FRQM-THE- LIBRARY-OF
TRINITYCOLLEGETORDNTO
WORKS BY CHARLES WORDSWORTH, D.D.
Late Bishop of St. Andrews.
ANNALS OF MY EAKLY LIFE, 1806-1846. 8vo. 15s.
ANNALS OF MY LIFE, 1847-1856. 8vo. 10s. Qd.
PRIMARY WITNESS TO THE TKUTH OF THE
GOSPEL : a Series of Discourses. Also a Charge on Modern Teach
ing on the Canon of the Old Testament. Crown 8vo. 7s. Gd.
CATECHESIS : or, Christian Instruction preparatory to Con
firmation and First Communion. Fifth Edition. Small 8vo. 25.
LONGMANS, GREEN, & CO., 39 Paternoster Row, London
New York and Bombay.
THE EPISCOPATE
OF
CHAELES WORDSWOETH
\
THE EPISCOPATE
OF
CHARLES WORDSWORTH
BISHOP OF ST ANDREWS, DUNKELD, AND DUNBLANE
1853-1892
A MEMOIR
TOGETHER WITH SOME MATERIALS FOR
FORMING A JUDGMENT ON THE GREAT QUESTIONS IN THE
DISCUSSION OF WHICH HE WAS CONCERNED
BY
JOHN WOEDSWOETH, D.D.
BISHOP OF SALISBURY
WITH PORTRAITS
LONGMANS, GBEEN, AND CO.
39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
NEW YORK AND BOMBAY
1899
All rights reserved
100194
APR 28 1977
PREFACE
CHARACTER AND DESCRIPTION OF THE MATERIALS.
I HA.VE undertaken to sketch the Episcopate of Bishop
Charles Wordsworth, my father's elder brother, which
extended over nearly forty years from his consecration
on St. Paul's Day, 25 January, 1853, to his death 5
December, 1892. I am conscious of many deficiencies in
undertaking this serious task, and especially the absence
of anything like continuous familiarity with the country in
and for which he had worked so long. But the sympathy
which comes from close relationship, kindred duties, and
common aims, and from a genuine but, I believe, un
biassed admiration of his character, may be pleaded as my
justification in doing so. The request to undertake this
duty came to me, shortly after my uncle's death, from his
two sons, Kobert Walter and William Barter Wordsworth,
who were appointed by him executors of his will, and who
confided to my care all the papers necessary for its full
completion. I have tried their patience in its fulfilment,
but their patience has been as generous as their confidence.
They and their sisters have also given me much real help
in collecting material, and in revising the proofs of this
volume.
Those who read these pages will probably, in most
cases, be already familiar with the two volumes of ' Auto-
vi EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
biographical Annals,' which proceeded from his own pen ;
one published during his lifetime, the other in the spring
that followed his death. The second of these volumes
edited by a Fifeshire man of letters, Mr. W. Earl Hodgson,
with whom the Bishop had made friends in the later years
of his life covered the period from 1847 to 1856, and
thus embraced the first three years of his episcopate. But
I have thought.it desirable to include those years also in
this volume in order to give unity to it, and to enable it to
take an independent position in the world of books. My
method naturally omits certain details which would have
place in an autobiography, and attempts something more
of an exterior judgment on the character and issues of the
Bishop's public acts. Indeed, I have thought it wise to
summarise, very briefly, the events of all the preceding
years for the benefit of those readers who might not have
the ' Annals ' at hand, and thus to prefix the most
necessary and fundamental facts of his biography to the
most important part of it.
In writing this sketch of his episcopate I have had the
advantage of his own careful preparation. This preparation
included a skeleton of three chapter headings, certain
paragraphs specially written, and references to other
paragraphs contained in five small oblong note-books, in
which he jotted down his views on different topics as they
occurred to him. 1 Some of these paragraphs are rough
and incomplete, some of them written and re-written in
several forms, while all would clearly have been subjected
to his own revision. I have, therefore, not thought it
necessary in all cases to reproduce them word for word,
but where I have done so I have distinguished them by
printing them, like the letters or extracts from books and
letters, in smaller type. In addition to these there is a
1 These are cited, as by himself, as MS. i.-v.
PREFACE Vll
nearly complete series of small S.P.C.K. almanacks with
notes of engagements and occasionally a few more interest
ing memoranda. There is also a larger note-book l con
taining only a few pages of material, but what there is is
important. It is a sort of index to the five note-books,
under paragraph headings.
His correspondence was carefully separated by himself
chiefly into years and partly also into subjects, but it
unfortunately does not contain so many of his own letters
as could be wished. For the latter I have had to depend
upon the affection and courtesy of friends who have been
good enough to send them to his sister-in-law and intimate
friend, Miss Mary Barter, whose beautiful penmanship,
unwearying labour, and keen intelligence were constantly
at his disposal throughout his life, and who has aided and
encouraged me during the years in which this task has
been in my hands. Her death, after a long and painful
illness, between its completion and the publication of
this volume, has been the removal of a bright example
from our midst. For such material I have specially to
thank the late Earl of Selborne, 2 Dean Boyle, Archdeacon
Aglen, Canon George Venables, the late Professor Milligan,
Dean J. S. Wilson of Edinburgh, Eevs. W. Tuckwell and
W. M. Meredith, and Messrs. John A. Spens and W. Earl
Hodgson. I have also some specially interesting notes of
his later years from Canon G. T. Farquhar, and generous
assistance from other clergy of the diocese such as Eev.
J. W. Hunter of Birnam, Canon Douglas of Kirriemuir,
and Dean Eorison, and from kind neighbours like Mrs.
1 Lettered VIBGIL, vol. ii. I have cited it as Note-book.
2 I have a letter from him to my cousin, B. W. Wordsworth, dated
' Gledstone, Shipton-in-Craven, 8 November, 1893,' giving permission for the
use of his Recollections. He also kindly sent a number of letters to Miss
M. Barter for my use. The present Earl has also kindly sanctioned the
use of the letter quoted on p. 195-6.
viii EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Smythe of Methven, and Lord Hollo, and many friends at
St. Andrews, especially Professor Knight ; also from Pro
vost Ball of Cumbrae. If I have not, in many cases, quoted
their material at length, I have had it all in mind.
But, after all, the chief materials are to be found in the
Bishop's printed writings, which are very numerous and
full of varied interest, although he left no great monu
mental work.
I have before me a list of some forty Charges and
Synodal Addresses drawn up by himself in 1891, all of
them . delivered in person, and all, except one or two,
printed in some form. I do not reprint the list here,
as the contents practically form part of Appendix VII.,
pp. 366-385 ; but it is an extraordinary record of diligent
performance of duty. Every one of the papers attains a
high standard of literary excellence, and, considering how
persistently he pursued certain subjects, there is great
variety in their treatment.
The greater part of these Charges, with other printed
documents, he caused to be bound up into eight volumes in
dark cloth. The first is a 4to, lettered C. W. 1851-1887,
and contains sheets of articles from the * Scottish Eccle
siastical Journal ' and other newspapers, ' Notes on the
Eucharistic Controversy, with Supplement' (1858), ad
dresses and papers on the case of St. Ninian's, ' Articles
of Presentment' against himself (1873), fly-sheets on the
'Eastward Position' (1874), 'In re Burntisland ' (1876),
' Final Suggestions on New Testament Eevision, the Four
Gospels' (1879), and others.
The second is an imperial 8vo, lettered C. W. 1878-
1888, and containing four magazine articles by himself.
The third, fourth, fifth, and sixth are in ordinary 8vo,
and are lettered C. W., vols. i., ii., in., iv., and contain the
great mass of his Charges, pamphlets, sermons, &c.
PREFACE ix
The seventh and eighth are in small 8vo or 12mo,
similarly bound and lettered C. W., vol. i., and C. W., vol. ii.,
and contain nearly all the remaining publications not
separately bound on their publication.
Many of these were reprinted in two volumes, published
in 1886, at Edinburgh, under the title ' Public Appeals in
behalf of Christian Unity with reference to the Present
Condition of the Church in Scotland.' The introductions
prefixed to each of the twelve numbers are very valuable
as materials for his biography, and it is on this account
that these volumes are mentioned here.
To the matter already described must be added collections
of fugitive pieces, epitaphs, epigrams, short poems, news
paper cuttings, and printed letters. The Bishop made it a
habit, and indeed considered it a duty, to write letters to the
newspapers, sometimes in his own name, sometimes with a
'nom de plume,' and he preserved nearly everything of this
kind that he wrote. There is therefore no lack of material ;
but what I have lacked in using it has been the time to ac
quire sufficient insight into so large a mass, and the capacity
always to choose what would give colour and reality to the
memoir, and at the same time be of permanent interest. I
have, however, attempted to gain both knowledge of persons
and places for myself, so as to speak less as an outsider.
Besides a visit to Perth as a boy, in the year of the Man
chester Exhibition, I spent some happy days with my uncle
at Edinburgh in the year 1885, and again at St. Andrews in
October 1888, when I had the honour to preach at the meet
ing of the [Representative Church Council at Dundee, and
made the acquaintance of the Primus and others of the
clergy and laity of our Communion. Since his death I have
visited Scotland three times, mainly for the purpose of
gaining an insight into matters connected with this book
first early in 1893, when I also went over to Aberdeen and
X EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH
made acquaintance with Dr. Milligan and Dr. Cooper ; next
in the summer and autumn of 1895, when I spent a
number of weeks in the diocese, making my headquarters at
Comrie, near Crieff ; and lastly in 1896, when I also visited
Edinburgh and Glasgow, mainly for the purpose of be
coming personally acquainted with such of the Presbyterian
clergy as were likely to be friendly to my uncle's great
design. In this* way I have visited nearly all the places
mentioned in this volume except the Highland centres.
Besides Perth and St. Andrews, which I have visited
several times, I may mention Methven, Crieff, Comrie, St.
Fillans, Duncrub, Muthill, Dunblane, Ardoch (Stirling),
Dunkeld and Birnam, Forfar, Glamis, Alyth and Meigle,
Kirriemuir and Dunfermline, and I have friends and
correspondents at nearly all of them.
With regard to a feature of the book which may seem
to need some explanation, viz. my own remarks upon the
questions on which the subject of this Memoir exercised
his remarkable powers, I may say that they have cost me
even more thought and care than the remainder of the
volume. I could not forget that, though belonging to a
younger generation, I have a duty as a Bishop to teach
which it is hardly ever possible to set aside, especially in
handling such weighty questions. Secondly, in order to
do justice to my uncle's own principles, I felt it necessary
not simply to say that I could not in every respect agree
with him, but to indicate the limits within which I have
ventured to differ from him. A general disclaimer of
agreement might easily be interpreted to mean much more
than I intended, whereas by pointing out the very large
amount of agreement and the subordinate character of the
difference, I am free to do all in my power to further his
objects, which were much dearer to his heart than his
methods. This is especially true of the two great subjects
PREFACE XI
to which he devoted his strength the Eucharistic Con
troversy and the Eeunion Movement. While I cannot
accept as final all his language or all his practical con
clusions on these subjects, I perceive that he had certain
true principles in view which have been obscured or over
looked by others to the detriment of the Church, especially
in the heat of controversy. In regard to the Eucharist,
his great wish was to preserve the true 'proportions of
the faith : ' in regard to Keunion, to make it clear that some
concessions are necessary on our part under the peculiar
circumstances of Scottish Presbyterianism. I trust that
readers of this Memoir will agree with me not only that he
acted conscientiously in regard to both, but that he was
right in emphasising both the general principle in the one
case and the practical duty in the other.
I have in the last chapter made a selection of the
lighter matter which lay to hand. In doing this I have
had to lay aside not a little that was of interest, sometimes
from one motive, sometimes from another. My uncle
was, as far as English verse went, strongest in epigram or
satire, and this is not generally the fairest permanent re
presentation of a man's character ; and the Latin verse,
of which he was a master, may be represented suffi
ciently by specimens. His graceful epigraphs, dedications,
epitaphs, and the like are well known to readers of the
' Annals,' and of less interest apart from the books or
places to which they belong. I should like to have added
more letters of Bishop Claughton's, but the best of them
are too outspoken and familiar for publication. Un
fortunately, only few of his own letters to Claughton have
been preserved. Others of his correspondents put ques
tions or cases in an interesting way, but their letters are
not complete without his answers. Others belong to phases
of controversy which it is inexpedient to pursue in detail.
xii EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
I have made an attempt at a Bibliography in which I
have endeavoured to steer between the two extremes of
exhaustiveness and severity. I have included every sepa
rately printed document of which I was cognisant, a rule
which appears to me the only safe guide, especially if such
a task is to supplement an imperfect Memoir like the
present. A mere fly-sheet often supplies an important
date. On the, other hand, I have purposely omitted
many letters to newspapers, while I have included those
that seemed to be most important, either as containing
fresh matter, or as incidentally showing his vigour and
vigilance, or as elucidating the course of events.
But, if any reader detects the absence of any separate
publication or privately printed document or fly-sheet, I
shall be grateful for information on such points ; and also
for any notices of articles or reviews published by the
Bishop in periodicals, or of sermons of his in series by
different writers, which I have failed to insert. I have not
attempted to record the date of every edition of the Greek
Grammar, but I should be grateful for any early copies that
friends may have to dispose of, especially that of 1843.
I have learnt much in the course of this work ; and, if I
can succeed in carrying my reader along with me, I do
not doubt that he too, if he is a gentle and sympathetic
reader, will at least learn something. He will take an
interest in the Bishop's personality and in the development
of his character under somewhat difficult and trying cir
cumstances. He will find that the questions with which
he was occupied, though local in their immediate bearings,
really concern the whole Church, and were treated by him
in a manner worthy of the great issues that attach to them.
JOHN SAEUM.
Feast of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple,
2 Feb. 1899.
Xlll
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE : Character and Description of the Materials . . v
CHAPTER I
EAELY LIFE ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDBEWS
1806-1853
' Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.'
Birth and Baptism .......... 1
Harrow (1820), Oxford, Christ Church (1825) .... 2
Character and accomplishments 2
Private tutor (1830) 2
Kemarkable pupils 2
Travels (1833-34) 2
Ordained Deacon 21 December, 1834 2
Second Master of Winchester 2
Marriage (29 December 1835) 2
Death of wife (10 May, 1839) 3
Ordained Priest (13 December, 1840) . . . ... 3
Eelation to Oxford Movement 3
Influence at Winchester 4
Death of Christopher Wordsworth, sen., 2 February, 1846 . . 4
Charles Wordsworth resigns his second Mastership . . . 4
Gladstone's visit .......... 4
Glenalmond 4
Second marriage (28 October, 1846) 4
Glenalmond opened 4 May, 1847 5
Consecration of chapel (1 May, 1851) 5
Warden of Glenalmond (May 1847 to July 1854) .... 5
Elected Bishop 30 November, 1852, consecrated 25 January, 1853 5
Circumstances of the election 5
xiv EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Unfortunate opposition 6
Strangeness of it . . 9
His views .. . . . 9
His opposition to the 'Cathedral Party' on Bishop Torry's
Prayer Book 10
Character of that Book (April 1850) . . / . . . 10
Storms raised by it 13
His strenuous action in censuring it 14
His strong defence of the principle of Establishment . . .15
His opposition to Gladstone 16
His own words' (MS. i. 3 foil.) 17
Outspokenness of antagonism in those days 17
His qualities enable him to bear opposition 18
Simplicity of faith and confidence in his own ideas . . . 19
A certain severity and impetuosity and critical instinct stand in
his way 19
But serene and large in his views 20
CHAPTER II
THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP
' Manus ad clavum : oculus ad coelum.'
The united Diocese ' the fairest portion of the Northern Kingdom ' 21
Late origin of Diocesan Episcopacy in Scotland .... 22
Rise of the Bishops living at St. Andrews . . ... 23
Patrick Graham first Archbishop (1472) 24
Short and tragic succession 25
Dunkeld and Dunblane ........ 25
His own retrospect in 1868 26
Title of St. Andrews in abeyance from 1704 to 1844 ... 27
Episcopalians tied their own hands by the * Assertory Act,' 1669 27
Extent and features of the Diocese 27
Its boundaries and river basins 28
Splendid site of Perth 28
Charm of St. Andrews 28
Other centres Dunkeld, Dunblane, Abernethy, Glamis, Forfar,
Dunfermline, Kinross 29
Character of the people ........ 31
Mixture of Highland and Lowland characteristics . . . . 31
Interest of the country to the Bishop from family traditions . 31
The Poet Wordsworth and Bishop Horsley 31
Conditions of the separation 32
CONTENTS XV
PAGE
The Episcopal Church has a right to territorial titles, yet has a
scant hold on the population . . . . . . . 32
Smallness of his flock in 1853 33
Strength of Presbyterian organisation . . . . . . 33
Character of the people illustrated by the humorous and pathetic
sketches of modern writers ....... 34
Quotations from Wordsworth's ' Resolution and Independence '
and from his description of the ' Wanderer ' . . . 35
The Bishop's great desire to create a united Church ... 37
Threefold duty realised: (1) To prevent the capture of the
Episcopal Church by an English party ; (2) Duty to con
vince the Scottish understanding of the claims of Episcopacy;
(3) Duty of making concessions : this emerged last . . . 37
Sketch of the working of these three convictions ... 38
CHAPTER III
EAKLY EPISCOPATE
1854-1856
' Crescunt dona, crescunt rationes.'
Early residence at Perth : its situation in the Diocese . . . 40
Early history of St. Ninian's (1849-50) 42
Statutes approved by Bishop Torry (1851) 43
Attempt to transfer an English institution to Scotland . . 45
Character of Provost Fortescue 46
His retirement in 1871 48
Character of Precentor Humble . . . . . . . 49
His fighting qualities ......... 50
Lay control of Cathedral 51
The Bishop attempts successfully to make the Cathedral more
Diocesan 51
Changes in 1853 52
Canon G. T. Farquhar's Summary 52
Enthronement . ......... 55
Building of St. Ninian's ........ 55
Other Churches in Perth 56
Primary Charge of 1854 57
Acknowledgment of Presbyterian Baptism . . . . . 58
Follows Hooker and Bingham in agreement with Bishop Forbes
ofBrechin 58
The author's judgment on the question . . . . . . 60
xvi EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
PAGE
The Charge well received . . . . . . . . 64
Visitations combined with Synod (1854-58) .... 64
Bishop takes charge of Muthill (1854-55) . . . . . 65
Beginnings of the Eucharistic controversy in Scotland . . 66
Originated in England (1853-54) . . .' . . . . 66
Attacks upon the Scottish Office .67
' Three Short Sermons on the Holy Communion : ' their value . 67
Extracts from them 68
Charles Wordsworth's attitude to the Scottish Office at various
times (1855, i858, 1859, 1862, 1884, 1889) .... 73
The abrupt formula of Invocation in it, introduced in 1764,
unscriptural and unliturgical . . . . . . . 74
Suggestions for its amendment 76
His final judgment .......... 78
The Bishop at Birnam Cottage, Dunkeld 80
Moves to Pitcullen Bank, Perth. End of Annals (August 1856) . 81
Trinity College becomes extra-diocesan 82
' Papal aggression in the East ' 82
The Feu House, Perth (1858). The Bishop's taste ... 82
CHAPTER IV
THE EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S
1857-1860
' The truth exploring with an equal mind,
In doctrine and communion they have sought
Firmly between the two extremes to steer ;
But theirs the wise man's ordinary lot,
To trace right courses for the stubborn blind,
And prophesy to ears that will not hear.'
WM.- WORDSWORTH, Eccl. Sonnets, ii. 40.
Bisnop Forbes' ' Primary Charge ' (1857) 84
Its connection with the controversy in England .... 85
Previous works of Pusey and Keble 86
Summary of the Charge : the Presence, Adoration, Sacrifice ;
Scottish Office 87
The Charge naturally creates excitement 95
Part taken by Bishop of St. Andrews reserved and laborious
and tending to united action 96
The Charge discussed in the Episcopal Synod . . . . 97
Agitation. ' Three Bishops' Declaration ' 100
Keble's * Letter ' to the Primus 101
CONTENTS XV11
PAGE
Clerical and lay addresses 101
Publication of Mr. Cheyne's 'Six Sermons' (February 1858)
prevents a settlement ........ 102
Their aggressive character 103
Mr. Cheyne presented to Bishop Suther 106
His attempted restriction on the parties 107
* Synodal Letter ' of 25 May, 1858, drafted by Bishop of St.
