquishes anger, revenge, and the other passions of the soul; and God requites his charity with far more abundant gifts of Grace. So that Holy Virgin mentioned by D. Tauler, when asked how she had attained to so great sanctity, replied, "I have ever loved with a special love any who have been troublesome to me; and to any one who has njured me I have always endeavoured to show some special mark of

acquainted with the riches of Catholic Doctrine concerning
the Third Person of the Godhead: His Work in the Church
and through the Sacraments; and His Work and Presence in
the individual soul,-is one of the most substantial proofs we
could have of the justice of the foregoing remarks.
words of our author :-

In the

As the field of Patristic, Med æval, and Modern Divinity on the Doctrine of the Holy Ghost is rather an extensive one, it is difficult to say to what authors the following pages are most indebted; perhaps amongst the first St. Basil and St. Didymus; amongst the second St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Bonaventura; and amongst the last, Bull and Burton, Gaume, Lallemant, and Saint-Jure, may be named.

Now if we except Bishop Bull and Dr. Burton, the author is not indebted to Anglican sources for the doctrine of his treatise. And as all the world knows, the writings of Bull and Burton are simply replete with the tradition of "unreformed" Christianity-for they give us little or nothing of an original character. But the mention of a spiritual writer like Père Lallemant at once reminds us that although we in England were standing still, or rather going backwards like crabs, during the eighteenth century, other parts of God's

Family were not. The Church of France and Italy was educating men of the deepest Christian instincts, whose knowledge of God was so real and profound that it permeated their whole being, and appears to have been little less than the result of inspiration.

But although Mr. Hutchings has, perforce, drawn upon the treasuries of Roman Theology, his work is extremely original in character and mode of treatment-there is not a page which is not full of very beautiful and striking passages in which doctrine is presented in a most attractive and devotional aspect; but space compels us to forego the pleasure which

quotation would afford us. We must, however, draw attention to a learned and most pertinent Note on the subject of the Filioque, of which the author is a strenuous but judicious defender. It will be found at page 215, as an appendix to certain remarks at page 33. His defence of the Double Procession forms an admirable supplement to our own recent remarks on the Report of the Bonn Conference.

It

In taking leave of Mr. Hutchings we heartily thank him for his thoroughly Catholic and most valuable addition to our stock of popular English Catholic Theology, which cannot fail to raise the tone of Christian Teaching amongst us. is an adaptation of Lectures originally delivered in All Saints', Margaret-street, in the Lent of 1868. There are some appreciative passages at pages 20, 56, 79 and 92, upon the person, faith and sanctification of our Blessed Lady, which we regret the author has not indexed, but which we especially commend to the devout consideration of the reader who accepts frankly and devoutly all the consequences of the

Incarnation.

AN "Oration" by Father Ignatius, The Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, published at 38, Hart-street, W.C., for sixpence, being vigorous, eloquent, and theological, was no doubt very effective when spoken. Our readers may judge of this by the following forcible and inspiriting passage. After his hearers had sung the Pange lingua, the Rev. Father proceeded thus:

Now, my young brethren-for I am speaking now chiefly to the younger part of my congregation who have professed their faith in the presence of Christ in the Holy Sacrament-you believe this because Jesus Christ has asserted it. The next reason you believe this mystery is because the whole of Christendom-I speak in round numbers-the whole of Christendom has always adored Jesus Christ in this mystery. Next you believe this because you are firmly convinced it would be impossible for Jesus Christ to allow so vast a deception as the adoration of a piece of bread to spring up from His Own unexplained words. You believe that to deny the Real Presence would be, first of all, to deny Christ's own expressed statement. Next it would be to deny that which Christendom teaches as the truth upon this point. Thirdly, to deny the doctrine of the Real Presence would be to assert that Christendom is the vastest system of idolatry that ever existed, and you believe that to deny the Real Presence would be to declare our Divine Lord and Saviour to be an impostor. He knew that His whole Church would adore That Bread as His Own Body, and although He knew it He let them do it. To deny the Real Presence would be to accuse the Saviour of this horrible cruel deception. Therefore, I say, we believe devoutly and firmly what the Church of England Catechism has taught us from our babyhood to believe, that that Host is verily and indeed the Body of Christ, and if any word in the English language has any meaning that word "verily and indeed" has. Then what are you to do, believing this. The laity have their duty, the clergy have their duty. How can the laity show their faith? Be more than ever particular in showing your adoration in your churches. The very instant the words of Consecration have been pronounced let everybody know that you believe that Jesus Christ spoke the truth, and bow down in belief at His words, "This is My Body." What shall the clergy do? Perchance they will have to go to prison; perchance they will have to say, sooner than celebrate the Holy Sacrament of Christ's dying love without those accompaniments which the Christian religion has ordained, and which the Church of England commands, that they will not celebrate It at all. They believe that they are acting within the law, and in obedience to the law; but they are accused of acting contrary to the law, so sooner than celebrate the Divine Mysteries without the accustomed ritual, reverence, and faith, we wont celebrate them at all; and we will wait in faith till God Almighty delivers us from the persecution. What will be the consequence? Would the laity of the Church of England be content to find their Altars bare and stripped, and find the daily Sacrifice that Malachi foretold abolished in their churches? What authority is it--what authority is it that has stripped the Altars-what authority has prohibited the Adoration of our Lord? It is the civil authority. The final judge in the matter and the Act that empowers the judge are new machinery. Is it derived from Jesus Christ or Cæsar? If it was the English Church in Convocation that had declared these things we should be obliged then seriously to ask whether we must not leave the Church. But, no, what are the Church of England's views? Why, if Convocation speaks at all-timidly it must speak by reason of the hubbub around its doors-it speaks in timid tones perhaps in voices very subdued perhaps-but we need not fear that the Convocation of our Church will ever be permitted to say that

Christ lied when He said "This is My Body." We never need fear that the Convocation of our National Church will refuse to her Priests permission to celebrate the Divine Mysteries as Christian ministers always have celebrated them. Wait till the tyranny is overpast, wait faithfully till the storm beating against our wall is lulled cling to that Shepherd Whom you call your own, and remember He has promised you shall not want. And I may promise you this in His Own Adorable Name: that if you will suffer and endure, be bold and brave, priests and laymen, in enflamed, and increased, and you shall prove to the rest of Christendom the preservation of your faith, your own love to Jesus shall be kindled, that there is the Divine Presence of Christ on England's Altars. Pp. 26-28.

CONTI

across

The

ONTROVERSY is little to our taste, more especially when charity is apparently absent. A letter just published, entitled Cardinal Manning and History (London: Pickering), is one of the most singular productions we have come for some time, and certainly will not advance the cause or hopes of its authors-two Priests of the Diocese of Manchester. Where they learnt their logical method, or where they obtained some of their facts, we have no conception. Cardinal is reported to have asserted that an appeal to History against the living Voice of the Roman Catholic Church is a treason a proposition neither unreasonable nor startling. For, to take a parallel: supposing a person condemned last week by the Court of Queen's Bench in a legal cause, were to appeal to the laws of Egbert, or the authority of some Court existing in the reign of Henry III., he would be laughed at as a lunatic or shut up as a madman. While as to the Cardinal's assertion regarding Bede and Roman Catholics, our authors have certainly bungled and stumbled most ably. Of that venerable and saintly personage they modestly remark Passing away from this incredible story, we come upon another more outrageous to common-sense and religion" (p. 15), Bede tell in favour of the Cardinal and against themselves. while almost all their arguments drawn from the Venerable they explicitly paraphrase what the Cardinal asserted-"The In fact they admit as much themselves on page xii., where

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Roman Church of to-day teaches the same doctrine as the Church of the Venerable Bede." Sic cudit quæstio. Controversialists who are gymnastic in their mental operations, and who evidently live in a fog, obviously are no safe guides either as to faith or morals. We are surprised to find Mr. Pickering's name attached to this very worthless production.