Andrews and signed by all Bishops but Forbes (p. 349) . 108
Comments on it by W. B. Barter and Christopher Wordsworth . 110
The Bishop's explanatory letter to Sir A. Edmonstone . . Ill
K. Palmer's ' Opinion ' 113
Bishop Trower's ' Pastoral.' Keble's ' Considerations ' . .114
Mr. Cheyne suspended at Aberdeen (August 1858) . .... 115
Bishop of St. Andrews' * Notes on the Eucharistic Contro
versy:' Summary of them 115
Pacific Charge of 1858 118
Mr. Cheyne's first appeal to the Bishops 119
Death of Kev. William B. Barter 121
His Character 121
Mr. Cheyne's obstinacy 122
His second trial (May 1859), appeal, and sentence (November
1859) 123
His restoration (1863) 124
Eupture between the Bishop and the Chapter of St. Ninian's . 124
History of their relations 125
Bishop's view of his position in the Cathedral .... 126
Mr. J. D. Chambers's ' Opinion ' 127
Perth Cathedral School and the ' Cathedral Declaration ' . .128
Bishop announces his withdrawal (May 1859) . . . . 128
More outspoken Charge of September 1859 ..... 129
Eastward position given up 129
Pamphlets of Mr. Humble and Mr. Lendrum .... 130
Legal proceedings against Bishop Forbes (October 1859) . . 131
His ' Letter to the Congregation of St. Paul's, Dundee ' . . 131
Anonymous ' Proposals for Peace ' by Bishop of St. Andrews :
Language of Anglican and Scottish divines . . . . 131
Further proceedings 133
Interview with Keble (8 February 1860) 133
Judgment in the case (15 March 1860) 134
The Bishop of St. Andrews' own remarks 135
George Forbes' approval of his 'Opinion ' 136
The question at issue, ' is there a Heal Presence on the Altar, in
the Elements, and a repetition or continuation of the Sacri
fice of the Cross ? ' 136
Criticism of this position from Scripture and antiquity . .137
a2
xviii EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Quotation from his * Opinion,' on the Melchizedekian Priesthood 138
The writer's own judgment . . . . . . . . 140
There is a ' disturbance of the proportions of faith ' in the doctrine
of adoration of Christ ' in the gifts ' 140
Danger of pressing logic to extremes 141
Our ignorance of the conditions of Christ's existence in the
unseen world 143
Equal difficulties surrounding the belief in a ' Presence of
Virtue and Efficacy ' and in a ' Supra-local Presence ' . . 143
The writer inclined to the theory of Sacrifice which regards the
Church on earth as uniting with her Lord in heaven . . 143
Eucharistic adoration properly a prelude to reception of Com
munion ........... 145
Scripture again teaches a distinction between different modes of
our Lord's Presence 145
Bishop Forbes passes from the Sacrifice of the Cross to the
Sacrifice of the Upper Room without perceiving the
difference between them . 146
CHAPTER V
FIRST PART OF RESIDENCE AT PERTH. REUNION WORK
1860-1867
' Making his hardest task his best delight.'
WM. WOBDSWOKTH, Eccl. Sonnets, ii. 16.
Resolution to hold a General Synod carried in 1859 . . . 149
Its constitution 149
Committee on Canons . . . 150
Bishop Eden chosen Primus (1862) : his character . . . . 150
Meetings in 1862-63 151
Canon on Episcopal elections 151
Bishop of St. Andrews offers to resign 152
Work of the Synod 152
Continuation of reunion work . . 152
Revival in the Establishment 153
Dr. 11. Lee, Principal Tulloch, Dr. N. Macleod, Dr. Bisset . . 153
Removal of clerical disabilities in 1864 155
Commemoration addresses by Bishop of St. Andrews, 1860, 1861,
1862 156
Charges of 1863, 1864 157
Dr. Caird and Dr. Pirie 157
Dr Rorison's attempt at a Reunion Conference . . . . 158
CONTENTS XIX
PAGE
Synodal Address in 1866 158
Chichester Sermon (Euodias and Syntyche) 1867 . . . 159
Correspondence with Tulloch. ' A Plea for Justice ' . . 160
Parallel attempts to use opportunities of educational changes . 160
Advantages of Scotland as to elementary education . . . 161
Acts of 1496 and of 1696 161
Act of 1861. The ' Shorter Catechism ' 163
Attempt at a * Common Catechism : ' not published . . . 164
A ' National Catechism,' 1864 165
Changes of 1872 166
Call for united action in this matter 167
The Bishop's ' Greek Grammar ' adopted by the head-masters
of England (1866) 167
' Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible ' and ' Tercen
tenary Sermon,' 1864 ........ 168
Their value 169
Projected ' Shakespeare for the Young ' 170
Three volumes of ' Historical Plays ' (1883) 170
Other Shakespearian lectures (in 8vo. vol. C. W. iv.) published in
1885 in ' Scottish Church Keview ' . 170, 382
Foundation of School Chapel at Perth (1866) . . . .170
Letter to ' a candid doubter' (August 1866) . . . . . 171
Foundation of Keble College . . . . . . .172
Reminiscences of Keble ......... 172
Closer intercourse with England useful in itself, but not wholly
favourable to the Reunion Movement 173
Archbishop Longley at Inverness (1866) 173
Charles Wordsworth at Rochester 174
Consecration of Bishop Claughton (June 1867) . . 174
At Lambeth Conference (September 1867) . 175
His position in it between Archbishop Tait and Bishop Gray . . 176
At Chichester (November 1867) 178
Dr. Hook's letter . . 178
Reunion work dropped for fifteen years ..... 179
Conditions of progress in such matters 179
Domestic events 180
Death of Kenneth Wordsworth (1862) 180
Death of Warden Barter (1861) 181
His character .... ....... 181
Bishop Hamilton's generosity (1866) 183
Hamilton's affectionateness . 185
XX EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
CHAPTER VI
LAST YEARS AT PERTH
1868-1876
' Through evil report and through good report.'
' The gracious Providence of Almighty God hath I trust put these thorns of
contradiction in our sides, lest that should steal upon the Church in a slumber,
which now I doubt not but through His assistance may be turned away from us,
binding ourselves thereto with constancy; constancy in labour to do all men
good, constancy in prayer to God for all men.' E. HOOKER, last page of Dedica
tion of Book v. of his Treatise Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity.
PAGE
Proposal to consecrate Bishop Macrorie in Scotland . . . 186
Proposal to revive Archiepiscopal titles . . . . . . 189
Irish disestablishment ......... 190
Letter from Bishop Claughton 191
Biography in ' Scotichronicon ' 191
Important conference of Clergy and Laity at Perth (1868) . . 192
Its Influence on Episcopal Synod (1869) 193
Correspondence with R. Palmer on Establishment . . . . 194
Christopher Wordsworth becomes Bishop of Lincoln . . . 196
Bishop Hamilton's death (1869). Depressing period . . . 197
Troubles among the Bishops 197
Renewed disputes at S. Ninian's. Mr. Burton Provost (1871-1885) 198
Perth Nunnery. Ritual Charge of 1872 199
Letter from Bishop Williams of Connecticut . . . . 200
Precentor Humble' s presentment : dismissed by the Bishops . 200
Special Synod of 1873 201
Proposed Committee 201
Address by Dean and other Clergy 202
Various circulars .......... 202
The Bishop gives notice of intended resignation (1874) . . . 203
Resignation suspended ......... 204
Attempts at a modus vivendi with Provost Burton . . . 204
Its partial success (1874-75) 204
Precentor Humble's death (February 1876) .... . . . 206
The Bishop's character of him ....... 207
Move to St. Andrews (October 1876) 207
Deaths of Bishops Ewing (1873) and Forbes (1875) . . .207
Of Rev. W. G. Shaw of Forfar (1874) 208
General Synod of 1876. Glenalmond Students. Cumbrae . 208
Sermons in England, especially in English cathedrals . . . 210
Visit to Gladstone (1876) 210
Work of New Testament Revision (1870-1881) . . . . 211
' Final Suggestions ' on the four Gospels 212
Dr. Field's * Otium Norvicense ' 212
CONTENTS XXI
Secondary advantages of the Bevision 213
Letter from Dean Blakesley 214
Charge of 1881 .... ... 214
Letter of Archdeacon Palmer 215
The writer's judgment 215
Important book on ' Outlines of Christian Ministry ' (1872) . 216
Its value 217
Supplemented by ' Kemarks on Dr. Lightfoot's Essay ' (1879) . 218
Stanley's Sermon on * the Burning Bush ' 218
Letter from Bishop Williams of Connecticut .... 218
Note on ' Sacerdotalism ' 219
CHAPTEK VII
RESIDENCE AT ST. ANDEEWS AND LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION
1876-1892
' He who would win the name of truly great
Must understand his own age and the next,
And make the present ready to fulfil
Its prophecy, and with the future merge
Gently and peacefully, as wave with wave.'
From J. E. LOWELL, A Glance behind the Curtain.
Eeasons for the Bishop's removal to St. Andrews . , . 221
Influence on him of the learned society there 222
Eetrospect. The ' Church Service Society,' founded in 1867 . 223
Its influence on Presbyterian worship 223
The Bishop renews his efforts 224
Sermon at the consecration of Edinburgh Cathedral (1879) . . 224
Eeview of Lord Bute's ' Breviary ' 225
Correspondence with Dr. Milligan (1880) . . . ' . . . 225
Duke of Argyll on origin of Episcopacy 227
The ' St. Giles' Lectures ' (1880-81) 228
His criticism in * Discourse on Scottish Church History ' . . 228
Its character 228
Letter from ' A Son of Toil ' 229
Summary of the Bishop's views on Church polity . . . . 230
' Prospects of Eeconciliation ' (1882) drawn out by Milligan's
conduct as Moderator ........ 231
Dr. Sprott's theory of { Two Orders ' 232
How far supported 232
Presentation of Portrait painted by Mr. H. T. Munns . . . 233
Invitations to preach in College Church and Parish Church,
St. Andrews, accepted (1884) 234
Letter to Dean Johnston 234
Archbishop Benson's general sympathy with his efforts . . 235
xxii EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Description of a University sermon at St. Andrews by the poet
Robert F. Murray 236
Important article on 4 Union or Separation ' (May 1884) . . 237
Its influence on the position of the Bishop at the Seabury Com
memoration .......... 238
Address prepared by him for that event 239
Article on ' Archbishop Hamilton's Catechism ' (January 1885) . 240
Death of Bishop Christopher Wordsworth (March 1885) . . 240
Relation of the brothers 241
' The Case of Non-Episcopal Ordination fairly considered ' (3 Sep
tember, 1885) 241
' Public Appeals ' (2 vols.) published 1886 242
Suggestion that Presbyterian Orders, though irregular, maybe valid 242
Address at Aberdeen University (February 1886) . . . 245
Invitation to lecture at St. Cuthbert's, Edinburgh . . . . 245
Changes in the Episcopate 246
Bishop Dowden consecrated and Bishop Jermyn elected Primus
(21 September, 1886) 246
Charge on Book of Common Prayer. Jenny Geddes . . . 246
Bishop Dowden, with his Chapter, objects to St. Cuthbert's lecture 247
' The Yoke of Christ to be borne in Youth ' published (1887) . 248
Letters from Presbyterians and others . . . . . 248
Dr. Cunningham's ' Lee Lecture ' discouraging .... 249
Other publications .......... 250
' Jubilee Tract ' . . .250
' Question of a Metropolitan ' . . . . . . . 251
Move to his last home, Kilrymont 252
Letter to Archbishop Benson on ' Ecclesiastical Union between
England and Scotland ' . . . . . . . 253
Case of the Donatists ......... 254
Wide proposals of the Committee of the Lambeth Conference (July
1888) 257
The Report re-committed 259
Charge of August 1888 on Lambeth Conference . . . . 259
Invitation to preach before University of Edinburgh, ' A Three
fold Rule of Christian Duty ' . 259
The author's own judgment 260
Discussion of Principle, Precedent and Expediency . . . . 260
These indicate weak points in the Bishop's scheme . . . 262
Further opinion reserved 263
Obvious points emphasised 264
Duty of co-operation in practical work . . . . . . 264
Altered relation to St. Ninian's 264
Healthy influence of ' Supernumeraries,' Revs. S. B. Hodgson
and G. T. Farquhar . ... 264
CONTENTS xxiii
PAGE
Bishop uses Cathedral again (1882) and onwards . . . 265
Death of Provost Burton and appointment of Provost V. L.
Korison. Lord Glasgow's failure : a blessing in disguise , 265
New life of Cathedral (1886-1890) 265
Consecration of nave (7 August, 1890) . . . . . 266
Verses to G. T. Farquhar 267
Family bereavements ......... 267
General Synod (1890). Cordial relations with his colleagues . 268
The Provost made Dean and Kev. A. S. Aglen Archdeacon . . 268
Charge describing work of General Synod (1890) . . . 269
Jubilee of Trinity College, Glenalmond (1891) . . . . 271
Charge ' On Old Testament Criticism ' (1891) . . . .271
Analogy from reaction against Wolfian theory of Homeric poems 272
Present of a chair and pastoral staff (April 1892) .... 273
Continued literary activity ........ 274
Last Charge read by Dean (October 1892) 275
Untoward incident .......... 276
Final words on Keunion. Foundation of ' Scottish Church Society ' 277
Last illness and death (5 December, 1892) 278
Burial in Cathedral Yard and Epitaph 279
Summary of the Bishop's public services by Dr. Danson and
Canon Farquhar 280
His supposed egotism . 282
His belief in the reality of the movement among leading Presby
terians . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Testimony of Dr. James Cooper ' 284
CHAPTER VIII
EVENING OF LIFE, PARTICULARLY AT ST. ANDREWS
1876-1892
' Inveni portum ! Spes et Fortuna valete !
Sat me lusistis : ludite nunc alios.'
' Immo alii inveniant ego quern, Christo auspice, portum,
Spes ubi non fallax, Forsque perennis adest.'
1. Latin verses: partnership with Deem Stanley
Motto of this chapter : its history 287
Stanley's version of these and other lines by Charles Wordsworth 287
Lines addressed to Dean Ramsay (1872) 289
Lines to Lord Beaconsfield on his return from Berlin Congress
(1878) 291
His acknowledgment 295
' Beaumont and Fletcher ' 295
Stanley's valediction 296
XXIV EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
PAGE
2. Latin verses connected principally with St. Andrews
Sophocles loquitur .......... 297
Prof. Lewis Campbell's reply . . . . . . . 298
Lines on Campbell's recovery from bronchitis . . . . 298
Lines to the ' Country Parson ' 299
Elegy on Principal Tulloch (1886) 300
Intercourse with Principal Shairp and Prof. Knight . . . 301
St. Leonard's Girls' School 302
Agnata Ramsay 's^uccess (1887) ....... 302
The ' Scarlet Gown ' (1878) 303
Dr. Macgregor's salmon 305
Dean Johnston's ' Wide-awake ' 305
3. The Wykehamist Dinner of 1880 and Athletics
Speeches at Wykehamist dinner 306
First game of golf (1890) 310
' Pindar and Athletics, Ancient and Modern ' (1888) . . .310
Letter on skating .......... 311
The ' Flying Mercury ' 312
4. Revival or continuation of old friendships Literary
correspondence
Cardinal Manning 812
Merivale's anecdote ......... 313
Cardinal Newman .......... 314
The Bishop's judgment of him 314
Opinion on Archbishop Trench 315
Letters to Dean Boyle 316
On Baxter 316
On Clarendon 316
On Hooker, Plea for Justice, &c. . . . . . . 317
Extract from Canon Farquhar's Diary : The Bishop's orderliness 318
The two Skinners 318
Letter to Dean Merivale : lines from Statius 319
The Bishop's version and the Dean's ...... 320
Mr. Tuckwell's * Tongues in Trees ' 322
Mr. Gladstone : note to Sir J. E. Eardley-Wilmot . . . 323
Intercourse with Bishop Claughton 324
Bishop Moberly's golden wedding ...... 325
Interest in his nephews' writings 326
5. Last publications in verse and prose executed and projected
Latin poem on ' Nightmare ' ....... 327
' Series Collectarum,' &c. 330
CONTENTS XXV
PAGE
Other hymns 331
* Lead, kindly Light ' . . 332
Sonnet by Bishop of Eipon after visit to St. Andrews . . . 333
Volumes of Sermons, Lectures, and Eeviews, projected . . . 334
6. Manner of Preaching and Confirming
Impressiveness of his sermons ....... 335
Dr. Danson's criticism 335
Canon Farquhar's ' Funeral Sermon ' 336
Always uses manuscript 336
Manner of confirming 336
Order of service. Cards 337
7. Lord Selborne's Character of Bishop Wordsworth . 338
The Bishop's remarks upon the book and the character . . 338
8. Conclusion 342
APPENDICES .... 343-388
I. On Bishop Torry's Prayer Book 345
II. Pastoral Letter issued by the Episcopal Synod (27 May
1858) 349
III. Suggested Addition to Church Catechism :
(A) Introductory Remarks (1878) . ... 353
(B) Confirmation Card and Addition . . . 357
IV. Remarks on the Archbishop's Judgment (1890) . . . 360
V. The Waverley Novels arranged Chronologically . . 362
VI. The Lambeth Conference of 1888 and Home Reunion.
Letter from Bishop Barry 363
VII. List of the principal Printed Writings of Charles Words
worth in Chronological Order 366
VIII. Churches and Parsonages built during his Episcopate . 386
IX. The Bishop's Family 388
INDEX 391
ILLUSTEATIONS
PORTRAIT. Painted by H. T. MUNNS . . . . Frontispiece
PORTRAIT, in later life. From a photograph . . to face p. 286
NOTE ON THE POETEAITS
The frontispiece is a reproduction of the portrait by Mr. H. T. Munns,
painted in 1882 (see p. 233), leave to copy which has been kindly given
by his son, Mr. H. E. Munns, of West-End Chambers, Birmingham.
The other is from a photograph taken in 1889, in the possession of the
Bishop's son, Mr. W. B. Wordsworth.
THE EPISCOPATE
OF
CHAELBS WOEDSWOETH
CHAPTER I
EARLY LIFE ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS
' Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.'
Summary of early life, 1806-1853 Harrow, Oxford, Winchester, Glen-
almond Election as Bishop Peculiar circumstances Nature of the
opposition His claims on Churchmen His criticism of Bishop Torry's
Prayer Book and views on Establishment The Prayer Book described
Charles Wordsworth's action respecting it Establishment ' an article of
the Christian Faith 'Criticism on Mr. Gladstone Strong feeling forty
years ago His character enables him to bear opposition.
CHARLES WORDSWORTH, second 1 son of Christopher Words
worth, sometime Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, and
Priscilla (Lloyd) his wife, was born 22 August, 1806, the
day on which, as it happens, eighty-eight years later, I begin
writing this memoir. He was baptised at Lambeth Palace
19 February, 2 1807 nearly six months after his birth the
1 His elder brother John, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, was a
laborious and most accomplished scholar, and a very amiable man, who
died young, 31 December, 1839. His younger brother Christopher, Fellow
of the same College, Head Master of Harrow School, Canon of Westminster,
and finally Bishop of Lincoln, died 21 March, 1885. Both were educated at
Winchester College as Commoners.
2 The day, as he afterwards noticed, on which his first grandson was
born in 1880.
B
2 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. I
Archbishop, Charles Manners Sutton, and William Words
worth, the poet, being his sponsors. He was educated at
Harrow School, where he went first in 1820, and at Christ
Church, Oxford, which he entered in 1825. His early
years, though chequered with occasional clouds of ill-health
and fits of nervousness, to which he was liable all his life,
were bright and successful. He was brilliant as a scholar,
and in writing Greek and Latin verse he became a poet-
Latin verse composition especially was his peculiar delight
and solace to the end of his long life. He was distinguished
in almost all manly exercises, particularly cricket, rowing,
tennis, and skating. Tall, handsome, and athletic, with a
strong and prepossessing countenance, set off by brown curly
hair and brightened by a winning smile to which the en
graving of G. Richmond's portrait does some, but not. suffi
cient justice he seemed destined for great achievements.
After taking his degree (1830) he acted for a time as a private
tutor at Oxford, numbering among his pupils a remarkable
band of eminent men, of whom Mr. W. E. Gladstone,
Cardinal Manning, Bishop W. K. Hamilton, and Lord
Canning will probably be considered by posterity as the
most eminent. After some interesting and somewhat enter
prising travels in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Germany,
in 1833-4, he came back to England engaged to be married
to a lady whom he had met at Paris Miss Charlotte Day,
eldest daughter of the Rev. George Day, rector of Ear sham,
near Bungay. On his return to Oxford he was appointed to
a public tutorship at the College by Dean Gaisford, and on
21 December, 1834, he was ordained Deacon by Bishop
Bagot, of Oxford.
In the summer that followed he became Second Master
of Winchester College, a position which enabled him to
marry (29 December, 1835). This office not only afforded
him an opportunity of teaching such as he was specially
CH. i EARLY LIFE 3
qualified to embrace, but it gave him an equally important
experience of management, since it involved the internal
control of the ancient College and its seventy scholars, to
which and to whom his heart became closely knit. Besides
the intimate friendship of the much-loved and noble-hearted
Warden, K. S. Barter, it brought him into daily and
familiar relations with Dr. George Moberly, afterwards
Bishop of Salisbury, whose mind (as I can testify from my
own experience) was specially fitted to strengthen and
clarify the Church principles and to sharpen the intelligence
of all with whom he came into close contact.
He held the office of Second Master for about eleven
years, until March 1846. His marriage was a very happy
one, but Mrs. Wordsworth died, to his extreme grief, on
Ascension Day, 10 May, 1839, after giving birth to a
daughter, the only child of their union. In the following
year, at the Advent Ordination (13 December 1840), he
was ordained Priest by the Bishop of Winchester a delay
of six years after his diaconate, such as would have seemed
somewhat remarkable in this generation, 1 especially in one
who conceived his duties as Master as involving so much of
pastoral responsibility. 2 He had left Oxford before the
* Movement ' was in full force, but he was, no doubt, con
siderably influenced by it, and for a time he appeared, at
least to others, to be likely to throw in his lot with it. 3
Certainly, in his relations to his boys, he seemed to a great
1 It may be remarked that Dr. Arnold was not ordained Priest till 1828,
having been ordained Deacon in 1818.
2 The two volumes of Christian BoyJwod at a Public Sctool, published
in 1846 and dedicated to Dr. Moberly, may be mentioned as giving a valu
able record of this relation. His sermon on Evangelical Repentance, with
its Appendix (Oxford, 1841 and 1842), is important in reference to the
question of Penitential Discipline in the Church of England.
3 He has discussed his relation to the Oxford Movement at some length
in the first volume of the Annals, 322-326. It contains, amongst other
interesting matter, an affectionate estimate of his debt to his father the
Master of Trinity.
B 2
4 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
extent inspired by its motives and imbued with its methods. 1
His work as a teacher was probably the most congenial of all
the employments in which he was at any time engaged, and
his influence on his pupils, and on the general conduct of
public school education, was remarkable. It would be diffi
cult to produce a better testimony to this effect than is
contained in the following words of the Bishop of Southwell
(Dr. George Ridding) , who was himself in after years one of
the most influential teachers of Winchester College, both as
Second and as Head Master. He writes thus on 6 December,
1892, just after the Bishop's death : ' Personally, I look upon
him as the man who did me the most real and effective good
of all who have helped me, and I hardly know at which time
I felt the value of his influence in the College most, when I
left Winchester or when I returned to it.'
In the winter of 1845-6 he determined to give up his
work at Winchester, which he found too exhausting, and he
was glad to be able to attend his father during his last
illness. The latter had retired from the Mastership of
Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1841, and died at his rectory
of Buxted, 2 February, 1846. In the spring of the
same year, shortly after he had completed his resignation
of the Second Mastership, but was residing still at Win
chester in a private house, Charles Wordsworth received a
special visit from Mr. W. E, Gladstone, which altered the
whole current of his after life. The object of this visit was
to persuade him to undertake the Wardenship of Trinity
College, Glenalmond, in Perthshire, which was then in
building as a public school for the sons of Churchmen in
Scotland, and as a training college for theological students.
This offer he accepted, and on 28 October of the same year
he entered on a second marriage, with Miss Katharine Mary
1 I may mention the evidence on this point of the present Bishop of
Truro (Eight Rev. John Gott, D.D.), who was one of his pupils.
CH. i EARLY LIFE 5
Barter, eldest daughter of the Kector of Burghclere, Hants,
and niece of his great friend, Warden Barter. A few
months were spent by the newly-married pair in Italian
travel, and it was not till 4 May, 1847, that the new
College was opened. The College Chapel, to the building
of which he was himself the chief contributor, was conse
crated 1 May, 1851, by the Primus, Bishop Skinner, with
the assistance of three other Bishops, and in the presence
of Mr. Gladstone.
From May 1847 to July 1854 Charles Wordsworth
continued to be Warden of Trinity College, although he had
been elected Bishop on 30 November, 1852, in succession to
the aged Bishop Torry, and was consecrated to that office
at St. Andrews Church, Aberdeen, on St. Paul's Day,
25 January, 1853. There was indeed no sufficient reason
why he should not have continued to hold the two offices of
Warden and Bishop, and to discharge their duties together.
The union of the two offices (as Dean Torry has stated)
was contemplated in the original project of the College, 1
and the Council of Glenalmond, after Bishop Torry's death,
unanimously resolved that the two were not incompatible. 2
The number of charges and clergy in the Diocese was, and
continues to be, very small, though it was doubled during
Charles Wordsworth's episcopate. In very many ways it
would have been advantageous to the Church if he had
retained the Wardenship (of course with such extra help in
teaching as might have been required), particularly as long
as the theological students continued to reside at Glenal
mond, whose education he considered to be a specially
appropriate duty for a Bishop. But a combination of cir
cumstances, which he has himself described, 3 led to his
1 See Annals, ii. 131.
2 Letter from Chas. Wordsworth to his brother, dated 12 October [1852].
3 Annals, ii. 168-183.
6 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
resignation in 1854, the chief being the unsatisfactory
financial condition of the College.
The circumstances of his election, which are somewhat
fully described and discussed by himself in the ' Annals/
cannot wholly be passed over here, as they had naturally a
certain influence on his after life and relations with some
of the clergy of the Diocese, and with others. These cir
cumstances involved his taking a part in the election
himself, and giving a vote which decided the choice of the
presbyterate. Unfortunately, in those days the laity had
no voice in elections of Bishops, and a bare majority of the
clergy present a very small body in this case was all
that was required by the Canons. The two parties were
exactly divided, apart from the Warden of Trinity College,
eight against eight, and he was persuaded, 1 after much
hesitation, to do as he had good precedents for doing, and
as he was conscientiously convinced it was right in this
case to do, to give his vote for himself and to subscribe
the document certifying the election to the Primus. The
election was, it so happened, twice repeated, the first
having been declared null and void by reason of the absence
of this proper form of return. His opponent on the first
occasion was the Bishop of Moray (Eden), who withdrew
when the election was cancelled, not wishing to oppose the
Warden of Glenalmond. On the second the choice lay
between himself and the Rev. T. G. Suther, D.C.L., then
the popular Incumbent of St. George's, Edinburgh, and
shortly after elected Bishop of Aberdeen. 2 The votes were
as follows :
1 I understand that Messrs. Lyon and Farquhar were specially strong in
their persuasion.
2 Dr. Suther became Bishop of Aberdeen in 1857. His name is unfortu
nately misprinted Luther in Annals, ii. 130, and on the next page, note 3,
1 Lord Thedvvyn ' should of course be ' Lord Medwyn.' Besides the Annals
I have had the use of the Minute Book of the Synod, through the kindness
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 7
For the Rev. C. Wordsworth. For the Rev. Dr. Suther.
Messrs. Blatch. Messrs. Burton.
Wood. Douglas.
Wordsworth. Forbes.
Bruce. Chambers.
Malcolm. Walker.
Johnston. Lendrum.
Farquhar. Macmillan.
Lyon. Milne.
Torry.
It will be observed that the name of the Dean of the
Cathedral (E. B. K. Fortescue) does not appear on either
side. He was present and claimed a right to vote as an
inducted clergyman ; but though this fact is entered on the
minutes, his name is not in the ' sederunt,' and he did not
put his claim into force. 1 It is also to be noticed that
before the voting the other party proposed that the election
might be rendered unanimous if Mr. Wordsworth would
promise to resign the Wardenship, but this he refused to
accept as a condition, though willing to do it if hereafter he
found the two offices incompatible. 2
of the Synod Clerk, Kev. J. W. Hunter, of Birnam. It is, however, not
complete. It contains, e.g., the protest against the election, but not the
finding of the Episcopal College of 6 January, 1853, for which see Annals,
ii. 136-7.
1 No doubt it would at once have been challenged if he had done so, as
is evident from the protest made by the Synod Clerk at the meeting of the
Synod, 18 June, 1851, when Bishop Torry's Prayer Book was discussed. See
Minute Book, p. 153 foil. Dean Fortescue withdrew his claim to a vote at
the next meeting of the Synod, 16 June, 1852, until the position of St.
Ninian's ' be determined by a General Synod ' (ib. p. 162). He had, there
fore, by his own act, no locus standi in 1853.
2 See Annals, -ii. 130. This is thus referred to in the Minute Book
p. 182 : ' Mr. Lendrum proposed that three on each side should adjourn to
the Vestry, and there hold a brief conference in order that an election
should, if possible, be rendered unanimous. The conference, though most
amiable, was unsuccessful.' A second adjournment followed after another
8 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
His own full account of the circumstances ('Annals,' ii.
124-137) places them in a very clear light, and not a
shadow of blame rests upon him. But none the less such
an entrance into office was not happy for his personal
relations in the future to some of those who were at the
time his opponents. It is, however, satisfactory to notice
that some ten years later, when a General Synod dealt with
the question of Episcopal elections, in its revision of Canon
III., and introduced a clause which seemed to himself to
weaken his position, and gave him some little disquietude,
all who still remained of those who at first opposed his
election joined in the petition desiring him not to sever
the tie between them by resignation. 1 This revision of the
Canons, while it forbade a clerical elector to vote for
himself, joined with the clergy a body of representative
lay electors, and required that the Bishop chosen should
have a majority of both orders.
Difficulties such as that to which reference has been
made are, indeed, part of the price which has to be paid
for a Church constitution in which the Episcopal office is
purely elective, especially when it is in the hands of a very
small body. They are, moreover, to be expected in a
country where free expression of opinion on religious sub
jects and a critical attitude towards the opinions of others
are parts of the daily atmosphere of life. But the period
discussion, but with the same result as the former. A motion for delay was
also lost by a minority of one.
1 See his Letter to Dean Torry dated Perth, 19 February, 1863, in reply
to an address signed by seventeen out of twenty-three clergy, to which
number two other incumbents joined themselves in even more forcible lan
guage. The Primus at the same time, in the name of the Bishops, disclaimed
implying any censure upon him in the smallest degree, though acknowledging
that his case had raised the question. This letter was printed at the
Perthshire Journal office, but not published. The address was, of course,
not signed by Rev. J. C. Chambers, the Incumbent of the Cathedral in 1852,
who had resigned shortly after the election, and so ceased to belong to the
diocese. So also had Mr. Lendrum.
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 9
was one of special tension in regard to ritual and doctrine,
particularly, perhaps, in the Diocese of St. Andrews. To
one outside the Diocese it might, indeed, have seemed
strange at the time that so orthodox a Churchman and so
eminent a man as Charles Wordsworth should have met
with any opposition. The Diocese had very few charges, and
was ill-provided in every respect, except in the possession
of Trinity College, and so able a man could hardly have
been expected to undertake its government. He was as
high a Churchman as Bishop Eden, and higher than Mr.
Suther. Not only was he an advocate for the daily service
and the use of music the whole school, in fact, acting as
a surpliced choir but he was known to be sound in his
opinions on the doctrine of the Sacraments, then debated
with especial keenness. His resolution in respect to the
Gorham Controversy on Baptism, and to the judgment
which at the time so shook the Church of England, was
adopted unanimously by the special Synod of the Diocese
held in 1850. 1 In regard to Holy Communion, he was at
that time, and for a number of years afterwards, a sup
porter of the Scottish Office, which, as Warden of Glenal-
mond, he was pledged to use alternately with the English,
and he had adopted the Eastward Position at the consecra
tion prayer. 2
His doctrine on the subject of the Holy Eucharist was
delivered in the autumn of 1851 to the students and pupils
1 See Annals, ii. 83, where it is given in full. It was held at Perth on
10 April.
- This he states himself generally in his Charge of 1859, pp. 21 foil.
' You will have noticed heretofore that in the celebration of the Holy Com
munion I have been in the habit of saying the consecration prayer with my
face towards the East.' More will be said of this later. Of. G. T. S.
Farquhar, Episcopal History of Perth, p. 344 (Perth, J. H. Jackson, 1894),
who does not, however, notice that the Bishop took the Eastward Position
at St. Ninian's for the earlier part also of the service for the sake of con
ciliation.
10 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWOETH CH. i
of the College in ' Three Short Sermons,' in which he
set forth its character as a Sacrifice, Sacrament, and
Eucharist, in terms which might content most Church
men of the present day. In these sermons he allied
himself in general terms to the school which seems on the
whole best to represent the peculiar attitude of Anglican
theology towards this great mystery namely, that which
sees in the semce on earth a representation of the service
actually offered by our Great High Priest in heaven. 1 More
will be said on these important sermons in Chapter III.
Why was it then that he was opposed ? Some no doubt
objected to the union of the qffices of Warden and Bishop ;
but the main opposition to him came from the ' Cathedral
Party,' who sheltered themselves under the authority of the
aged Bishop Torry, and resented his stern censure of the
peculiar edition of the Prayer Book which was, as it were,
the symbol of their cause. His views on Church Establish
ment, and his strenuous defence of the principle as an
article of faith, also contributed to the opinion formed of
him. A few words are necessary, especially in regard to
the Prayer Book, in order to account for the influence of
this question on his election, in addition to what he has
himself written upon it.
Bishop Torry in 1847, being then about 84 years of
age, received a request signed by seven clergy of the
Diocese consisting of his son, John Torry, the Dean, and
Revs. John Macmillan, 2 Alexander Lendrum, 2 Thomas
Walker, 2 J. Charles Chambers 2 and Thomas Wildman,
1 These sermons were printed when he was at Muthill. The preface is
dated Epiphany 1855. The references to the heavenly sacrifice may be
found on p. 10 (where he quotes the well-known passage from St. Ambrose
de Officiis Ministrorum, i. 48), and on pp. 34, 35 the latter is a passage of
considerable force and beauty.
2 It will be observed that these four afterwards voted against Charles
Wordsworth's election as Bishop.
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 11
Priests, and Rev. Wm. Palmer, Deacon stating that they
were 'deeply sensible of the importance of having the
Liturgy and usages of the Church of Scotland, for the last
century, attested by a Prelate of his age and experience,
and begging to express their desire that such a book might
be edited under his sanction as shall serve as a document
of reference and authority in regard to the practice of our
Church.' l To this request he returned a favourable answer.
The book was edited by certain Presbyters of the
Diocese, of whom, I believe, Messrs. George Forbes,
brother of the Bishop of Brechin, and Alexander Lendrum
were the principal, ' every proof being forwarded to and
revised by them.' I have also heard that a Mr. Campbell,
an Edinburgh advocate, had a hand in it. But when it
appeared in April 1850 it was found to bear this title :
' The Book of Common Prayer, and Administration of the
Sacraments, and other Rites and Ceremonies of the Church,
according to the Use of the Church of Scotland : together with
the Psalter or Psalms of David, pointed as they are to be sung
or said in Churches ; and the form and manner of making,
ordaining, and consecrating of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.'
(Edinburgh : R. Lendrum & Co., Hanover Street, 1849.)
The next page bore the following certificate from the
Bishop :
I hereby certify that I have carefully examined this edition
of the Book of Common Prayer, and that it is in strict conformity
with the Usage of the Church of Scotland ; and I accordingly
recommend it to the Use of the Clergy of my own Diocese.
PATBICK TOKRY, D.D.,
Bishop of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dunblane.
1 I take these facts from J. M. Neale's Life and Times of Patrick
Torry, D.D. Bislwp of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dunblane. London, 1856,
p. 273. The document in which they are found is a memorandum of
Bishop Torry's own dated St. Mark's Day [25 April] 1848.
12 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
There was no hint that it was a composite production
or that this was the first time that a Prayer Book with such
a title had appeared in Scotland, 1 for Scotland up to the
present day has not followed the example of the Church of
the United States and of the Disestablished Church of
Ireland, in having a Prayer Book of its own, but is content
to use 'the English Prayer Book, with or without the
Scottish Communion Office, which is sometimes bound up
with it, but more often printed separately. Bishop Torry's
Prayer Book had not been in any way before the Diocesan
Synod, much less before the Episcopal College or the
General Synod. It was, therefore, wholly unauthorised
except by himself, and open to attack from many quarters
and on many grounds.
The salient features of this book may be summed up as
follows : It presented the Church with a large addition to
its Calendar. It sanctioned the sponsorship of parents
in Baptism, and enjoined the sign of the Cross in Confir
mation. It provided for reservation of the Sacrament for
the sick. It emphasised examination of Communicants as
to their faith, and absolution of notorious evil-livers. The
mixed chalice was prescribed and permission was given to
1 The only similar title is that called The Booke of Common Prayer and
Administration of the Sacraments and other parts of Divine Service for the
use of the Church of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1637, the service book which
was so summarily rejected in the reign of Charles I. As to the title
' Church of Scotland ' it was no doubt continued on the title-pages of many
editions of the Scottish Communion Office as in that of Bishop Falconar,
1764. It was not apparently till about the beginning of the present century
that the title ' Episcopal Church in Scotland ' or ' Church in Scotland ' came
into use (see Bibliography of tlie Scottish Office in Bishop Dowden's Anno
tated S. C. O. pp. 276 foil. Edinburgh, 1884). Thomas Stephens's well-
known book in four volumes is called, on the other hand, the History of
the Church of Scotland (London, 1848), and many similar facts could be
adduced. Nevertheless the official title of the Church as witnessed by
the Code of Canons in its various revisions, 1838, 1863, 1876, 1890, is
' The Episcopal Church in Scotland.' The titles ' Scottish Episcopal
Church ' and now ' Scottish Church ' are also used in similar documents.
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 13
celebrate with only one Communicant beside the Priest.
On the other hand, there was no change in the rubric about
the ' north side ' except the use of the word ' altar '-
and for the first time, in any English Prayer Book known to
me, appeared a rubric ordering the minister to dismiss
non-communicants after the sermon.
It is easy to imagine the storm to which this publica
tion at such a time gave rise, both in the Episcopal and
Diocesan Synods, and in the public press. The Episcopal
Synod seems to have lost no time in condemning the book,
for it met on 17-19 April and desired the publishers to
withdraw it from circulation Bishop Forbes alone dissent
ing. The Diocesan Synod met at St. Andrews on 19 June
and again at Perth on the 25th. On the former occasion
it passed two resolutions on the proposal of Charles
Wordsworth : the first concurring in the resolution which
had been passed in April by the Episcopal Synod ; the
second ' recording its strong disapproval of the use of the
book which has been so condemned, and also its determi
nation, should the book be adopted or recommended by
any clergyman of the Diocese, to institute Canonical pro
ceedings against the offenders ' (' Minute Book,' p. 142
foil.).
These resolutions were carried by a majority of eleven
to five, the Dean, Torry a son of the Bishop and the
Synod Clerk (Kev. G. G. Milne, of Cupar- Angus), voting in
the majority, while Messrs. Lendrum, Chambers, and G.
H. Forbes protested. These resolutions were sent to the
Bishop of the Diocese asking his Episcopal sanction
(ib. p. 148), as well as to the College of Bishops.
In view of the second resolution it was elicited in Synod
that Messrs. Lendrum and Forbes used the book. 1 This
1 Through the kindness of Miss Carrington, now living at Dunkeld or
Birnam, I have a copy given to her by Mr. Lendrum, which was, I believe,
for her use in the Cathedral.
14 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
was equivalent to threatening them with Canonical pro
ceedings if they continued to do so. The book was also
used in the Cathedral, and was in fact a sort of symbol
of the ' Cathedral party.'
The Diocese of St. Andrews did not of course stand
alone in condemning the book, but a similar censure was
pronounced by the other Synods, 1 and the Episcopal
College went sMll further in the controversy.
Mr. Wordsworth not only took this prominent part in
the condemnation of the book in the Synod, but also wrote
seven letters to the English ' Guardian ' newspaper, which
were occasioned by an inaccurate report of the Synod pro
ceedings in that paper sent by Mr. Chambers, and after
wards reprinted them as a Pamphlet (Edinb. 1850). This
and other actions on his part in the matter are recorded
by himself. 2
No doubt the Warden of Glenalmond was entirely in
the right in the main issue, but it cannot be denied that
he was over eager and anxious for completeness in what he
did. Accuracy and orderliness were to him objects of
almost a passionate devotion, carried into the details of
daily life. It was too, unfortunately, impossible for him
to be prominent in such a cause without seeming to act
somewhat harshly towards his own Diocesan, an old man
of eighty-five, and now afflicted with a painful disease.