WE

E have a volume before us, evidently the work of an amateur, without very great experience, but owning certain ability and some promise. So Sinks the Day-Star (London: S. Tinsley) by Mr. J. Keith, is a novelette, in which the story is slender, the incidents not without interest, and the writing sharp and oftentimes interesting. Had the plot (which we shall not reveal,) been a little more elaborated, and the incidents more carefully worked out, it would have owned greater merit than it possesses. As it is, promise rather than performance is evidenced throughout. author manifestly owns dormant abilities, which literary study and careful culture might one day efficiently serve to bring out. In his book he has scarcely done himself justice.

THE BISHOP OF LONDON AND THE VICAR OF ST. VEDAST'S, CITY.

The

We have been requested to publish the following correspondence:6, Ladbroke-gardens, W. My Lord,-In the private interview on Maundy Thursday with which I was favoured by your Lordship, I expressed my willingness and desire to obey your Lordship to the utmost limit of my conscience. I had hoped, therefore, to have had, even after the interview, some expression of your wishes more definite than the direction to obey the law as contained in the Purchas Judgment, with which you then favoured me. I would have either complied or else asked permission to state the reasons which compelled me to decline to do so. I trust you will allow me to do this now, although I cannot hope that such a statement will have any other effect than to absolve me from the charge of any wilful disrespect to my Bishop.

My difficulty then is this:-I am instructed by the Twentieth Article "that the Church," by which, of course, I understand the Church Catholic, for the word is without any limitation which might restrict it to the National Church, "hath power to decree rites and ceremonies and authority in controversies of faith." Yet it appears that by the authority of a secular court, which, as far as I see, will not even consider the question what the Church Catholic has decreed or practised, certain ceremonies are condemned as illegal. These ceremonies have, it appears, the sanction of all Christendom, were practised in the most primitive antiquity, some of them, the unleavened bread, and very probably the mixed cup, are sanctioned by the acts of our Blessed Lord Himself. It seems to me, therefore, that to render obedience to such prohibitions is treason to the teaching of the Catholic

Church. The Church clearly has determined the controversy between the Catholic and puritanizing parties; the lawfulness or unlawfulness, the expediency or inexpediency, of such observances, and decided them emphatically in favour of the former. To give them up because a secular court has in an undefended case, and reversing a far more learned decision of an inferior court, decided against them is an outrage against that fundamental principle of our Church, her appeal to Catholic antiquity, which every true son is, cost what it may, bound utterly to resist. Why not on the same principle give up, as has been proposed, the symbolic act of laying on of hands in conferring Holy Orders, or deny to laity or clergy, or both, the sacred chalice itself?

But I cannot consider the real matter in dispute a matter of rites and ceremonies only; it also involves doctrine, and that doctrine is this, viz., the necessity of the Eucharist to the believing soul. You are aware that the three delating parishioners are none of them communicants in their parish church; one of them to my knowledge is not a communicant at all. Now, my Lord, this is an old grievance, and one which dates back in our case at St. Vedast to time far anterior to our present Church controversies.

It seems to me simply monstrous, under any circumstances, to allow a voice in the regulation of services to those who habitually take no part in them; but when these persons are by their own act excommunicate, what are we to say then? I only know that it is an injustice which no other religious body, except the Church of England, permits at all. It was forced upon a reluctant aud remonstrating Church by an omnipotent (1) Parliament legislating in the weakness of a panic. Yet a true son of the Church is to be called disloyal because he protests and resists!