One cannot read the old Bishop's reply to the Synod 3 with
its sigh < Eheu in quae reservasti me tempora ! ' without a
feeling of sympathy, and a wish that it had been possible
for his own Synod to have met him in a different manner.
For I do not think it possible to accept the explanation
1 See Neale's Life of Torry, p. 282 foil. Many documents are given
there which are necessary to the full understanding of the matter.
2 Annals, ii. 86.
a Dated Peterhead, 17 August, 1850, and preserved in the Minute Book,
p. 148. It was an echo of Archbishop Parker's note on his own consecration.
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 15
that the Bishop was led into rash action without knowing
what he was about, though, doubtless, his judgment may
have been weakened by old age.
No doubt Messrs. Forbes and Lendrum, and perhaps
Mr. Chambers, had much to do with the form of the book,
but the rubric ordering the dismissal of non-communicants
is, I think, conclusive as to the Bishop's real responsibility
for it ; l and certainly, in his controversy with the Episcopal
College, Bishop Torry showed a vigour and a determination,
in fact an obstinacy, which at once makes his own position
in the matter clear, and shows how difficult a man he was
to deal with. It also has to be borne in mind that for a
long time he had not resided in the Diocese, but at Peter-
head, north of Aberdeen, and had for a number of years
ceased to attend the Diocesan Synods. He therefore could
hardly expect to exercise the influence proper to a Bishop.
As regards the other matter which placed Mr. Words
worth out of harmony with certain others in the Diocese his
defence of the principle of Establishment 2 ' as an Article
of the Christian Faith ' it is necessary to remember that
even in England a shock had recently been given to that
principle by the Gorham Judgment, and that High
Churchmen in Scotland could not be expected to be
ardent defenders of a principle which at once brought
up the vexed question of their duty towards the Estab
lished Presbyterian Church in the midst of which they
were living. Mr. Wordsworth not only defended the
Establishment of Keligion in England, but he defended it
on a far-reaching principle deduced from Holy Scripture, as
the intention of Christ for the welfare of His Church and
people, whensoever and wheresoever circumstances reason -
1 See Appendix I. On Bishop Torry's- Prayer-book.
2 Especially in the sermon, National Christianity an Article of he
Christian Faith, published at the expense of his friend, T. L. Claughton, then
Vicar of Kidderminster, where it was preached in 1851.
16 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. I
ably admitted of it. He afterwards (in 1868) l for a time
attempted to draw a distinction between Establishment
such as we have in England and that which exists in
Scotland, in regard to which there is certainly much to
be said ; but he returned to his first broad view in later
years, and those who felt he went too far in 1853 had
divined what was the permanent bias of his mind.
Another element in the opposition to his election as
Bishop was the influence of his old friend Mr. W. E.
Gladstone, in whose principles Charles Wordsworth had
ceased to feel confidence, and with his usual outspokenness
took occasion to proclaim it. He could not do otherwise
than give his reasons for not supporting him on the
occasion of his first election for Oxford ; but it was perhaps
not very opportune to put forward his difference of opinion
on a special occasion when Mr. Gladstone was present, 2
and, of course, personally deeply interested namely, at the
consecration of the Chapel of Trinity College, Glenalmond.
He also published a ' Letter to Mr. Gladstone on the Doc
trines of Eeligious Liberty,' in reply to his letter to Bishop
W. Skinner, of Aberdeen (then Primus), 'On the Functions
of Laymen in the Church,' in which he pointed out the in
consistency of his opinions there expressed with what
he formerly held, and inferred that the principles there
enunciated would probably one day, sooner or later, lead the
writer to desire the separation of Church and State. This
must have been his last publication before his election.
Taking all these things into consideration and
1 See his Address to tlie Conference of Clergy and Laity at Perth,
1 October, 1868, p. 3, col. 2. This address was never printed in pamphlet
form, but only extracted from the Perthshire Journal. It is in many ways
valuable (see below, p. 26 and Chapter VI.).
2 I do not see. anything in the Fasque sermon preached in 1847 to which
Mr. Gladstone could reasonably object. For the Glenalmond sermon see
Annals, ii. 92, 93.
i
CH. I ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 17
remembering that Mr. J. Charles Chambers was at that time
Incumbent of the Cathedral, it is not surprising that the
party who were representatives of the Tractarian Movement
in England were anxious to prevent his election as Bishop.
His own words on this subject, written towards the close of
his life, may fitly be quoted l :
I was soon made to feel that no party spirit is more keen
and bitter than that which is directed against those who
sympathise to a great extent and approach near, but cannot
allow themselves to go all lengths in a movement, which appears
to them extreme and injudicious or ill-timed. Dr. Hook had
experienced this at Leeds.
During the whole period of my Wardenship at Glenalmond
I had to encounter much which would have been very trying
and discouraging to a man of less sanguine and resolute dis
position than I was ; and the discouragement for the most part
came from quarters in which I had every right and reason to
expect support. A few energetic men, of great zeal but little
judgment or discretion, were impatient to push on the cause of
our Church by ways which for many years proved a hindrance
rather than a help, and do so still to some extent at the present
time. They were men of advanced opinions, who looked for
guidance to Pusey and Keble rather than their own Bishops.
He then goes on to remark on the opposition of the
* Guardian ' newspaper and the prejudice excited against
himself when it was seen that he was determined to take
an independent line.
There was certainly in those days a strength and an
outspokenness of antagonism which was characteristic, not
only of those who took part in the Oxford Movement, but
of the religious newspapers on all sides, and even some
times of graver writings and graver personages. This was
partly owing to the fiery spirit of individuals, partly to the
anxiety and unrest of the times, when secessions to Borne
1 MS. i. 3 foil.
18 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
were actual, or imminent, or seemingly probable, not on
the part, as now, generally of weaker men, but of some
who were confessedly regarded as leaders. Still more was
it due to the miscalculation of the forces necessary to check
or crush the natural, and, in a degree, perfectly innocent
and salutary, development of parties and opinions within
the Church. Appeals to force, in the form of hostile votes
in Oxford assemblies, or of legislation in Parliament, or of
actions at law, were still considered natural, if not highly
creditable, weapons. It is not perhaps safe to anticipate
that they have entirely disappeared from use among us,
but it is probable that they will never again be resorted to
under similar circumstances with the same sanguine hopes,
and put in operation by men of the same high position.
It was then considered almost latitudinarian to love the
comprehensiveness of the Church of England. Now, thank
God ! there are few, at least among the clergy, who do not
understand in some degree why it is to be cherished.
In such days as these, however, Charles Wordsworth
was called to be a Bishop. His life in this great office was
not an easy one, and in many respects it was not a happy
one. He had, however, many qualities which enabled
him to make a better use of his opportunities, and to ride
through the storms which he encountered with less loss
than many a weaker man would have done. Though con
stitutionally nervous as regards things in prospect, he was
yet, as he describes himself, ' sanguine and resolute.' He
was determined to do whatever he did * with his might,'
and he threw himself eagerly into the study of any question
that presented itself. He gave his full attention to it, and,
as far as he was able, exhausted it, and thus satisfied
himself that he had done his best to arrive at the truth,
and to be able to deliver a fair judgment upon it. Having
done his best, he did not dwell with morbid introspection on
CH. i ELECTION TO THE SEE OF ST. ANDREWS 19
the details of the past. When a thing was done he did not
usually worry himself about it, or finely balance his own
motives, or the share which he had with others in pro
ducing a particular result. He had a very genuine and
healthy piety, an untroubled faith, and an unbroken confi
dence in the beliefs and convictions which he had partly
inherited and partly embraced. Eeligious doubt, such as
is now floating about us, was probably unknown to him.
Nor does he ever seem to have experienced that attraction
to the Eoman position, much less to Koman ways and
usages, which men as strong as himself have been known
at certain moments to feel. His mind, though logical,
well-trained and full, and with a great capacity for his
torical judgment, and aided by an admirable memory, was
not readily engaged by questions which concern the philo
sophical side of religion, or eagerly occupied about its more
mysterious aspects. He was naturally on the look out for
sympathy, and keenly appreciated it from whatever quarter
it came, and he was exceedingly anxious to be fair and
moderate in his judgments, but he did not enter very easily
and fully into the views and feelings of other thinkers.
Occasionally, too, his perception of the folly or weakness of
those with whom he was dealing was allowed to express
itself too frankly in epigrammatic phrase or telling anti
thesis. He was then apt to take things too seriously, and
to betray a certain lack of humour. This apparent severity
gave a wrong impression of his character and accounted
for some of the opposition which he met with, especially
where he yielded to an almost youthful impetuosity. No
doubt, too, his long experience as a schoolmaster intensified
the critical instincts of his nature, and made him ready to
express disapproval and to try to set things right, when a
man more used to policy and to weigh consequences would
have asked himself whether it was necessary to emphasise
c 2
20 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. i
and enlarge upon his disagreement in public. But gene
rally, and more markedly as he mellowed with age, he took
a large, serene and public view of things, believing that
time and good sense would work men round to views which
he supposed to have the strong balance of historical experi
ence and reasonableness in their favour. A character and
disposition of this kind, controlled by a clear and quiet
conscience, enabled him to bear opposition, suffering, and
disappointment, and to go on with hopefulness, where
many a softer or more self-conscious man would have been
thoroughly beaten and out of heart.
CHAPTEE II
THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP
' Manus ad clavum : oculus ad coelum.' 1
The Diocese of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dunblane Character of Epi
scopacy in Scotland Early history of the three Sees Historical interest
of the united Diocese and attractiveness of the district Strong points
of Presbyterian organisation and Scottish character Its attraction to
Bishop Wordsworth General conception of his duty Three prin
ciples adopted by him His progress in the movement towards reunion.
THE united Diocese of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dunblane
is in more than one respect the most eminent in Scotland.
Not only does it represent the primatial see and two others
of great dignity, but it contains within its boundaries * the
fairest portion of the Northern Kingdom.'
Before we consider its natural beauty and attractiveness
a few words will not be out of place as to the historical
interest attaching to the Diocese ; and I shall endeavour to
consider it not merely as the sphere of labour to which the
subject of this memoir was called, but also in connection
with the great task to which he specially applied himself
and the difficulties he experienced in it. In order to
understand the circumstances of a Scottish Bishop's life
it is well always to remember the general outlines of
the history of episcopacy in that country, which differ
1 This motto, which is in English ' The hand to helm : the eye to
heaven,' is regularly inserted in the Bishop's almanacks from 1857 onwards
up to 1874, sometimes with the addition of a sentence of Scripture. From 1875
onwards he wrote it, ' Oculus ad coelum : manus ad clavum,' with a reference
' see BisJwp Sanderson, ii. 93.' Sanderson writes it so. The words are on
the grave at St. Andrews : see p. 280.
L>2 EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
widely from those with which we are familiar in England.
It has been asserted, and I believe with correctness,
that the growth of the parochial system in Scotland
was more rapid than it was in England. 1 The growth of
Dioceses, on the other hand, was very much slower and
less systematic, though this was not from want of an
Episcopate. The members of the order of Bishops, as
distinct from flae Presbyterate, seem indeed usually, if not
always, to have been sufficient for the wants of the people,
and from time to time we have evidence that, even in early
ages, they formed a numerous body. They had, as else
where, a dignity and a certain class of duties which were
reserved to them alone. But they did not, as elsewhere,
form centres of unity, or possess the authority of Diocesan
Bishops with mutually exclusive jurisdictions. The centres
of unity and authority were rather the Abbats or heads of
monasteries, who might possibly be Bishops, but were gene
rally, like their chief, the Abbat of lona, only Presbyters. 2
In the latter case the Bishops were subordinate members
of the corporation, or they might apparently be living
unattached, possessed of Episcopal dignity, but with no
settled jurisdiction. 3
Whatever may have been the case in the south, where
the successors of St. Ninian (circa A.D. 360-432) in Gallo
way may have obtained, at an early period, some kind of
1 Sir John Connell, On Tillies (Edinb. 1815), i. p. 46, quoted by C. J.
Lyon, History of St. Andrews, i. p. 44 (Edinb. 1843), a book in which I
have found much that is valuable.
2 See on this subject generally George Grub's Ecclesiastical History of
Scotland, vol. i. chaps, x. ' The Ecclesiastical Government of lona,' and xi.
The Doctrine and Ritual of the Scottish Church during the Primacy of
lona.' Cp. e.g. p. 152: 'There was no Diocesan Episcopacy; properly
speaking, no Episcopal rule at all. Each abbot was the head of his own
monastery, and over all was the successor of St. Columba, the Primate of the
Picts and the Scots.'
* Even in later days the Bishop of the small Diocese of Brechin was a kind
of appendage to the Abbey of Arbroath rather than an independent Prelate.
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 23
jurisdiction, 1 there appears to have been no attempt at
Diocesan Episcopacy to the North of the Clyde and the
Forth till a very much later date. It was not till the
beginning of the tenth century that we find a Bishop
residing at St. Andrews, emerging suddenly in alliance
with the newly-risen power of the Kings of the Scots.
The notices of a Pictish primacy at Abernethy about
seven miles S.E. of Perth are too shadowy to be more than
just referred to in passing. For our present purpose it is
enough to remember that about the middle of the ninth
century Kenneth Mac Alpine, King of the Scots, absorbed
into his dominions the southern kingdom of the Picts and
transferred the primacy of the Abbat of Tona to the Abbat
of Dunkeld (A.D. 849). About fifty years later Constan-
tine III. and Kellach the Bishop possibly in consequence
of a recent raid by the Normans on Dunkeld entered into
a solemn compact to observe the laws and discipline and
rights of the Church. This act, which has been compared
to the signing of Magna Charta in England, took place at
Scone, near Perth, in the year 906, on a hill henceforth
called ' The Hill of Faith.' This act was not improbably
connected with the transference of the Primacy from
Dunkeld to St. Andrews 2 Kellach being the first Bishop
1 Cp. the monuments of the praecipui sacerdotes ' at Kirkmadrine in
Wigtonshire. St. Mungo or Kentigern at Glasgow, the contemporary of St.
Columba circa A.D. 600, appears to have had no definite successors. The
first Bishop of Glasgow was John Achaius, A.D. 1115-47.
2 The Eev. Hob. Keith (Hist. Cat. of the Scottish Bishops down to 1688 :
Edinb. 1824) gives seven different forms of the succession. The folio win gentry
(describing the circumstances referred to in the text) in the Chronicon
Pictorum, No. 83 (printed in the Appendix to John Pinkerton's Enquiry into
the History of Scotland preceding the Reign of Malcolm III. [1056], vol. i.
493), is one of the landmarks of Scottish Ecclesiastical History : ' Constan-
tinus fil. Edii tenuit regnum xl annis. Cujus tertio anno Normanni prae-
daverunt Duncalden, omnemque Albanian!. In sequent! utique anno occisi
sunt in Fraith heremi Normanni. Ac in vi. anno Constantinus rex, et
Cellachus episcopus, leges, disciplinasque fidei atque jura ecclesiarum evan-
geliorumque, pariter cum Scottis, in Colle Credulitatis, prope regali civitate
24 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
named in connection with the latter place. From this
point something like Diocesan Episcopacy begins in the
North of Scotland. The Bishop living in St. Andrews
received or assumed the title of ' Episcopus Scottorum '
or ' Scotorum,' or ' Episcopus Primus (or Maximus)
Scotorum,' keeping, however, his residence in the old
Culdean Monastery of Kirkheugh, which was situate east
of the Cathedral and overlooking the harbour. The first
Bishop of St. Andrews who established himself in a
separate dwelling was, characteristically enough, an
Englishman, Koger, son of the Earl of Leicester, who built
the castle at the end of the twelfth century (A.D. 1200).
Yet it was not till towards the close of the thirteenth cen
tury that the definite title ' Bishop of St. Andrews ' appears
on the seal of William Fraser or Frazer l (1279-1297 A.D.).
To the Bishop of this See was accorded by custom a kind
of Primacy. Nevertheless, it was not for a century and
three quarters after the death of Bishop Fraser that St.
Andrews acquired the dignity of a metropolitan and archi-
episcopal see. This was in the person of Patrick Graham,
who in the year 1472 received the corresponding titles from
Pope Sixtus IV., 2 and thus ousted the much disputed
metropolitical claims of the Archbishop of York. 3 It is
Scoan, devoverunt custodiri. Ab hoc die collis hoc meruit nomen i.e. Collis
Credulitatis. Et in suo viii. anno cecidit excelsissimus rex Hybernensium,
et archiepiscopus, apud Laignechos, i. Cormace filius Culenan,' etc. . . .
' et in senectute decrepitus [R. Constantinus] baculum cepit, et domino
servivit : et regnum mandavit Mael filio Domnail.' According to Pinkerton,
this chronicle was written about A.D. 1020.
1 It was used, however, somewhat earlier in the attestation of Charters
(see Dr. J. F. S. Gordon's Scotichronicon, i. 175, Glasgow, 1867). Roger
(1188-1202), before his consecration, is described on his seal as ' Electus
Sancti Andree,' ib. p. 145. Frazer, on one seal, is also ' Scottorum episcopus,
p. 174. It is noted that the Culdees were excluded for the first time from
voting for Frazer's predecessor, Wm. Wishart, in 1273.
2 Lyon's St. Andrews, i. 233 ; Grub, E. H. S. i. 376.
3 The southern part of Scotland was no doubt in the province of York,
but an attempt was made to claim supremacy over the whole kingdom. In
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 25
very remarkable that Scotland was so long in arriving at
this point of development, since as early as A.D. 816 the
Anglo-Saxon Council of Celchyth had made it a reason
amongst others for suspecting men in Scottish (which of
course included Irish) orders ' that they acknowledge no
metropolitans.' } But whilst Ireland had long accepted the
authority of Armagh, Scotland had before and during the
Church Ee volution of the sixteenth century only a short
and tragic succession of seven Archbishops of St. Andrews,
two of whom were boye and two were murdered. 2
The foundation of the second See of the United Diocese,
that of Dunkeld, is referred to the reign of Alexander I.
(A.D. 1124), the first Bishop being named Cormac, to whom,
besides the present Diocese of Dunkeld (including Dun-
fermline), were probably also assigned the territories after-
terwards divided between the Bishops of Dunblane and
Argyll. At the same time the Scottish provinces on the
left bank of the Spey, to the north-west and north of Perth
shire, were formed into the Bishopric of Murray.
The erection or restoration of Dunblane is attributed to
David L, the son of Malcolm and St. Margaret, about A.D.
1150, when the number of Dioceses was further increased
to its full extent, with the exception of Edinburgh, founded
in the time of Charles I.
1126, just after the foundation of the Sees of Dunkeld and Murray, an effort
was made at Rome to obtain the pallium for St. Andrews, but it was success
fully opposed by Thurston, Archbishop of York (see Grub, E. H. S. i.
p. 264).
1 See Haddan and Stubbs' Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents,
iii. 581 ; cp. Wilkins' Concilia, i. 170. A similar canon was enacted at
Chalons on the Saone in 813, but it went even further in declaring
ordinations by Scottish Bishops to be null. See Labbe, Concilia, vii. 1821 ;
Grub, E. H. S. i. 127-8.
2 1. William Schives or Shevez ; 2. James Stewart (aged 21) ; 3. Alex
ander Stewart (a youth of 18-23 years, natural son of King James IV., who
fell with his father at Flodden) ; 4. Andrew Forman ; 5. James Beaton ; 6.
Cardinal David Beaton ; and 7. John Hamilton. The two last were murdered.
26 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. u
Bishop Wordsworth felt the importance of his position
in succeeding to so wide an inheritance, if not of power yet
of tradition. It may not be out of place to quote here
from an important address which he delivered some years
later to the clergy and laity of the Diocese, 1 in which,
after sketching the history of the three Dioceses to his own
time, he passes to their present condition with some words
of graceful appreciation of the most distinguished of his
predecessors.
Before I proceed to take account of their present condition, I
feel that, after a retrospect which has shown us much to deplore,
it would be inexcusable if I failed to pay some tribute of respect
ful and grateful commemoration to those among my predecessors
who have been most deservedly eminent to Turgot in the See
of St. Andrews (A.D. 1109-1115), the chaplain and, after her
death, the biographer of the saintly Queen Margaret ; to James
Kennedy in the See first of Dunkeld and afterwards of St.
Andrews (1436-1466), the munificent founder of St. Salvador's
College, and in this and other respects the William of Wykeham
of our Scottish Church ; to Gavin Douglas in the See of
Dunkeld (1516-1527), our Scottish Cbaucer ; to John Spottis-
woode, Archbishop of St. Andrews 2 (1615-1639), who, having
died in London, was honoured by burial in Westminster Abbey ;
to Robert Leighton, in the See of Dunblane (1661-1673), our
Scottish Fenelon ; to Thomas Rattray, in the See of Dunkeld
(1727-1743), equally memorable for his theological attainments
and for bis services in securing to our Church, as disestablished,
the basis of the pure Scriptural and Apostolical constitution
which it now enjoys. 3
The Diocese, as now consolidated, had not, indeed, very
long been so large in extent as it is at present. The name
1 At a Conference held at Perth, reprinted from the Pertlishire Journal
and Constitutional of Thursday, 1 October, 1868. See Chap. VI. below.
2 The historian.
8 This refers to his securing the restoration of Diocesan Episcopacy
against the system of ' College Bishops.' He was owner of Craig Hall, in a
romantic situation, near Blairgowrie, in Perthshire.
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 27
of the See of St. Andrews had been for 140 years in abey
ance, since the death of Archbishop Eoss in June 1704
(when the primacy and metropolitical jurisdiction of that
See came to an end), until 1844. The nonjuring Bishops
appear to have been afraid of trenching on the prerogatives
of the Sovereign whom they acknowledged, which they
supposed to include that of assigning jurisdiction to par
ticular prelates. They had, in fact, tied their own hands
by assent to the ' Assertory Act ' of 1669, under which
Archbishop Burnet was suspended, and Leighton (nomi
nally at least) translated to Glasgow. At first they were so
timid as to drop all Diocesan titles, but these, after an
interval, were revived under Bishop Eattray's influence.
It is not quite clear why they shrunk from the further step
of reviving the Archbishopric, since the assignment of
metropolitan jurisdiction is no more part of the prerogative
than the distribution of Dioceses. But probably they were
afraid of alarming their countrymen, to whom the traditions
of Archbishops were worse even than those of simple
prelacy. However this may have been, in the temporary
arrangements then and thereafter made, the county of Fife
was treated as a Diocese, with no special pre-eminence,
sometimes being administered alone and sometimes in con
junction with other districts. It was not till September
1844 that it was determined, by an Episcopal Synod held
at Edinburgh, that the ancient name should be restored,
and from that date Bishop Torry took the title of Bishop of
St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dunblane. 1
The Diocese thus constituted consists of the entire
counties of Fife and Kinross, the whole of Perthshire except
the Carse of Gowrie, Clackmannan (less Alloa) , two parishes
1 Grub, E. H. S. iv. 250. Cp. iii. 346 foil. Before that date he was
for a time ' Bishop of Dunkeld, Dunblane, and Fife ' (Neale's Life of
Torry, p. 202).
28 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
of Stirlingshire, and a great part of Forfar. In naming
this district ' the fairest portion of the Northern Kingdom '
I am but accepting the judgment of Sir Walter Scott, who
applies that title to the county of Perth, 1 a title which he
supposes would be given to it by any intelligent stranger,
while the natives of any other district of Scotland would
acknowledge its merits at least as second to those of their
own home. Bounded on the south by the Kiver Forth, and
containing the lovely lakes by which it and its tributary
the Teith are fed, it embraces nearly the whole basin of
two other rivers, the Earn and the Tay, which rise amidst
the most beautiful mountains and descend through the
most romantic glens and passes of the Highlands. In
Perth it has a capital, close to the old royal residence of
Scone, on so attractive and so obviously commodious a
site at the head of the Firth of Tay, that its ancient
history has been prolonged into the present ages by suc
cessful commerce, which has made it one of the most
flourishing cities of Scotland. In St. Andrews, on the
sweep of a great bay of the Fifeshire coast, it has a uni
versity city, with a tragic yet not wholly mournful past,
relieved with much that is bright and dignified, and with a
sunny, breezy, present charm of its own which almost every
one who knows the place has experienced. A similar interest
and a similar beauty attach to the other traditional
centres. The Tay, which is glorious at Perth, is more
beautiful still in its narrower current higher up in the
soft wooded valley, where it is spanned by Telford's bridge,
and flows between the ancient city of Dunkeld and the
modern village of Birnam. At Dunblane the Allan, famous
in song, which drains the lowlands where Agricola fought
and conquered Calgacus 2 and Mar, in 1715, disputed the
1 Fair Maid of Perth, beginning of Chap. I.
2 The camps at Ardoch, near Braco, a short distance from Greenloaning
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 29
ground evenly with Argyll, 1 passes quietly beneath the
picturesque cliff on which the Cathedral stands, and where
the saintly Leighton loved to walk. At each little city was
a ruined cathedral, with some special grace and glory of its
own, one of which, Dunblane, was gradually restored
during Bishop Wordsworth's latter years in a manner which
augurs well for the future progress of Church life in Scot
land in the beauty of holiness.
At Abernethy, an old Pictish centre, stands one of the
two round towers of Scotland, which a good authority
supposes to have been erected as early as the reign of the
third King Nectan (A.D. 712-727), and by the Northum
brian architects of the monastery of Jarrow, 2 and to be
a remarkable link of connection with the golden age of
the North-Anglian Church in the time of the Venerable
Bede.
At Glamis, in the northern part of his Diocese, is a
castle of unparalleled dignity and strangely fascinating
traditions. At Forfar, hard by, ie a centre of Church
life, and of persistent ministry in the evil days of the last
century, which has shown what the Episcopal Church may
be to the people when led by devoted men.
At Dunfermline, on rising ground overlooking the Firth
Station, are the largest and most complete in Britain, and are supposed to
be those used by Agricola A.D. 88. See Tacitus, Agricola, chap. 29 foil.
I visited them 2 September, 1895. I find from his diary that my uncle
visited them 11 August, 1876.
1 At the battle of Sheriffmuir, though neither side gained the victory,
Argyll prevented the Pretender's army from crossing the Forth,
2 Dr. Petrie, quoted in Murray's Handbook to Scotland, p. 279, ed. 5,
1884. See also J. Kussell Walker, Pre-Beformation Churches in Fifeshire,
fol. Edinb. 1895, from which I gather that it was connected with a Church
dedicated to St. Bridget. The other round tower in the Scottish mainland
is at Brechin, and is considered to be several centuries later. It is con
nected with the Cathedral. Abernethy is sometimes called the Pictish
capital, but that is said rather to have been at Forteviot. See Grub, E. H. S.
i. 132 and 116 foil, who records the intercourse between Nectan and Ceolfrid
and possibly Bede himself, from Bede, H. E. v. 21.
30 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
of Forth, the southern boundary of the Diocese, is a busy
manufacturing city which contains some of the most
interesting memorials of the royal families of Scotland.
Here on a mound, surrounded by a deeply-cut defile,
Malcolm Canmore built his modest tower, where he wel
comed his sainted wife Margaret flying from the Norman
Conqueror, and here they became parents of a line of
kings. Here, too, in close proximity, they founded
together the Benedictine Abbey, where they and their
descendants, down to Kobert the Bruce, lie buried. The
solemn almost empty Norman nave, in style not unlike
Durham, is nearly all that remains of the ' Westminster
Abbey of Scotland,' but the great ruined front of the later
palace, close to and connected with the abbey buildings, is
intimately associated with the history of Queen Mary and
her descendants the English Stewarts, and carries on our
thoughts to times that closely affect our own.
At Kinross, which lies half-way between Dunfermline
and Perth, is a bright little county town, with red- tiled
roofs that might belong to Lincolnshire, lying on the
western shore of the picturesque basin of Lochleven the
glory of that little county guarded by the two Lomonds.
The reader needs hardly to be reminded of the historic
islands which rise from its surface, one, St. Serfs, carrying
us back to the early times of the Culdees, the other, with
its peel tower and rampart wall, the scene of one of the
hard captivities, and of the romantic escape of the ill-fated
Mary Stewart.
It would take too long to describe, even in few words,
the castles, forts, and battlefields, the abbeys and churches
and sacred shrines, of this fair district. Everywhere
throughout these counties are scenes that delight those
who look upon them, and raise images of love and pity in
the reflecting mind. Everywhere are signs of old piety
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 31
disturbed by conflict, and suddenly arrested in its develop
ment, but ready to rise again ; of old honour and glory, of
baronial state and Highland chieftaincy, now bent down
and ruined in civil warfare, now emerging from it with
renewed bravery. Everywhere are signs of modern
activity in religion, but of religion at variance with itself
and eager to display its differences. Everywhere, and
above all other sources of interest, is a strong and self-
confident humanity, yet with a quaint charm, like that of
the country itself, from its blending of Celtic and Lowland
characteristics. Here you have enthusiastic devotion to a
cause or a person, reckless of consequences, side by side
with plain good sense of duty and respect for others.
Here you will find tenderness and poetry mingled with
roughness and bluntness, strange outspokenness and
equally strange reserve, generosity and shrewdness of
dealing, the expected and the unexpected, doors opened
into the soul and suddenly shut in fact all the marked
characteristics of our composite British nature,' more
developed than in England, and, more often perhaps than
with us, united in the same persons. To Bishop Words
worth, who had come into such close contact with his uncle
William, and was in many ways imbued with his spirit, the
country which had inspired some of his most characteristic,
that is to say, at once most spiritual and most human
poems, could not but be full of an inexpressible charm. It
had also a sort of family interest of another kind, from the
exertions of the men whom the Wordsworths were specially
brought up to honour, Bishop Horsley, William Stevens,
and Joshua Watson, who were the particular friends and
benefactors of the Scottish clergy.
No region could be fitter than this to evoke the desires
of an earnest and persistent man in the fulness of life and
power, anxious for the coming of the Kingdom of God. It
32 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
was, as he said to a friend l (towards the close of his long
life), to our Lord's office as King that he looked with most
earnestness for stay and comfort, in the midst of the con
troversies and divisions in which his lot was thrown. It
would not be untrue to say that this was the guiding
principle of his life. Such a country could not fail to
stimulate him to vigorous action of some sort in the hope
of contributing j;o the fulfilment of his Master's designs and
prayers. Here was a strong people and a religious people
all about him, separated as to its great bulk into three
opposing Presbyterian communions, divided, as every
Englishman feels, for no sufficient reasons, and yet divided
by a hostility, or at any rate a rivalry, of a most practical
kind. His own historic Church, which had the right, as he
notes, to the territorial titles, at least as regards its
Dioceses, 2 was but a fraction of the population (in his later
1 Dr. J. Myers Danson (of Aberdeen), who quoted his words in his paper
entitled ' Charles Wordsworth,' one of the lectures on Scottish Church
Worthies, given in St. Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh, in 1895.
2 This is his note, MS. i. 11 : ' Our use of territorial titles. Some
persons imagine that the use of territorial titles of the ancient titles of
their respective sees is a usurpation on the part of the Scotch Bishops, and
an intrusion into the privileges of the Established (Presbyterian) Church.
But this is a mistake. When Lord John Eussell brought in his Ecclesiastical
Titles Bill it included the prohibition of these titles, but the clause was
withdrawn and our titles were purposely left unprohibited ; in other words,
they were recognised and allowed by the Legislature. In my own case,
when I was elected Fellow of Winchester [the new statutes made by the
Governing Body and approved by her Majesty in Council, November 20,
1873, contained the following clause, under the title " Fellows," p. 4 : " The
llight Eeverend Charles Wordsworth, Bishop of St. Andrews, shall enjoy as
a Fellow of the College the same pecuniary interest, as well as the same
status therein, as the Fellows elected before the passing of the 'Public
Schools Act, 1854 ']." ' I have completed this note by the words in brackets
taken from a memorandum on a loose paper. My uncle has not, perhaps,
stated his case quite as strongly as he might have done, for not only are the
titles ' left unprohibited,' but section 3 of the ' Ecclesiastical Titles Assump
tion Act (14 & 15 Viet. c. 60) of 1851 ' provides as follows : ' This Act shall
not extend or apply to the assumption or use by any Bishop of the Protestant
Episcopal Church in Scotland, exercising episcopal functions within some
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 33
years he described it as 3 per cent.). In the Diocese
which he was called upon to administer, it had, with the
partial exceptions of Perth, Forfar, and Muthill, no such
strong traditional centres as exist in the great towns of
Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Aberdeen. At the end
of his life the total Church population of the Diocese was
returned as under 7,000, and it had largely increased in
forty years. It was, in fact, to a flock of only about 3,239
souls, divided among some twenty-one charges, that he was
at the first called to minister. We can readily imagine
what a constant disproportion he must have felt between
his will and power to guide and teach on the one side and
the willingness of those about him to be guided.
Nor could he be blind to the many points of difference
and of superiority which marked the position of the Presby
terian clergy and their flocks when compared, for instance,
with the majority of the dissenting ministers and their
congregations in England. The Genevan polity, intro
duced by Melville, though much out of harmony with our
ways of thought and feeling in the Church of England,
nevertheless retained and exhibited many of the elements
of true Church life, and discharged many of the educational
functions which are characteristic of a national Church. 1
It was a polity, not a conglomerate of varying congre
gations. Not only in the Establishment, but in the two
great schisms from it there was strong parochial feeling
a realisation that every resident in a place stood or ought
to stand in some relation to the Christian religion. The
district or place in Scotland, of any name, style, or title in respect of such
district or place, but nothing herein contained shall be taken to give any
right to any such Bishop to assume or use any name, style, or title which
he is not now by law entitled to assume or use.' This Act was repealed in
1871 by 34 & 35 Viet. c. 53.
1 In illustration of what I mean, I may be permitted to refer to my
Charge of 1894 (part 2), entitled The Educational Functions of a National
Church (Salisbury: Brown & Co.).
84 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
minister was often a true ' persona ecclesias,' a parson with
pastoral habits and instincts, not merely or chiefly a
preacher. We may believe that this attitude, especially in
the Established Church, has been much stimulated by the
presence and example of the Episcopal clergy ; but there
was a basis prepared for it to grow upon, and during the
lifetime of Bishop Wordsworth it was constantly growing.
The ' Elders ' and heads of families formed a religious
Parish Council or ' Kirk Session,' which was perhaps often
fidgetty and wrong-headed ; but its work interested them,
and their friends and relations, in the doctrine, worship, and
discipline of the Church, as well as in its finance, and thus
realised a side of Church life which is often felt to be defec
tive in England. Above the Parish was the Presbytery, and
then again the Synod representing something like a Diocesan
area, and, more important still, the General Assembly,
the backbone of the whole system. More than all this
organisation, the mass of the people, baptised Christians, 1
and better instructed in the details of their faith than the
majority of our own people, and none the less ' members of
Christ, children of God, and inheritors of the Kingdom of
Heaven,' were zealous believers in the Presbyterian system,
and had many evidences of the presence of the Holy Spirit
among them. English people have recently had their
minds opened to the depth and reality of religious feeling
among the Scottish poor by the humorous and pathetic
descriptive sketches of Messrs. Barrie and Crockett, and
even more by those of the Free Church minister who writes
under the name of ' Ian Maclaren.' 2 It may be interesting
1 Something will be said on Presbyterian Baptism in Chap. III., p.
58 foil. The subject was one discussed in the Bishop's first Charge,
September 1854.
2 In this connection Mr. Barrie's best work must be considered to be
A Window in Thrums, and Auld Licht Idylls, and Mr. S. E. Crockett's two
volumes of sketches, called The Stickit Minister and some Common Men,
en. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 35
to the reader to be reminded that the valley and village
which is idealised in ' Drumtochty ' is understood to be
close to Trinity College, Glenalmond, while the ' Thrums '
of the first writer is known to be Kirriemuir in Forfarshire,
also in the Diocese. But merely from a literary point of
view these characteristics were evident to every careful
reader of Sir Walter Scott and William Wordsworth.
Burns's * Cottar's Saturday Night ' had long been a classic,
and Gait's * Annals of the Parish,' published in 1821,
might almost seem worthy to be called the Scottish * Vicar of
Wakefield.' But specially would Charles Wordsworth feel
the attraction of such pictures as those drawn by his uncle
of the Leech-gatherer in the short poem called ' ^Resolution
and Independence,' and the longer and more detailed
portraiture of the humble Wanderer a gentle and philo
sophic pedlar who may be called the hero of the ' Excur
sion.'
Such passages as the following from the first book of
the * Excursion ' must have had a peculiar attraction for
him :
Among the hills of Athol was he born ;
Where, on a small hereditary farm,
An unproductive slip of rugged ground,
His parents, with their numerous offspring, dwelt ;
A virtuous household, though exceeding poor !
Pure livers were they all, austere and grave,
And fearing God ; the very children taught
Stern self-respect, a reverence for God's Word,
And an habitual piety, maintained
With strictness scarcely known on English ground.
and Bog-Myrtle and Peat chiefly tales of Galloway. But from the point
of view of the historian of religion, perhaps Mr. Watson's idealised Perth
shire villagers make even more impression. I believe that the volume
Beside the Bonnie Briar-bush has passed its hundredth thousand. I saw
it first in Australia and New Zealand, where it seemed to be as popular as
at home.
D 2
36 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
And then again from the same book describing the
same character :
The Scottish Church, both on himself and those
With whom from childhood he grew up, had held
The strong hand of her purity ; and still
Had watched him with an unrelenting eye.
This he remembered in his riper age
With gratitude, and reverential thoughts.
But by the native vigour of his mind,
By his habitual wanderings out of doors,
By loneliness and goodness and kind works,
Whate'er in docile childhood or in youth,
He had imbibed of fear or darker thought
Was melted all away : so true was this,
That sometimes his religion seemed to me
Self-taught, as of a dreamer in the woods.
Nor was the slow deliberate way of speaking, habitual
to many Scotsmen, uncongenial to one who was so careful
in his own choice of language. The reader will not be
sorry to have William Wordsworth's description of it, in
the person of the Leech-gatherer, recalled to his mind :
His words came feebly from a feeble chest,
But each in solemn order followed each,
With something of a lofty utterance drest
Choice words and measured phrase, above the reach
Of ordinary men ; a stately speech
Such as grave livers do in Scotland use,
Religious men who give to God and man their dues.
As long as the Bishop remained specially connected
with Glenalmond, and to a great extent absorbed in daily
scholastic duties, the force of these considerations would
not be so strongly felt, though felt it undoubtedly was.
But when removed from it and thrown upon himself to
answer the question how he could best spend his time to
the glory of God and the increase of Christ's Kingdom, he
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 37
could not long doubt about the answer. He could best
serve God by doing his best to reconcile the Presbyterians
to the ancient Church and thus to create one united body
of Christ, primitive, Apostolic, and orthodox, for the three
kingdoms. This became the leading principle of his life,
and gave a unity and a dignity to it which otherwise, in so
small a sphere, it might have lacked. It was for this idea
that he lived. Other interests, both literary and religious,
though pursued with the eagerness and love of complete
ness which distinguished all he did, came more and more
to be subsidiary to this great end.
Such was the basis of his after life, and when the
practical question was raised, by what steps and through
what means reunion was to be effected, two answers arose as
naturally as the first. The primary necessity of all was to
prevent the capture of the Scottish Episcopal Church by a
party, especially by a party manned by Englishmen and con
trolled from England. The duty forced upon him, as he sup
posed, by the circumstances of his election was to prevent
the Church from drifting into a mere Donatising sect (as
he sometimes thought of it), very narrow, and at the same
time high and arrogant ; to avoid giving offence to Presby
terian prejudices, and to present the whole Church to the
nation in as Scriptural and reasonable a form as possible.
The second duty was to convince the strong Scottish
understanding that their own way was, at least in part
wrong, and that ours was, in some respects at least, more
right. These two duties were taken in hand at once and
pursued, with more or less persistency, to the end of his
long life. A third emerged and developed in course of
time as the strength of the National Presbyterian ' Church
of Scotland ' was better understood by him, and the
chequered course of the history of the country, and the
nature of the precedents for approaches to union, became
38 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. n
more familiar in detail. This was the duty, as he con
ceived it, of making concessions on the part of Episco
palians, whereby the principle of Episcopacy should be
saved, while temporary expedients might be adopted to
make the reconciliation less uncongenial to the bulk of the
people and especially to their ministers. Coincident with
this conviction came his practice of cultivating friendly
relations with ^Presbyterians, especially when asked to
preach on special occasions in their churches.
The following pages will exhibit the working of these
convictions in the Bishop's mind the first especially in
his relations with St. Ninian's Cathedral and his action in
the Eucharistic controversy and in his attempts to pro
mote the co-operation of the laity in Church Government.