But bad as this is it is not all; there is something still deeper, and to my mind more pressing. This implied recognition on the part of the Establishment of the claim to be Churchmen without being communicants, leads those who are so to imagine that they may do that with impunity, which our Church tells them they cannot do without peril to their souls-live in habitual neglect of the Blessed Eucharist. I for my part will never so act as to promote such a soul-destroying delusion. It would be treason against the life of those for whom Christ died. To me it seems that the whole of the faithful, clergy as well as laity, should protest against such an error. It is because I perceive that a return to the ancient ritual does, as a matter of fact, set forth very plainly to those who can with difficulty be reached by other mears the value and importance of sacramental grace, that I so earnestly desire its restoration amongst us. It teaches both the eye and the ear in a manner which the most unlearned and careless cannot mistake, the great benefit of worthy, and the equally great and awful danger of unworthy, participation, and surely still greater danger of habitual neglect.

I must also point out to your Lordship that in my own special case this celation comes from those with whom I am at issue as to the expenditure of Church trust funds. It is no secret in the City, and, I believe, out of it, that the management of the large church fund there is in a very unsatisfactory state. Anyone who attempts to do his duty as a trustee (and it has come to my knowledge that the clergy have very pressing responsibilities) must incur considerable cdium. I have simply asked, as yet in vain, to see the trust accounts. I am advised that unless I enforce their production I may, perhaps, be myself guilty of a dereliction of duty. Now, I venture to think that there was here a strong case for a stay of proceedings, at any rate, for a time (and you will remember I asked for no more), under the special circumstance. It could hardly have escaped the sagacity of our legislators that interested representation were possible in some parishes, and I presume that the power of the Bishop to quash proceedings was given him to prevent an abuse which was very likely to occur. I mention these facts because I wish to put in the strongest light I am able what is likely to be the real character of proceedings under the Public Worship Regulation Act. If to stay these is out of your Lordship's power, you will perceive that you may expect ere long that so-called Ritualists will not be the only persons amenable to its provisions.

Your Lordship will permit me to observe that a City incumbent of a deserted City church is not exactly the person who might be expected to be the first in this great diocese to be proceeded against under the Act. If it were a case of a single individual guilty of disobedience to a well-ascertained law, the matter would be very different. But it is not so. The real question, as everybody knows, is not whether the Rector of St. Vedast shall be made to conform to the Purchas Judgment, but whether this Judgment shall be enjoined over the whole diocese before it is finally argued. Thus I am placed in this very painful position. I am unable to consider whether, for the sake of peace and as an act of obedience, I may not abandon my work amongst the young people of the City, but am compelled to resist, lest I should so act as to precipitate the solution of the present controversy by setting the example of surrender to that Erastianizing Judgment, which is not even yet the law of the State, and I trust never will be. I cannot tell you the pain it gives me to write thus. Should matters come to extremity, which God avert, to me it means loss of all. I am too old to begin life again, and the little learning you spoke of so flatteringly is not likely to afford more than the barest subsistence, if it do even that. But only one honest course is open to me, that is (if it must be so) to submit to be ejected from my benefice and position; no State court can take away my priesthood. I must obey the law, indeed, and shall, God helping me, do so; but it must, in this case, be the law of the Church, not of the State, the Divine in preference to the Human. If I have erred in the estimate of my duty, I err with a clear conscience. I say, then, with the Prophet, in all humility, "O Lord Thou hast deceived me, and I am deceived." I reserve to myself the right to publish this letter, with your Lordship's answer, should you favour me with one.-I have the honour to remain, your Lordship's faithful and obedient servant.

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therefore apparently unsympathizing reply. But as it would be obviously unbecoming to enter into a public correspor dence on a matter which is on its way to a judicial investigation, I can only assure you again of the great pain with which I have been compelled by your own decision, which, however conscientious, I must hold entirely mistaken, to allow the law to take its course.-Believe me to be, my dear Sir, very faithfully yours, J. LONDON. Mr. T. Pelham Dale.

Endications of Current Opinion.

“We all like to see what the World says; though, perhaps, the World's sayings would not be so highly regarded, did we know who guided the pen and registered the opinion."-COLERIDGE.