The second effort was mainly a literary and social one, and
exhibited itself not so much in private correspondence as in
letters to the newspapers, an instrument of which he made
unreserved use, and in a long series of Charges, tracts,
books, and lectures in defence of the Episcopal position.
Four of these may be particularly named, two of them
specially referring to Scotland, viz. a ' Discourse on the
Scottish Keformation ' published in 1861, and a ' Discourse
on Scottish Church History from the Keformation to the
Present Time ' in 1881, and two on the general subject of the
three-fold ministry, viz. ' Outlines of the Christian Minis
try,' published in 1872, followed by ' Kemarks on Bishop
Lightfoot's Essay on the Christian Ministry,' which ap
peared in 1879.
The whole subject of Keunion is treated in various
aspects in the two volumes of c Public Appeals on Behalf of
Christian Unity,' in which he collected and republished a
number of his previous addresses, connecting them together
by valuable introductions in which he summarised the
progress of opinion on his own part and that of others.
CH. ii THE DIOCESE AND THE BISHOP 39
These two volumes were issued in twelve parts in 1886,
and culminated in the last number, entitled ' The Case
of non-Episcopal Ordination in reference to Scotland fairly
considered ' (a Synodal address delivered at Perth, 3 Sep
tember, 1885), in which he stated the kind of compromise
he was prepared to recommend should the matter ever
come to a practical issue. Up to the last fortnight of his life
he was still vigorously at work on the same topic, the most
important of his later utterances being his powerful letter
to the late Archbishop Benson of Canterbury in 1888, and
his Charge to his Diocese after the Lambeth Conference was
over. Previous to these publications he had, as I have said,
taken advantage of opportunities of co-operation with Presby
terians by preaching and lecturing to audiences in which
they formed the principal part. The College pulpit of St.
Andrews, of which University he became an honorary D.D.
in 1884, afforded him a sort of neutral ground, as we shall
see in a later chapter (Chap. VII.). He also delivered an
address to the students of Aberdeen in the hall of
Marischal College on Sunday evening, 21 February, 1886.
He prepared a similar address (which he did not deliver)
to the members of the Young Men's Christian Association
of St. Cuthbert's Parish in Edinburgh, which he issued on
St. Andrew's Day of the same year under the title, ' The
Yoke of Christ to be borne in Youth.' One of his last public
appearances outside his Diocese was to preach a * Com
memoration Sermon ' before the University of Edinburgh in
St. Giles' Cathedral, 18 April, 1889, the subject being ' A
Threefold Eule of Christian Duty needed for these Times.'
This refers to his text, 1 Thess. v. 21, 22 : * Prove all
things ; hold fast that which is good. Abstain from all
appearance of evil.'
40
CHAPTEK III
EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 !
* ' Crescunt dona, crescunt rationes.'
Early Episcopate Perth Early history of St. Ninian's Cathedral Bishop
Torry's Statutes Characters of Provost Fortescue and Canon Humble
Eevised Constitution accepted Enthronement Primary Charge (1854)
The validity of Presbyterian Baptism The author's judgment on it
Residence at Muthill till Easter 1855 Beginnings of the Eucharistic
Controversy Attacks upon the Scottish Office Three Sermons on Holy
Communion and their value Extracts from them Charles Wordsworth's
attitude at various times (1858, 1859, 1862, 1884, 1889) towards the
Scottish Office The formula of Invocation in it Suggestions for the
amendment of the Consecration Prayer His final judgment The Bishop
at Dunkeld Finds a home after three years at Pitcullen Bank, Perth
End of ' Annals, August 1856 ' Papal aggression in the East ' The
Feu House (1858) The Bishop's taste.
AFTER leaving Glenalmond, which he and his family relin
quished with many tender regrets, the Bishop took his usual
midsummer holiday in England, which included, as of
course, visits to his wife's home at Burghclere and to Warden
Barter at Winchester, and on many occasions also to my
father's country vicarage at Stanford, in the Vale of White
Horse, Berks, or to his canonical house at Westminster. 2
Early in September he returned to Perth, the city which
was afterwards to be his home for about twenty years,
where he at first resided in lodgings in Kose Terrace, an
open situation, with good views in front of it.
Those who know anything of Scotland are generally
1 See Annals ii., chap. ix. The motto is from one of the Bishop's
almanacks.
2 This ie the house in Little Cloisters, now inhabited by Canon Charles
Gore and the Community of the Resurrection, and is therefore still happily
a home of Christian learning.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOI'ATK 1853-1856 41
more or less familiar with Perth, which, as one of the keys
of the Highlands, 1 has a position scarcely surpassed by that
of any city in the United Kingdom. It lies compact and
foursquare between two fair, green riverside meadows, the
North and South Inches, presenting all the appearance of
having grown out of a Eoman encampment, such as that
practical nation would naturally have placed on so com
manding a site. The Tay, which here almost becomes an
estuary, flows broad and strong past the city and its two
meadows ; a nobler Tiber past a nobler field of Mars, as
local patriotism is fond of reflecting. To the north,
across the Tay, lies Scone Palace, the ancient home of
kings, and the meeting place of many Scottish Parliaments
and Councils. To the south-east and south lie Kinnoul and
Moncreiffe Hills, forming a picturesque background, and
delightful breathing places to those who feel the lower level
relaxing. The river is crossed by one bridge at the north
east corner of the ancient city, taking the place of a more
central one which was destroyed in 1621. The railway
bridge from the south-east is accessible also to foot-
passengers.
Perth is the only town of large population in the Diocese,
and it is, no doubt, the most central place in it. It was in
ancient times in the Diocese of St. Andrews, 2 though not in
the same county, being no doubt connected with it through
1 The other would, I suppose, be Stirling, and perhaps Dunblane.
2 My uncle has this note in his Virgil Notebook : ' It is curious that
Bishop Torry, in 1810 and after [1847, see Life by Neale, p. 302], is under
the mistake of supposing that Perth was in his Diocese as Bishop of
Dunkeld. It is in the Diocese of St. Andrews. At the latter date he had
been Bishop of St. Andrews, and was therefore justified in writing thus.' He
became Bishop of Fife, I think, in 1838, and took the title of St. Andrews in
1844. The old arrangement may be seen by looking at the map given by
Skene of the dioceses in the time of David I., reproduced in W. Stephen's
History of tJie Scottish Church, i. chap, xix., 1894. But Bishop Torry
probably thought of the customary division of his own times, when ' Fife '
was still a diocesan district.
42 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
the fact that kings resided constantly both in its own castle
and at Scone. But it was also easily accessible to the two
other united dioceses, which St. Andrews itself is not. It
was therefore very naturally chosen by the promoters of
the Cathedral scheme in the time of Bishop Torry as the
site for their new institution.
In order to understand the position of things which
Bishop Wordsworth found here when he left Glenalmond,
and was considering where he should settle, we must go
back for a few years and trace the outline at least of the
history of St. Ninian's from 1847 to 1854, and particularly
recall its constitution and the character of the persons who
had most to do with its management.
At the time of Bishop Torry 's death the Cathedral had
been in actual existence as a building for about two years.
The scheme had been first proposed by Lord Forbes, 1 and
recommended by the Bishop in August 1847. Two years
later the first stone of the church was laid (16 September,
1849), and rather more than a year after that the first
portion of the Cathedral, including the chancel, was conse
crated 11 December, 1850, by Bishop Forbes of Brechin,
acting by commission for Bishop Torry.
A few weeks later the aged Bishop gave his formal
approval to the Statutes of the Cathedral (6 January, 1851).
He survived long enough to hear of its working with some
measure of efficiency and with considerable beauty of wor
ship, but he passed away on 3 October, 1852. He never,
I believe, saw the building, but was buried in it ten days
later.
The constitution of the Cathedral body was a somewhat
irregular one. It was never submitted to the Synod nor was
it communicated to the clergy. What authority it possessed
1 Farquhar's Episcopal History of Perth, p. 282.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 43
proceeded entirely from the Bishop's sanction. 1 There
may have been ages in which such sanction alone would
have been sufficient to establish a Chapter, but such
power could hardly be supposed to be practically in exist
ence in the Scottish Church of the nineteenth century, in
which Synodal government was so definitely and in some
respects so strongly developed. Nor was the constitution
in itself one which could naturally commend itself to the
Diocese, or to Bishop Torry's own successor, when it was
tried and put in action. The following account of it is
given by a member of the present Chapter, Canon George
Farquhar, in his valuable recent volume, * The Episcopal
History of Perth.' 2
Cathedral Statutes.
The Statutes were twenty-seven in number, and, especially
in view of future events, it will be necessary to indicate their
leading features. All the real power was lodged in the lesser
Chapter that is, in the Dean and Canons residentiary. The
entire patronage was in their hands that is, they elected the
Dean, Canons, Prebendaries, and appointed all other officials.
They could increase or decrease the number of these. They had
the right of altering the Constitution ; and thus they took the
initiative in everything. The position of the Bishop was of a
more passive kind : ordinarily the work of the institution would
go on without him. He had no more authority over the Cathedral
than over any other incumbency. He was to adjudge all
disputes when referred to him ; he had a veto upon all appoint
ments, and everything that was done was ineffectual without his
ratification. The Scottish Communion Office, with the ancient
usages thereof, was to be exclusively used in the Cathedral. The
clergy of the Diocese were hardly connected with the foundation ;
1 Both the old and the new constitution may be found in extenso in the
Appendix to Canon Humble's Letter to the Bishop of St. Andrews (Masters,
Lond. 1859, pp. 63-68).
2 By Geo. T. S. Farquhar, M.A., Canon and Precentor of Perth Cathedral
and Supernumerary of the Diocese (Perth : James H. Jackson, 20 High
Street, pp. 299 foil. 1894).
44 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
since, when installing the Prebendaries, the Chapter were not
free to select from the whole body, but must only choose those
who held incumbencies founded by the Cathedral, or the
patronage of which was somehow vested in the hands of its
officials.
The only point of interest in this constitution not touched
upon by Canon Farquhar is the modified provision for
celibacy in section XII.: 'It is hereby provided that the
Dean and Canons remain unmarried so long as they con
tinue to be resident in the college attached to the Cathedral
Church.'
The idea was to build a college or clergy-house for the
residence of the Cathedral body ; but this never went further
than the taking of a private house as a school, which was
to be for a lower class of boys than those who could go to
Glenalmond, and to furnish the materials for a choir. 1
The relation of the Bishop to the Chapter was not, however,
as Canon Farquhar seems to imply, even as authoritative
as that of the Bishop in respect to an ordinary incumbent.
It was not, and was clearly not intended to be, so effective
in its control or power of intervention. It was rather
intended to be that of a Bishop towards one of the cathedrals
of the old foundation in England, e.g. such as Lincoln,
Wells, or Salisbury. He was to be visitor, and with a strictly
denned visitatorial power, with a right of hearing com
plaints and ratifying new statutes, and sanctioning certain
new departures and appointments. It is not clear that he
would even have had the right to visit ' proprio motu '-
that is, when he thought it expedient. Certainly there was
no provision for his taking any part in the Cathedral services
or preaching at his own will, as, of course, he can do at any
1 See Farquhar's History, pp. 297, 305, ' the dining-hall of St. Ninian's
College.' 314 : ' The maximum number of boarders at any one time was
30, of whom 16 were choristers. There was, besides, a school for the poor,
the largest attendance at which was 80.'
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 45
church or chapel of the Diocese to which he has instituted
an incumbent.
The attempt was, in fact, to transfer bodily to Scotland
an institution of a very English character, such as is suitable
to a strong and well-endowed corporation with a lengthy
history and traditions, and having a large population round
it, and in a Church where the Bishop's incessant occupations
are such that he can only give a small portion of the time
to the affairs of his Cathedral, even if he be resident in close
proximity to it. All the members of the resident body
were Englishmen. The three canons were, Eev. John
Charles Chambers, 1 chancellor ; Kev. Henry Humble,
chaunter or precentor ; and Eev. Joseph Haskoll, 2 sacristan
with the duties of the treasurer in one of our ancient
cathedrals. These three first asked Mr. Kenrick to under
take the office of Dean, and then Dr. J. M. Neale. They
then, being unsuccessful in both these directions, elected the
Kev. Edward Bowles Knottesford Fortescue on 7 January,
1851, the day after the Statutes had been signed by the
Bishop. He was instituted in June of the same year.
Of the body so constituted, only two continued to reside
after Bishop Wordsworth settled at Perth. The other two,
Canons Chambers and Haskoll, went out of residence in
1853, 3 leaving as the chief supporters and authorities of
1 Mr. Chambers resigned 17 June, 1853, and became Incumbent of St.
Mary Magdalen's, Harlow, and in 1856 of St. Mary's, Crown Street, Soho.
2 Mr. Haskoll ceased to reside in 1853, and became Incumbent of
Laurencekirk, and in 1854 Hector of East Barkwith, in Lincolnshire. He
was a man of literary abilities.
3 The Bishop appointed as their successors Eev. J. A. Sellar and Bev.
R. Campbell. Mr. Sellar was educated at Glenalmond, and was ordained to
the Glenalmond Mission. He then became a Master there, and, when he
was transferred to Perth, was put in charge of the Choir School there. He
resigned in 1858 from want of sufficient means of support to the Cathedral,
and was afterwards for many years Incumbent of St. Peter's, Edinburgh.
Mr. Campbell resigned in 1856 for the same reason, and soon afterwards
joined the Church of Rome.
46 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. m
St. Ninian's the Dean, afterwards better known as Provost
Fortescue, and Canon Humble.
As these two members of the Chapter were for a number
of years in close relations with the Bishop, and often,
unhappily, in relations of constraint and conflict, it is right
that the reader should have some detailed description of
their character. I have been fortunate enough to obtain
it, partly from general report, but more particularly from
the hand of one who was personally friendly to them, and
who sympathised with them in many of their views and
practices, so that it may, I believe, be considered free, at
any rate, from bias against them.
Provost Fortescue, who was educated at Wadham
College, Oxford, was at the time of his election as Dean
perpetual curate of Wilmcote in Worcestershire, near Strat-
ford-on-Avon. He was a gentleman of refinement and of
good family ; l married (since 1838) to Miss Frances Anne
Spooner, daughter of the Archdeacon of Coventry, and
sister to Mrs. A. C. Tait. He was a man rather of feeling
than of learning, but thoughtful and able ; and one who
exercised considerable influence, both by his preaching
and his personal intercourse. He was, however, wholly
unversed in Scottish affairs and ways of thought, and was
in many things fanciful and unpractical, and deficient in
some of the stronger qualities of character. The following
description of his outward man, and his way of thinking
and acting, will be read with interest. 2
In dress Provost Fortescue was carefully clerical, but in old-
fashioned style. Although not much, if at all, below the average
height, he looked shorter from his habit of holding his head
1 He was son of the Kev. Francis Fortescue-Knottesford, Hector of
Billesley, co. Warwick, and connected with the family of Lord Carlingford.
2 This and the notice of Canon Humble are from the pen of Provost
T. I. Ball, of Cumbrae.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1803-1856 47
rather bent and forward. His face usually wore a grave and
rather mysterious look, and he seemed sensitively to shrink from
anything like a familiar gaze. If he did not like his company,
or did not feel sure of it, Provost Fortescue used to adopt a some
what donnish, reserved, enigmatical manner, and spoke little and
(apparently) unwillingly. When at his ease, however, he could
talk much and with great animation, and when it pleased him, in
a select circle, freely to unbend, he was full of mirth, and could
tell or enjoy a good story with the best. The Provost read very
little, but thought a good deal. I do not know that he took, or
pretended to take, much interest in things in general, though he
enjoyed stories which illustrated the variations of human nature.
Otherwise his tastes were exclusively ecclesiastical. Art he only
cared for in any form so far as he thought it expressed correct
ecclesiastical ideas. His theology was fundamentally that of the
advanced High Church School. In his public teaching he was
generally content to set forth clearly and plainly, and in the very
striking manner which he could employ, the orthodox aspect of
doctrine and practice. But in private talk or conference his
great delight seemed to be as paradoxical as possible, and
he seemed to take pleasure in bewildering his listeners by
startling and apparently inconsistent statements. A favourite
way of his was to maintain the tenability of the most ultra-
Roman opinions on all subjects. This reckless manner of
argument, which was with him (at all events for many years)
only a wayward jeu d' esprit, sometimes had unhappy conse
quences, Sometimes, however, all his power of paradox was
put forth to maintain the perfection of something Anglican
which most men of his school would consider to be among
reformanda. In his own house he could be a charming host ;
for behind all his waywardness and whimsical ways you could
see the English gentleman ; but he shrank (as I have said) from
unsympathetic company. A man of this disposition was not
made for fighting, and when ecclesiastical differences arose his
inclination was to come to terms, or to look round for a loophole
of escape. Even when not on harmonious terms with Bishop
Wordsworth he was fond of saying, in his characteristic way,
that there was something ' supernatural,' the effect of the
divine charisma which a Bishop possesses, in that prelate's
official utterances.
48 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
He continued to be Provost till 1871, but resigned that
office in July of that year. Upon his resignation he
married (as his second wife) a lady of the congregation
(Miss Bobbins), and both he and his wife simultaneously
entered the Church of Rome, I believe in Belgium.
The circumstances of his leaving the communion of the
Church in Scotland were such as to produce great dis
couragement to his friends, and especially to members of
his congregation, by whom he was much beloved. They
were necessarily followed by much sorrow to himself; for
in the Eoman communion he of course suddenly ceased to
be recognised as a Priest, or to be able to consider himself
as such, though his whole previous life had been involved
in the habits of thought and action proper to that character.
I have evidence, not exactly that he repented of what he
had done, but that he was not contented with what he
found in his new communion, and that he continued to
take a strong and respectful interest in everything con
nected with the Anglican Church.
Canon Humble, the other leader of the Chapter, was a
man of very different character and antecedents. He came
from the Diocese of Durham, of which he was a native, and
was educated at the newly-founded University there. He
was a member of a family much respected in the City. His
father was proprietor of the ' Durham Advertiser ' and he was
for a time himself its editor. There can be little doubt that
his early training in journalism largely influenced his after
style, and gave him the habit of writing aggressively and
without sufficient consideration of his opponents. He was for
a time tutor at Castle Forbes, six or seven miles above Mony-
musk, in the valley of the Don . As a clergyman he is described
as a good man and a hard worker, especially among the
poor and middle-class members of his congregation. But
he was essentially combative, and I fear I must add self-
CH. in EAELY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 49
willed. His strong will dominated the Chapter both in the
time of Provost Fortescue and his successor. He was not,
however, a man of strong health, and he died of consump
tion in the early part of 1876.
The same able pen that has sketched for us Provost
Fortescue has kindly delineated the person and character
of his subordinate but more powerful companion.
Canon Humble was a typical Englishman of the educated
middle-class. He was of average height, broadly built ; he held
his head upright, slightly thrown back; he had a rather large
nose, strong and determined looking, though not of the classic
Roman shape. His dress was always strictly clerical, of rather
old-fashioned cut, without a trace of ecclesiastical foppery about
it. In manner Canon Humble was friendly, frank, and open.
His kindness and courtesy saved him, but perhaps only just
saved him, from a tendency to brusquerie. The Canon had read
much, and thought much, on a great many subjects ; his
interests were wide and general, but they were chiefly concen
trated on all that related to his profession. He was a good
talker, had a great fund of humour, and was full of common
sense ; his judgment on ordinary matters of life was sober and
clear, and he was eminently a man who attracted confidence.
He was given to hospitality, and was ready to open his purse
to those in need. He was an ardent disciple of the Tractarian
Movement as represented by Bishop Forbes, of Brechin, but
always set himself against anything like mere extravagance or
excess. His piety (as far as one may presume to judge of it)
was deep and sincere, but was entirely unostentatious. Though
in friendly and social intercourse Canon Humble never showed
anything even approaching to quarrelsomeness, contentiousness,
touchiness, or ill-temper (or even quick temper), yet he was a
born warrior. He smelt the battle afar off. One thing that
especially incited him to gird on his armour was anything that
seemed to him like oppression, or the taking of unfair advantage
of the weaker by the stronger. Those who loved and admired
him most often regretted the eager way in which he sometimes
threw himself into the defence of persons the reality of whose
wrongs was not above suspicion. And so it will be easily under-
E
50 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
stood how that, when ecclesiastical differences arose, Canon
Bumble's line was, not that they should be composed or accom
modated, but that the matter should be fought out. Even those
who most agreed with him theologically were often not a little
dismayed at his eagerness to fight, and in Dundee, where the line
taken in ecclesiastical matters, under the suave rule of Bishop
Forbes, was ruled by reserve, prudence, and diplomacy, Canon
Humble was regarded as the enfant terrible of the advanced
High Church school in those parts. Many of those who loved
and revered him most sincerely (including, I may perhaps be
allowed to say, myself) did their best to persuade him to desist
from his last contest with Bishop Wordsworth, but all in vain
the battle must be fought. It was lost, and I know he felt
keenly the want of sympathy with him that his friends showed
in the matter. But what could we do ? It was one of those
cases in which affection looks one way and judgment and reason
another. When the news arrived of Canon Humble's death at
San Remo, they who really knew and valued him did not feel
that a war-making spirit was at rest so much as that they had
lost a brave and loyal friend, on whose kindness and generosity
they could always rely.