THE EDUCATION POLICY OF THE TORIES.
(From the John Bull, May 27.)

A change of ministers implies a change of policy. Much of the educational policy of Mr. Gladstone's Ministry was intensely distasteful to the country, and the country had a right to expect a reversal of that policy when it gave its confidence to the Ministry of Mr. Disraeli. These words are wrung from us more in sorrow than in anger; and even yet we entertain the hope that the Government will not only accept but welcome such amendments in their Bill as will render it more acceptable to many of their most earnest supporters. What did those supporters look for? They expected some relief from the exactions and oppressions of School Boards. They expected to be excused from the duty of paying twice over for the education of their poorer neighbours. They expected that some substantial attempt would have been made to enable voluntary schools to wage a more equal contest with Board Schools. They expected that some greater obstacles would have been placed against the transfer of voluntary schools to School Boards. Many of them hoped that means would have been provided for the dissolution as well as for the formation of School Boards. All these expectations, and many more, have been disappointed by the Bill. The powers of School Boards will not be curtailed. Their number may go on multiplying. Their expenditure may continue to be as lavish as ever. They may still compel the supporters of a voluntary school to pay a heavy rate towards the maintenance of a Board School, which possibly is not really required at all. They will still be at liberty to exclude the Bible from their schools whenever they wish. The last point is one that will be sure to challenge attention in this country; for nothing is now plainer than that the vast majority of the people of England desire religious instruction to be given to the scholars in public elementary schools. The Legislature may fairly be asked to give effect to this general wish. It ought to be no longer possible for any School Board to deprive little children of the opportunity of learning their duty to God in the day schools. At this moment there are in the Board Schools of Birmingham not less than 7,000 children, who receive from their ordinary teachers no hint about the existence of God, of heaven, or of hell. It seems to us that Parliament would be only doing its duty, if it were now to step forward, and take away from School Boards the dangerous privilege of excluding Scriptural instruction from their schools. They ought no longer to possess such a power. In the course of his speech Lord Sandon admitted that poor schools suffer an injustice under the regulations of the law at present in force. One of these regulations requires that a school shall raise from the locality in subscriptions, rates, and fees a sum at least equal to the amount of the Grant claimed from the public purse. Flourishing schools have no difficulty in meeting this requirement. Struggling schools in poor parishes, both in town and country, cannot meet it. Their grants are consequently cut down without remorse.

ECCLESIASTICAL LAW CASES.-The appeal in the Folkestone Ritual case has been ordered to stand over till next November.-Judgment was given on Wednesday in last week in the case of Shaw v. Thompson and others as to the legality of the election of a Vicar for Clerkenwell. ViceChancellor Bacon confirmed the election of the Rev. J. Rose, who had obtained a large number of votes over his opponent.-The ex-Judge of the Divorce Court has granted a monition to the Rev. J. S. Marriner against the Bishop of Bath and Wells to compel that Prelate to institute him to the living of Marston Magna, to which, being patron, Mr. Marriner had presented himself.-The long pending dispute between the Vicar of Yeovil and the parish organist, has at length come to an end, both parties having placed themselves in the hands of a committee nominated in vestry. A proposal from the organist to resume his duty and to continue it until Easter next, and then to tender his resignation, has been approved, and the necessity for further legal appeals is obviated.

THE CULTIVATION OF CHURCH MUSIC.-A festival service was held in Westminster Abbey on Thursday evening, in aid of the Trinity College (London), which was established in 1872, with a view to improving Church music. The curiculum of the institution includes, besides lectures on the particular branch of the art for which it was founded, classics, mathematics, modern languages, and English composition. Periodical examinations are held, and the successful candidates are awarded diplomas and prizes, which are a guarantee of their fitness for the position of choir master at devotional services. An effort is being made to collect sufficient money for the erection of a suitable building, and any persons who may be interested in the scheme are invited to communicate with the warden, Mr. H. G. B. Hunt, 4, Garden-court, Middle Temple, E.C. At the service the choristers, selected from various churches in the metropolis, numbered about 200, and were under the direction of Mr. E. H. Turpin. The Rev. S. Flood Jones intoned the Prayers, and Bishop Claughton preached the Sermon.

NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS.

H. H. P.-A. H. W.-W. R. C.-W. F. W.-R. S.-W. P. G.-C. C. C.-F. G. L. -Aliquis-De C.-P. A. B-Q. D.-C. D. R.-K. B. S.-G. R. J.-C. P. R.-Archdeacon F.-W. W. B-A. B. E.-Honiton Churchwarden-R. W.-BathoniensisP. C.-A Working Man.-Presbyter (Bath)-No Bishop can revise any of Lord Penzance's judgments. He is bound to accept them whether he likes them or not. A Woolwich Man.-We object to those kind of tactics, because they are obviously illusory and dishonest; in the long run deceive nobody; and are speedily found out.

J. M. C.-Pray heartily by all means: you could not possibly do anything better, and we are most grateful to you.

M. C. W.-(1.) We can understand a person "leaving the Church of his baptism:" but we cannot understand a man leaving the Church of his choice. (2.) Dr. Faber is buried at Sydenham.

C.-We don't wonder that our contemporary has refused your proposed contributions. We, however, decline to be its scavenger. Such an office would neither bring credit nor dignity.

As a rule, we must decline to insert both personal attacks of every sort and kind, and anonymous letters. If people want to ventilate their opinions (and a newspaper is certainly a proper vehicle for such action,) they must be good enough to sign their names to communications forwarded.

We beg our correspondents and supporters to address all Letters relating to the literary portion of this paper to "The Editor of THE PILOT, 376, Strand, London, W.C.;" and all communications regarding the sale and advertising, to Mr. J. H. BATTY, Publisher, at the same address.

"Has not all our misery, as a Church, arisen from people being afraid to
look difficulties in the face? They have palliated acts, when they
should have denounced them
And what is the consequence?
That our Church has through centuries ever been sinking lower and
lower, till good part of its pretensions is a mere sham; though it be a
duty to make the best of what we have received."-P. 274-" HISTORY

OF MY RELIGIOUS OPINIONS." BY VERY REV. J. H. NEWMAN, D.D.

THE

T

PILOT.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 1876.

Published on Every Alternate Wednesday.

Fortnightly Notes.

HE most remarkable, if not the most distinguished, Knight of the Garter, the Sultan Abdul Aziz has been quietly and peaceably dethroned in favour of his nephew. At the same time England has stepped forward with a definite policy, to the astonishment of some of the European Courts. She has, morcover, backed up her position in other than a diplomatic mode-and few can doubt what her meaning is. Our Indian Empire can never be left out of arising from the state of the Sick Man. May the Cross consideration in dealing with the perplexing complications triumph over the Crescent! The ex-Sultan is reported to stand in danger either of a rope or poison. We had written the above before the news arrived that the ex-Sultan was dead. The official report states that he committed suicide by opening one of his veins with a pair of scissors he had secreted on him. Another, and a more likely report, is that he was found dead in his bed with a dagger thrust through his heart, evidently not his own act.

heretics also those who aimed at the foundations of Christianity. Religious indifference was never tolerated, and even now the neglect of divine service, blasphemy, and breaking the Sabbath Day, meet with punishment. Every one knows, moreover, how jealously England has preserved her own. ecclesiastical hierarchy, maintaining it in honour, and calling it also to form part of one of the great bodies of the State. Thus the English is a highly religious nation, and, as far as the Reformation permits, a Christian nation."