It was with these two men, who while they differed
largely from each other, differed yet more thoroughly from
himself, that Charles Wordsworth was called to live and
work in close proximity. Had he lived at a distance from
them in the same Diocese he might conceivably have been,
outwardly at least, at peace with them ; but the Cathedral
would in that case have been a very isolated institution,
and much out of harmony with all his plans and hopes for
the Diocese and for Scotland in general. He was bound
either to leave the Cathedral severely alone and to show
himself in no way responsible for it ; or to take it well in
hand and to mould it into his scheme of work. He deter
mined, I think with good reason, to adopt the latter
course.
The new Bishop, though he felt that the Cathedral
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 51
scheme was premature and open to many objections, had
thought it right to give it a modified, but very decided
support. His reasons for objecting to it were clear. It
was a very expensive scheme, and was therefore in that
matter a rival to Glenalmond. It was or might be a rival
also to some extent as a place of education. Its constitu
tion was open to much criticism. It was a kind of outpost
of the Tractarian party in England, and was in the Diocese
without really belonging to it. It was largely controlled by
two generous laymen, who had no property in the Diocese,
and were neither of them much in touch with residents in
it. 1 On the other hand, it was in its essence an institution
with which he was bound by the traditions of his family to
be in sympathy. It was not only the first Cathedral es
tablished across the Tweed, but, in the words of Dr. Neale, 2
' the first British Cathedral (with the single exception of
St. Paul's) that had been consecrated since the Eefor-
mation.' It was a great venture of faith, and many hopes
were centred on it.
He therefore at once took steps to give it a legal stand
ing in the Diocese by inducing its promoters to accept a
revised constitution for it, and by persuading those who
looked coldly upon it to recognise it as a Cathedral for the
Diocese. This somewhat difficult task was achieved by his
wise conduct of business at two synods held at Trinity
College, Glenalmond, the first a Special Synod on 6 April,
1853, and the second at his first Annual Synod on 6 July
of the same year. At the first of these meetings, to which
laymen were for the first time invited (to speak, but not to
vote), the Cathedral was ad interim accepted, subject to
1 Lord Forbes and Hon. G. F. Boyle, afterwards Earl of Glasgow, who
died in 1890. As Earl of Glasgow he inherited Crawford Priory, in Fifeshire,
but this was not till 1869.
2 Life of Torry, p. 367.
E 2
52 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. m
some general resolutions as to the composition of the
Chapter and a revision of the Statutes by the Bishop.
This recognition was balanced with a proviso that the
acceptance was also subject to the approval of the next
General Synod of the Church. At the second meeting the
draft * Code of Statutes ' was proposed by him and accepted
unanimously. At the same time he gave notice of his
intention to ^ummon the laity to meet at a visitation to be
held the day following the Annual Synod, which was ap
pointed to be held at the Cathedral on the third Wednesday
in September 1854. The two main objects of the revision
of the Cathedral Statutes were, of course, to ensure the
proper influence and authority of the Bishop, both in the
way of appointments and in regard to the control of the
services, and to connect the Cathedral more closely with
the Diocese.
The following summary of the changes made may be
quoted from Canon Farquhar's ' History,' premising that
the whole relation of the Bishop to the Chapter was
governed by the following general clause (in Art. 2) :
The clergy of the Cathedral shall be subject to the Bishop
and amenable to Canonical jurisdiction provincial and diocesan
in all respects as the other clergy of the Diocese.
Article 4 was also of great importance :
It shall be the duty of the Provost (under the Bishop) to
govern the whole institution, cathedral, and collegiate, to
superintend and control the performance of all Divine offices,
and especially to take the chief part in preaching sermons.
These regulations were supposed at the time by all
concerned to give the Bishop plenary powers in the Cathe
dral. Mr. Boyle, then secretary and treasurer for the
Cathedral scheme, wrote to the Bishop (19 May, 1853) :
CH. in EAELY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 53
I should rejoice to see the Cathedral really yours, and worked
as such.
And again on the 24th :
After much thought and prayer I have come to these con
clusions :
1. That the scheme as embodied in your Lordship's Draft of
a Constitution is the best that can be adopted. It ought to do
much to allay the suspicion with which the Cathedral scheme is
so generally regarded, as it will no longer be worked by a few
individuals, but by the Bishop of the Diocese, and under his
unlimited control and supervision.
2. That so far as I am personally concerned, I will only work
in your Lordship's Diocese in such a way as a layman can do so,
in entire accordance with your wishes, and as far as possible in
the manner in which you most recommend. I could not for one
moment think of affording any support to St. Ninian's were it to
assume a tone of opposition to its Bishop.
It should be said that the new Statutes were drawn up
by the Bishop, with the help of the Kev. John Jebb, Pre
bendary of Hereford, a man of great knowledge and authority
on all subjects connected with Church law and order, but
especially as regards Cathedrals. The Bishop's leading
idea was (as Canon Farquhar well remarks ] ) that the
Chapter should be no longer an imperium in imperio a
close corporation, independent of the Bishop and the
Diocese. He desired, on the contrary, as he himself said,
'to maintain the unity and singleness of Diocesan Epi
scopacy ; not according to the mediaeval plan of checks and
counterpoises of government (which arose in part out of
the aggrandising spirit of the Church of Kome).'
Accordingly his new code depressed the power of the Chapter.
They were no longer to have the appointment of the Dean,
Canons, and other officials exclusively in their own hands ; they
were no longer to be the sole originators of all business at the
1 Episcopal History of Perth, p. 338 foil.
64 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. m
meetings ; they were no longer to have power to increase and
decrease the number of stalls at their pleasure ; in fact, the
initiative in the government of the institution was to be no longer
theirs. They were to act strictly under the Bishop, whose
powers therefore were largely increased ; he was to be no longer
passive and merely sanctioning or vetoing what came up to him
from the Chapter. He was to be the ordinary president of the
Chapter ; he was to initiate all business there ; he was to have
the power of proceeding against the members of the Chapter for
insubordination &c., and of making new laws or altering the
Statutes, provided he obtained a two-thirds majority. As
regards the Clergy of the Diocese, they were to be so connected
with the Cathedral that, the patronage of the Chapter having
been done away, the five oldest Presbyters in the Diocese were
always to be invited to become Prebendaries. Thus every school
of thought would have an opening. As for the Scottish Com
munion Office, though he would not interfere with its actual
exclusive use, yet it must not stand on the formal Statutes of the
Cathedral that any Canonical Service, such as the English
Office, was to be constitutionally excluded.
The Bishop was able to carry this constitution by
reason that the body of Presbyters in his Synod was still
exactly divided the half who had supported his election
being opposed to any recognition of the Cathedral, while
the other half, who had opposed him, supported it. These
latter, therefore, needed and welcomed his influence and
authority in order to obtain for it a regular position
in the Diocese. His wise use of this opportunity was of
great advantage to him at the commencement of his Epi
scopate, and gave fair promise for the future. The Cathe
dral became a Diocesan institution, and as such is now
well established and successful ; but curiously enough the
formal ratification of the act of the Diocesan Synod, which
should have been given by the next General Synod, was
never asked for in 1862 and cathedrals attained no
Canonical status in Scotland generally until 1890.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 55
Coincidently with the acceptance of the constitution
certain minor changes were made in the ritual at the
Bishop's suggestion, and about the same time two new
Canons were appointed to take the place of those who had
gone out of residence, one of whom (Kev. J. K. Sellar) was
specially to undertake the educational work of the choir
school. The Bishop was enthroned at St. Ninian's on 7 St.
Matthew's Day, 21 September, 1853, and preached a
sermon suitable to the day ' St. Matthew an Example to
Scotland ' in which he specially tried to move Episcopalian
landowners to dedicate their sons to the ministry of the
Church. The sermon also contained a warning to the
Cathedral clergy to be careful not to give offence by dis
loyal innovations, a hint which at that time they might be
expected to take in good part. Both parties had made
sacrifices, and for a time it seemed that it would be possible
for the Bishop's great gifts as a preacher to find a sphere
of exercise in a Church where beauty of worship and a high
standard of devotion were also manifest; so that the ideal
excellence of the Church might be exhibited before the
world in something like completeness. Here for five years
(1854-1858) he constantly preached, and here he held
Diocesan Synods and Visitations, including both clergy
and laity, and this annually on two consecutive days.
The actual building of St. Ninian's was at this time
and for many years afterwards only a fragment of Mr.
Butterfield's design, consisting of the choir, dwarf tran
septs, and one bay of the nave, and was capable of con
taining a congregation of about 350 persons. It was high
in proportion to its length, and the chancel was raised
above the nave, and thus it already exhibited some of the
dignity and impressiveness which the completed interior
certainly possesses. It stands in the north-west corner of
the city, near the infantry barracks and on the Dunkeld
56 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
road. The only other Episcopal church was St. John the
Baptist's in Princes Street, towards the south-east of the
city, and therefore almost as far as possible from the
Cathedral, and so placed as not to interfere with its
congregation. 1 It was natural that this name should be
chosen in a city which in early days was usually called St.
John's town or St. Johnston, but now that the old church in
the centre of^ the city where Knox preached the iconoclasm
which was so speedily put in practice has recovered its
ancient name, there is some danger, perhaps, of confusion.
A school chapel close to the Central Kailway Station was
also built by my uncle's instrumentality in 1868, and has
our family motto, i VERITAS,' over the principal entrance.
It is now no longer used for Divine service.
The residence at Eose Terrace, Perth, with a mention
of which this chapter began, was not of long duration. It
included, however, an important annual event the second
regular Diocesan Synod. This took place on the anniversary
of his enthronisation, St. Matthew's Day (21 September,
1854), and was followed on the next day by the Visitation,
at which laymen attended, and at which he took occasion to
deliver his Primary Charge.
This Charge, the first of a series of important de
liverances, contained a considerable amount of matter
bearing on the subject of Eeunion with Presbyterians, and
in particular a recognition of the reality of their Baptism,
which the Bishop held to be valid though irregular. In
this admission he was dissociating himself from his pre-
1 In 1849 the congregation of St. John's, Perth, was reunited to the
Church after a separation of nearly fifty years. My uncle, then Warden of
Glenalmond, desired that the two congregations should be moulded into
one, and published a pamphlet on the subject, A Call to Union. See
Annals, ii. 66 foil. But neither party would combine with the other. The
new St. John's Church was consecrated by Bishop Trower, of Glasgow, acting
for Bishop Torry, in 1850.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 57
decessor, Bishop Torry, and the general policy of the non-
jurors, and making the first and most essential step in the
advances which he was so much drawn to extend in later
years. The Charge was, like nearly everything he wrote,
carefully composed and guarded in its language, and well
fitted to conciliate all parties of Churchmen as things then
were in Scotland. It not only showed, as might have been
expected, both classical and patristic learning, and a con
siderable acquaintance with the treatment of the subject
by Anglican divines, but it also exhibited a true insight
into the particular difficulties of the situation. The reader
will gather its character from a few extracts, and will then
be ready to consider a little more at length the special
point to which his attention has been called.
It may, I think, be said without exaggeration that the
clergy and people of a Christian Church have rarely met
together for mutual counsel and encouragement under circum
stances of deeper and more anxious moment than those in which
we, my brethren, are now assembled. In a Diocese which
comprehends the ruins of one Archi-Episcopal and two Episcopal
sees, we have held our Synod, and now hold our Visitation for
the first time, in a corner of a Cathedral which is still but half
completed, but which, as it is the fruit of the first attempt that
has been made to erect such an edifice in this country for
upwards of three hundred years, so it can scarcely fail to cheer
our desponding hearts with brighter and more hopeful thoughts.
Ourselves but a small and feeble remnant : the Laymen of us
representing, indeed, the possessors of more than half the soil,
but not more than a hundredth part of the population of the
three Dioceses ; the Clergy representing in less than twenty
unendowed Incumbencies the two hundred parishes and upwards,
in which our forefathers ministered, reduced to struggle with
difficulties of all kinds ; and meanwhile having too much reason
to fear that every effort which we may make to recover our lost
ground, as it cannot fail to provoke the spirits of evil, and the
enmity of an ungodly world, to increased hostility, so it must
tend to aggravate and increase our trials, unless we are careful
58 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
to proceed in the faith and fear of God, -with the utmost prudence
and discretion, with the wisdom of the serpent, no less than the
harmlessness of the dove (p. 6).
In his treatment of the relation of the Episcopal Church
to Presbyterians he starts with the maxim of Cicero (de
Orat. ii. 82) : * Ad consilium de Eepublica dandum, primum
est nosse Kempublicam : ad dicendum vero probabiliter
(primum est) .nosse mores civitatis,' which he paraphrases
' In order to give good counsel concerning the Church, our
first and most indispensable care must be to know the
Church. To plead the Church's cause with a good prospect
of success, it is essential that we should know and consider
well the character of the people among whom we live, and
with whom we have to deal.' He then proceeds with the
following wise and conciliatory words :
No one, I think, can doubt that there are elements in the
Scottish character which hold forth the promise and exhibit the
capacity of producing fruits of holiness, richer and more mature
than those which at present are commonly perceived amongst us ;
but it is no less clear that there are also other elements in the
same character, as it now exists, which raise more than ordinary
impediments to the reception of certain portions of the Apostolical
system (subjected as that system has been to so much unworthy
treatment on the part both of friends and foes) ; and which must
be taken into account with the utmost tenderness and forbearance
if we desire to follow the example of the great Apostle, who
scrupled not to 'become all things to all men, that he might
by all means save some ' (p. 12 foil.).
In treating of the validity of Presbyterian Baptism, he
naturally follows Hooker and Bingham, and the general
consent of Anglican divines, in doing which he was in
company with Bishop Forbes, of Brechin. 1 He notices the
dissent of the nonjurors, and the remarkable fact that
1 See his Explanation of the Nicene Creed, ed. 2, p. 299, Oxf. 1866, and
cp. Rev. Warwick Elwin, The Minister of Baptism, pp. 275 foil. Lond. 1889.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 59
strictness in the matter also came from the Calvinistic side,
and was enforced by the earlier Presbyterians : * Denying
as they did, and blaspheming our ministry as anti- Christian,
they could not do otherwise than deny our Baptism, which,
according to their teaching, none but a duly authorised
minister is competent to give ' (p. 16). But he does not
notice the considerable amount of Anglican authority which
there also is for the stricter practice. He mentions, indeed,
the nonjurors Brett and Laurence (p. 15 n.), but not
Waterland, whose ' Letters on Lay-Baptism ' l are very
decided against its validity, and represent the judgment of
a man who has always commanded respect, especially
among the school of Anglicans to which the Bishop of St.
Andrews belonged. Nor does he refer to Maskell, whose
then recent ' Dissertation on Baptism ' contains some
valuable arguments on his own side. He was not, however,
writing a set treatise on the subject, and was certainly
justified in saying that Canon xvn. of the Scottish Code of
1838 did not enforce re-baptism, but directed conditional
Baptism in cases ' where the applicants shall express a doubt
of the validity of the Baptism which they have received
from the minister of the sect to which they formerly
belonged.' Nevertheless we must remember that not only
is there the question of a valid ministry, but also the doubt
whether baptism has been administered at all. There is, I
understand, unfortunately very good reason for this doubt
in Scotland. Strangely enough, in so well educated a
country, where judicial records are admirably preserved, bap
tismal registers have been very much neglected since 1848,
even in the Established Church, in which they have long
been ordered to be kept. And as the children only of
1 They have recently been reprinted from his Works, with notes by
F. Nutcombe Oxenham, and a preface by the Bishop of Argyll (Haldane
Chinnery), Lond. 1892.
60 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. in
* godly ' parents are admitted to Baptism, the parents are
often afraid to bring them to the minister lest they should
be refused. Very many, therefore, remain unbaptised.
For my own part, if I may express an opinion in
passing on the general aspects of so difficult a subject, I
should remark that while the command to baptise is
given to the Apostles, and through them undoubtedly
to the Apogtolic ministry, it is, nevertheless, naturally
inferred from Scripture that they rarely baptised with their
own hands. St. Paul, who was justly very eager to main
tain his full rights and position as an Apostle, and most
unlikely to have done anything singular, or calculated to
prejudice his claims to Apostolic powers, states this dis
tinctly as regards himself (1 Cor. i. 14-17). It is matter
of inference as regards the Twelve ; but our Lord's own
example naturally suggests the idea that Baptism was
recognised as, so to speak, a minor ministry (John iv. 2),
and the remarkable fact should be noticed that the passive
voice ' they were baptised,' &c. is regularly used in the
New Testament as regards Christian Baptism. The single
exception in the Acts proves the rule, viz. that of Philip the
Deacon, who, being alone with the Ethiopian, necessarily
baptised him in person (Acts viii. 38), and he of course
was not an Apostle. Yet of John the forerunner it is as
regularly noticed that ' he baptised,' evidently in his own
person. It seems clear from this, at any rate, that little
stress was laid at first on the person who administered
baptism among Christians. The faith of the recipient and
the other conditions of the Sacrament are the points
especially dwelt upon. See particularly Eom. vi. 4, Col. ii.
12, 1 Peter iii. 21.
When we come to sub-Apostolic times we find the same
thing true. In the ' Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,'
generally dated about the end of the first or beginning of
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 61
the second century, the directions about Baptism are
general, though 'the Baptiser ' is bidden to fast before it,
as well as * the Baptised.' The command to appoint
' Bishops and Deacons ' is connected with the Eucharist,
but not with Baptism. In the same way, in Justin
Martyr, where a rather lengthy description of Baptism
and the Eucharist is given, Baptism is spoken of as
if administered by the whole body of faithful Christians
(' Apol.' i. 61 &c.), whereas the ministry of the clergy is
distinctly referred to in regard to the other sacrament.
Even the well-known text of St. Ignatius, which forbids to
baptise or to hold a love-feast ' without the Bishop '
(' Smyrn.' 8), does not by any means necessarily imply
that he was the actual minister of Baptism. Doubtless
even in the second century there were two tendencies, a
laxer and a stricter one, and these two have continued side
by side ever since. On the one side, it is clear that the
Apostles were the right persons to determine the conditions
of Baptism, and in the great case of Cornelius they
exercised this authority in a most momentous manner, by
ratifying the decision of St. Peter, that Gentiles were to
'be baptised. It is further clear that Bishops succeeded
generally to this authority, sometimes to such an extent,
and with such a closeness of grasp, as to be the sole
ministers of Baptism, as was the case in the Church of
Milan in the fourth century. 1 On the other hand, the
tradition that laymen might, under proper conditions, be
ministers of Baptism has always existed in the Church,
from the time, at ahy rate, of Tertullian, though not always
without protest, and subject to greater or lesser attempts
to limit it. The question as to heretical Baptism has, from
1 See the remarkable passages on this point quoted in Smith and
Cheetham, Diet, of Christian Antiquities, s. v. Baptism, p. 166 an article
by the late Wharton B. Marriott.
62 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
time to time, been diversely decided, the East tending to be
stricter in this point than the West. Schismatical Baptism
was, however, theoretically at least, accepted in both regions
of the Church, 1 if administered in the right form and with
the right matter, and with the right faith on the part of
the recipient, even though the validity of the orders of the
sects in question were denied. There can, therefore, I
think, be no doubt that the balance of authority is in
favour of a charitable acceptance of Presbyterian and Non
conformist Baptism, whenever the conditions required by
the Church are adhered to, as they certainly are according
to the general intention of the chief bodies into which our
fellow Christians are divided. And surely in this matter
the strongly-expressed design and desire of our Saviour to
create one Church must count for very much. Faith and
Baptism are by Him and His Apostles so closely connected,
that where we find the one Faith sufficiently existing on
the part of Christians, and the intention to administer the
1 The Council of Aries, A.D. 314, which ruled the custom of the West,
upheld the anti-Cyprianic view, and decreed that a convert from heresy
should be asked to repeat his Creed, and if it should be found that he had
been baptised ' in Patre et Filio et Spiritu Sancto ' he was only to receive
imposition of hands. The Council of Nicasa, A.D. 325, distinguished between
the Novatian schismatics (Canon 8) and the Paulianist heretics (Canon 19).