Of course, the only result of the mischievous Education Act

-the evil effects of which the present Government does not appear to realize, and, therefore, does not aim at recovering can be to demoralize and ruin the country. Such an opinion may be put down to us as that of a prophet of evil,"- -as we have been foolishly termed by a shallow contemporary, but when the Guardian, allowing Mr. Kingsmill, of Bredicott, to analyze the Parliamentary Returns, can print the following, we may all see how speedily demoralization and religious disintegration are advancing:"It is a most significant fact that under seven Boards only (two included in the Church Catechism), out of 724,—that is, barely one per cent.,-is the Apostles' Creed set forth as being used. School Boards, therefore, are all but unanimous in the interpretation that it is a 'Religious formulary, distinctive of a particular denomination,' forbidden to 'be taught' under 14, (2) of the Education Act. Three Boards in the above use the Creed, Lord's Prayer, and Ten Commandments." If this be so now-if Christian formularies are retained only in one per cent. of the Board Schoolswhat will be their position ten years hence as regards Christianity; and, still further--what will be the moral and religious character of the scholars?

A BILL for the Disestablishment of the National Church
Liberation Society and will soon be made public. Some of
has, we are informed, been carefully drafted by the
the supporters of that organization counsel delay: others, and
they are in the majority, are for immediate action. The Bill
may not be forthcoming this Session, but next Spring it is
certain to see the light; and its support will be made the test-
Added to this, we may
question at every coming election.
entitled "Disestablishment; or, a Defence of the Principle of a
note the publication by Messrs. Macmillan of a very able and
remarkable book from the pen of Mr. George Harwood,
National Church." This defence, with a commercial flavour
backbone. We shall shortly review it.
about it, is clever, plausible and adroit, but Erastian to the
In the meantime, we
point out to our Catholic readers, what is so obvious to the
more thoughtful amongst us-viz., that the only possible
defence of the Established Church which can be made in the
future, is a defence based on the Erastian principle. The
old Catholic standing-point is absolutely and totally gone.
The Bishops have sacrificed it. Since the advent of Lord
the Church of England on the old lines is rendered quite out
Penzance, a consistent intellectual defence of the status of
of the question. The only sound policy is to prepare wisely
and at once for the coming change.

E are glad to be able to transcribe from the Osservatore WE Romano-the official organ of the Holy Father-the generous and faithful testimony to the general character of England quoted below. If those few earnest and influential authorities at Rome, who are impressed with the need of Corporate Re-union, would only take note of the present unparalleled position of affairs amongst High Anglicans-aHE young Oxford gentleman-a man of mark-whom position of perplexity threatening a complete dead-lock and certain disruption-and make some kind of concessionseven more seeming than real-England might be deeply blessed and the legitimate spiritual influence of the Holy See largely extended. Better far for any Christian to have Pope Pius for our chief than "Pope Penzance:" for the antiquity of this latest lay-Patriarch only dates from the year before last. Of course the Tudor notion of a personal Royal Supremacy has gone to the dogs years ago. The following are the words of the newspaper referred to:-" England is religious, and her intimate union with religion has preserved for her the blessings of peace and prosperity. Separated from the Church and from the Vicar of Christ, she has, however, retained all the remainder of Christianity, and above all, the Ten Commandments. England is not to be looked upon as having only persecuted the Catholics: she persecuted the

Lord Salisbury has just raised to the Bishoprick of Bombay, having used language with regard to the obedience he expects from his Clergy, has been most righteously taken to task for it by Mr. J. H. Blunt in the pages of the Guardian. Dr. Mylne tells the public that each parson under him will "have to regard his Bishop as his spiritual leader, whose voice is directing his work, is to him as the Voice of God"—a statement which, to say the least, is at once modest and perplexing. A principle laid down for an Anglican Clergyman at Bombay is, we presume, equally good for an English parson at home. Now, what person outside of Bedlam would maintain for example that Dr. Tait's dicta concerning the Athanasian Creed, Dr. Temple's "views" regarding Inspiration and the Apostolical Succession, or Dr. Baring's misbelief concerning the Sacraments, were "the voice of God"? Until our Bishops-juvenile as well as

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