The Cathari or Novatians were accepted on rather easy terms. Nothing is
said as to their baptism, which was clearly admitted, though their clergy
appear to have been technically re-ordained (xftpoeerovnevovs avrovs
ptveiv OVTCDS v T<$ K\-f)pcf), but admitted, as far as possible, to the same
position as they previously held. The Paulianists, or disciples of Paul of
Samosata, though there is evidence that they used the threefold name in
Baptism, were to be re-baptised, and their clergy (with some formality)
re-ordained. See the evidence carefully collected on these points by Dr.
Wm. Bright in his Notes to the Canons of the First Four General Councils,
pp. 25 foil, and pp. 66 foil. (Oxf. 1882). The re-ordination of the Novatian
clergy is a moot point, but Dr. Blight's evidence for it appears to me
sufficient, and it is the natural interpretation of Canon 8. It is, in this
case, a practically decisive precedent for the admission of Presbyterian
baptism. My uncle, in his Ecclesiastical Union between Scotland and
England, Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, 1888, supposes that they
werenoJ re-ordained, quoting various good authorities for his opinion (p. 18).
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 63
one Baptism equally apparent among them, we must have
very clear proof indeed that the consequent blessing does
not follow. And when we see in fact the fruits of the
Spirit's presence following (though not always with the
sweetness and maturity that we should find if all other
conditions of Church-life were present), we cannot doubt
that a valid Baptism has been administered.
The true policy for the Church, and the most consistent
with antiquity, seems to me to be to make much of Confir
mation as a perfecting of Baptism, and to be very clear and
distinct in our teaching on this head. It is this view of
Confirmation as an admission into the full privileges of the
Catholic Church that makes it important to insist upon it
in such cases as a condition preceding Holy Communion,
according to the teaching of our Prayer Book. This is
distinctly taught in the Charge which has led to this
discussion, 1 and must be remembered as the proper safe
guard of the freedom and charity which is recommended.
The reader will pardon this digression ; for I take it for
granted that no one is likely to read this memoir unless he
is already interested in the question of Keunion, or is willing
to be drawn to take interest in it. And those who know
the present condition of opinion and practice in Scotland 2
will be aware that an attempt is sometimes made to intro
duce a rigorous teaching and practice on the subject, which
1 See p. 17, where he also refers to Bingham's Scholastical History of
Lay Baptism, part 1, ch. 1, 21, 'What defects there are in the Baptism
of heretics and schismatics, and how those defects may be supplied.' The
Bishop of St. Andrews, however, did not in after years insist absolutely on
Confirmation of all Presbyterians who joined the Church as communicants.
He left a note for this volume, saying that he ' had uniformly acted on the
same principle as that by which Bishop Torry was guided : see his Life, p.
188, 205 ; ' i.e. to recommend without forcing it.
2 The two books which I have quoted above, The Minister of Baptism,
by Mr. Elwin, and the reprint of Waterland's Letters, are an outcome of
this movement. Both are useful contributions to the history of a difficult
subject.
64 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
is likely, in some degree, to endanger the efforts to which
Charles Wordsworth devoted nearly all the remainder of
his life.
The concluding portion of the Charge deals generally
with the duty of convincing members of the truth of our
own position 'the Diocesan, Provincial, or National
System ' as against the Koman and our behaviour
towards those who are separated from us. The Charge,
both from its 'tone and its matter, was well fitted to be the
prelude to such an effort as the Bishop was then steadily
contemplating. It is impossible not to reflect how much
more effective the result might have been if those who
heard him had been content to subordinate their individual
aims to a general levelling up of the small Church of which
they were representatives, instead of making it a battle
ground for the controversies which were only just tolerable
in the broader area of the Church of England.
The Charge was very well received at the time and
circulated in considerable numbers at the expense of its
hearers, both clerical and lay, and speedily passed into a
second edition. 1
The ' Visitation ' at which this Charge was delivered
was held on the day after the Synod, and was well attended.
It was continued, as I have said, for four years, when it
was dropped, being held for the last time in 1858. In
1859 the strained relations with the clergy of St. Ninian's
led to the Synod being held at Dunkeld, and some other
arrangements had also to be altered.
The Synod and Visitation being over, the Bishop took
Mrs. Wordsworth to Bournemouth, whence he was sum
moned by a call of duty, the important charge of Muthill
being vacant owing to the resignation of the incumbent,
Mr. Lendrum. When a charge fell vacant it was his habit,
1 Annals, ii. 185.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 65
when no one else was available, to take the Sunday duty
himself, sometimes for weeks in succession, going forwards
and backwards from Saturday till Monday from Perth.
But the circumstances of Muthill were exceptional, and he
remained there, in a house lent him by Mr. Lendrum's
brother-in-law, Dr. Clarke, from Advent 1854 till Easter
1855. Such spells of duty and occasional residences were
among the most valuable instruments at his command for
smoothing away difficulties and giving parochial life a new
start, and this residence at Muthill was a particularly
useful one as well as very satisfactory to himself.
Muthill is a pretty village, some three miles south of
Crieff, in Perthshire, with the remains of an old church and
an ancient tower, which are unfortunately not now (as they
might easily once have been) in the hands of the Episcopal
Church. The history of the congregation is an honourable
one, and it is in some respects one of the strong centres of
the Diocese. The following notes about it have been kindly
made for me by my friend Mr. W. M. Meredith, now
Incumbent of Crieff, but formerly of Muthill.
Whilst at Muthill the Bishop had a curate, Mr. Browning,
to assist him in the services and in visiting. There was daily
service, but it was found that those who could come did not, on
the score of innovation. One old woman tells how the Bishop's
daughter and Mrs. Wordsworth used to sing Psalm 100 at their
week-day services.
The Bishop also re-started the Church Day School at Muthill,
which Mr. Lendrum had begun, but which had apparently stopped
for a time.
From the impression made we gather that he was the first
Bishop of the Diocese in this century to wear the Bishop's dress.
He is remembered as a good visitor, and every one speaks of his
magnificent preaching, how the church was filled, and many
came from a distance to hear him.
The Bishop procured for Muthill the old Font from Trinity
College, Glenalmond, and to the people here he addressed his
F
66 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
well-known ' Plain Tract on the Scottish Communion Office,' by
which he saved the use of the Office in this congregation.
The mission at Comrie (St. Fillan's) was started as an
offshoot from Crieff (which was itself an offshoot from Muthill)
in the Bishop's life-time ; and on the other side of Muthill (in
which he always continued to take a keen interest) the town of
Auchterarder seemed to offer room for Church work. The
Bishop and Lord Rollo_went over one snowy Sunday evening and
held service in a plain, bare building placed at their disposal,
which was Attended by some three hundred people, though no
actual mission work was taken up there till many years after
wards. The Bishop, however, had the happiness of seeing the
work begun, and gave it his hearty blessing. A fine church has
since been built.
About the time of his residence at Muthill he began to
be involved in the Eucharistic controversy, though not at
first in a form that required the full exercise of his critical
powers. Controversy was indeed ' in the air ' in all parts
of the Church of England, especially on this topic. Dr.
Pusey's sermon ' On the Eucharist ' was preached early in
1853. 1 In the same year, just before Whitsuntide, appeared
the important book of Archdeacon Kobert Isaac Wilberforce
on the same subject. 2 In the autumn of 1853, and in the
following spring, Archdeacon Denison had preached three
sermons on ' Holy Communion ' in Wells Cathedral, which
were made the occasion of formal complaint against him.
Scotland felt the stir which was thereby raised almost as
much as England, at any rate throughout the Episcopal
Church. Charles Wordsworth took the opportunity of a
petition from some of the communicants at Meigle (pre-
1 See Life of Pusey, iii. ch. xvii. Second period of the Eucharistic
Controversy.
2 He was received into the Koman Church in October 1854, but
maintained to the last that his book on the Eucharist was not inconsistent
with the formularies of the Church of England. His later book, Principles
of Church Authority, undoubtedly was, and was intended to be, in opposition
to them. See Life of Pusey, iii. 426.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 67
sented April 1854), for the disuse of the Scottish Office,
which had always been in use there, to republish his three
sermons on ' Holy Communion,' preached at Glenalmond,
which defined his own position without attacking that of
others. They are so important, both in themselves and as
an index of his mind, and have the advantage of being
so uncontroversial, that the reader will benefit by the follow
ing notice of their contents and especially by the extracts of
the more important passages in them.
The full title of the publication is ' Three Short Sermons
on the Holy Communion considered as Sacrifice, Sacrament,
and Eucharist, with notice of the differences between the
Scotch and English Offices for its administration.' The
preface is dated ' Muthill, Epiphany 1855,' and notes that
the sermons, delivered in the autumn of 1851 at Trinity
College, were now committed to the press, * partly for
reasons which concern the Author's own Diocese.' The
sermons contain a statement of the doctrine under each of
the three heads with a practical application. The doctrine
of Sacrifice is thus connected with the duty of Repentance ;
that of Sacrament with the duty of Faith ; that of Eucha
rist of course with special modes of Thankfulness. The
references to the Scottish Office, which made these sermons
useful in the Meigle case and elsewhere, are explained by
quoting the following instruction of the Episcopal College
to the Warden of Glenalmond, where the two offices were
used on alternate Sundays, ' earnestly to recommend and
inculcate on his pupils the propriety of their attendance on
either service, the doctrine of the two Churches, though
varied in expression, being confessedly one and the same.'
The statement of the doctrine of Sacrifice (p. 3) is
important as a prelude to the after development of the
controversy. The Lord's Supper is first treated as an ordin
ance commemorative of the Sacrifice of the Death of Christ.
F 2
68 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
We are to learn, that in this holy rite Jesus Christ is not only
preached by word of mouth, but by visible signs ' openly set
forth, crucified amongst us.' We are to see in the breaking of
the Bread His Body broken, and in the pouring out of the wine
His Blood shed. But more than this ; we are to recognise in
the same divine rite all the essential properties of a true sacrifice ;
we are to see done in very deed what Christ did, for the
remembrance of Him. And what then did He do? When
fche time of the Passover was fully come, He the great High
Priest, the Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek, took
Bread and Wine, and having sanctified them by His word and
heavenly Benediction, He offered them to the Father as the
representation of Himself. This action, therefore, to be
adequately commemorated requires not only an offering to be
made, but a Priest to offer it, and an Altar (Heb. xiii. 10) to be
offered on. And this, my brethren, is the reason why the
elements of Bread and Wine are first placed upon a side table
(which we call the Credence or Prothesis) in order that the
Priest, and no other, may solemnly present them upon the Altar
as the minister of Christ, and acting in His stead.
He notes the corruption of this doctrine by the Church of
Eome, since the Council of the Lateranin[1215], 1 teaching
' that the sacrifice of the altar is not a commemoration only,
but an actual repetition of the one great and all sufficient
Sacrifice once made upon the Cross.' He accounts thereby
for the retrenchment of some portions of the service bearing
on the doctrine of Sacrifice at the English Reformation ;
and describes the * true doctrine of a representative sacrifice '
as properly restored in the Scottish Office and ' exhibited
1 The date is misprinted 1245. Keference of course is to the first
Canon of the Fourth Lateran Council, which contains the memorable
words : ' In qua (ecclesia) idem ipse sacerdos et sacrificium lesus Christus ;
cuius corpus et sanguis in sacramento altaris sub speciebus panis et vini
veraciter continentur ; transsubstantiatis, pane in corpus et vino in san-
guinem, potestate divina, ut ad perficiendum mysterium unitatis accipiamus
ipsi de suo quod accepit ipse de nostro.' That ' actual repetition ' is involved
in this Canon may, however, reasonably be doubted.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 69
in the clearness and integrity in which it is uniformly set
forth in the Primitive Liturgies.'
The following passage sums up the first head of
doctrine :
It teaches us of a death to be commemorated, by visible
representation, till the end of time (1 Cor. xi. 26). It teaches
us of that death as a sacrifice for sin, for the sin of the whole
world. It teaches us of that sacrifice, as offered once for all by
Jesus Christ, emblematically at the Paschal supper, but sub
stantially upon the Cross; and as represented continually by
His appointed Ministers who still 'do this,' or rather 'make
this' that is, make this offering 'for the remembrance of
Him ' (Luke xxii. 19). It teaches us of the offering which He
made, and commanded to be repeated, 1 for a continual witness
and exhibition of His precious death to the world, to the holy
Angels, and above all to God, as none other than Himself ; Who
being from the beginning the Son of God, and so all-mighty to
save, became, in order that He might die, and so accomplish our
Salvation, the Son of Man (pp. 7, 8).
This doctrine is supported by quotations from Bishop
Andrewes, Bishop Jolly, and St. Ambrose de Officiis Minis-
trorum (i. 48).
In the second sermon on the doctrine of Holy Com
munion as a Sacrament the following gives the pith of his
teaching.
In the view we are now to take, we are to see the same
Bread and Wine which have been offered as the symbols of the
Body and Blood of Christ, first consecrated into a most holy
mystery by prayer and the laying on of sacred hands, and then
returned to us as from God by the same representative of Jesus
Christ to be to us all that that mystery portends, and all that
we ourselves had signified by the offering we had made.
1 This must refer to the offering made at the Paschal supper, as he says
above 'emblematically.' In a MS. note to p. 18 he quotes Bishop
Buckeridge, Discourse on Kneeling, p. 52 : ' Tho' there be not idem sacrifi-
cium, as it denoteth the action of sacrificing, yet it is idem sacrificatum ;
Christ crucified, that is, represented to God and communicated to us.'
70 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
Hence the Altar in this view becomes the Lord's Table
and the Priest the Steward of the Lord's household. The
former view presupposed a congregation of fellow worship
pers with the priest, the latter a companionship of guests.
' It is odious among men for one to feast by himself alone.
How much more at the Table of the God of Love.'
The careful reader will note here the phrase * be to us
all that that mystery portends,' which echoes the words of
some of the old Liturgies including those of the first
Prayer Book of Edward VI., and differing very slightly from
the Eoman form, ' ut nobis Corpus et Sanguis fiat.' It is,
however, as we shall presently see, a reading into the
Scottish Office of what ought to be, but is not, there. The
reader will also observe the stress justly laid on the partici
pation of ' a company of guests ' to communicate with the
priest, the absence of which, except on rare occasions, can
only be justified by treating the service simply as a Sacrifice
and not also as a Sacrament. Here we have the germs
of much of the Bishop's controversial teaching in after
times.
He then adds some helpful words on the topic of the
relation of Sacraments generally to the Incarnation, and the
virtue which they derive from the presence of Christ's man
hood in them by the operation of the Holy Ghost.
Their great characteristic is that they unite us to the man's
nature of Christ, Who took our life that we might partake of
His ; Who became the Son of Man, in order that He might give
us the power to become sons of God. In this view they have
been called 'the extension of the Incarnation' that is, the
channels through which the virtue and efficacy of that stupendous
act of goodness and condescension on the part of the second
person of the blessed Trinity (whereby our fallen nature is
again renewed after the image of God) are extended and com
municated to man. . . . Hence we conclude, that whatever
efficacy the Sacraments possess they derive from hence, that the
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 71
manhood of Christ is truly present in them ; and that this
presence is effected by the operation of the Holy Ghost
(p. 20 foil.).
This naturally leads to a commendation of the special
Invocation of the Holy Spirit in the Scottish Office as
adopted from the ancient Liturgies, in favour of which
Bishop Short of St. Asaph and Bishop Wilson of Man are
quoted. Finally, he does not scruple to call the sacramental
presence of Christ ' a real, and in some sense a bodily
Presence of Christ with all who worthily receive Him in
these Holy mysteries.' In a note to this passage he shows
that the Primitive Church did not hold the modern Eoman
doctrine of the bodily presence, by referring to * the illustra
tion which the Fathers derived from the union of the two
parts of the Sacrament, to confute the heresy of Euty-
ches, who denied the union of the two natures in the one
Person of Christ.' * In another he quotes Bishop Andrewes
as testifying that unworthy Communicants receive to no
purpose a tacit reference to the controversy raised by
Archdeacon Denison.
The words which follow on the consequent duty are
worth quoting :
As a necessary consequence of the doctrine of Sacramental
Communion in the Lord's Supper we require faith. To possess
faith we require to cultivate habits of holiness. We require
charity which gives a single eye ; we require temperance which
gives a single heart ; an eye to discern Christ in these holy
mysteries, and a heart to love Him, and not only Him, but our
neighbour also for His sake. [Then follows a warning not to
consider forms of devotional preparation as by themselves
sufficient.] . . . Unless at the same time you are honestly
1 The heresy of Eutyches was what is generally called monophysite,
teaching that the human nature was absorbed by, if not wholly lost in, the
divine. In the Sacrament, as in the Person of Jesus Christ, both the divine
and the human characters coexist.
72 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
striving, watching, praying day by day to form in yourself the
habits which I have named, and which a man can no more put
on and off for the occasion than he can change at a wish the
height of his stature or the colour of his skin (p. 28).
In the third sermon there is an animated passage based
on the language of Ps. cxvi. showing how much the
Christian's reasons for Eucharistic thankfulness exceed
those of the Jew. It ends thus, and is interesting because
of its reference to our Lord's continual High Priesthood
as far at any rate as this offering is concerned :
If a Jew in thankful acknowledgment of the benefits he had
enjoyed, could solemnly promise ' I will offer to Thee the sacrifice
of thanksgiving ; I will pay my vows unto the Lord in the sight
of all His people, in the courts of the Lord's house, even in the
midst of thee, Jerusalem ' ; how much more is the Christian
called upon to promise and to pay the same, who has a great
High Priest, even Jesus the Son of God, to present his offering,
and who through Him is admitted into the courts above, into
the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and is joined
in presenting the same offering by an innumerable company of
Angels, and by the general Assembly and Church, living and
departed, gathered not from the Jews only, but out of every
nation and kindred of the earth ! (p. 34 foil.).
The consequent teaching on thanksgiving by word, by
alms, by offering of the creatures to the Lord of creatures,
and in the act of Communion, may readily be imagined by
the thoughtful reader. More striking perhaps still, is the
quotation from Isaac Williams * to illustrate the value of
the humble and penitential character of the English and
Scottish Offices. The sermon ends with a recommenda
tion of the practice of weekly Communion, made, we must
remember, originally to boys, by one who had great ex
perience as a master of what they were capable.
Of these sermons I do not think I shall do wrong in
1 Sermons on the Catechism, ii. 289, 290.
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 73
saying that they are even now very valuable as an exposi
tion of what is the general Anglican position, and that it
would be difficult to find it better stated in the same com
pass. For general use in England they are, perhaps, a
little unsuited on account of the frequent references in
them to the Scottish Office, in defence and illustration of
which they were partly written. The position of that
Office, and Bishop Wordsworth's attitude to it, are, however,
so important, both in themselves and as illustrative of his
policy as a Bishop, that the reader will desire to have a
general summary in this place of what is necessary for him
to know about the matter. The publication of the ' Three
Sermons ' at this time was, as I have said, with special
reference to the petition from Meigle, but the author tells
us in his ' Annals ' that during the first four or five years
of his Episcopate he received applications to sanction " the
partial or entire abandonment of the Scottish Office in
favour of the English, not only from Meigle, but from Alyth
(close to Meigle), Muthill, Forfar, Strath- tay and Blair-
gowrie. This movement he resisted to the best of his
power, making special efforts at Meigle and Muthill, but
with very little success, except (as we have seen) at the
latter place. The statistics given by him in his Charge of
1862 (p. 8) record that between that date and 1844 the
Scottish Office had (more or less entirely) been lost in ten
congregations, while it had been freshly adopted only by
three.
The fact of course is, that the Scottish Office, which is in
many respects beautiful arid affecting, and which is known
by careful students to have a distinctly non-Eoman colour,
requires not a little liturgical culture for its appreciation.
It has, moreover, one crucial point of special difficulty, and
its order is very strange to an Englishman. The latter
point strikes the most careless worshipper, who observes
74 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. m
that the Consecration Prayers are much longer than the
English, and that they come before the prayer for the
' whole state of Christ's Church,' so that a long interval
occurs between Consecration and Communion. But when
he looks more deeply into the Consecration Prayer he
observes in it an abrupt and startling formula, for which
no precedent can be found in any Liturgy, ancient or
modern. Aft^r the recitation of the words and acts of the
Institution occurs an oblation, and then an invocation after
the manner of the Eastern Liturgies in the following terms :
' Vouchsafe to bless and sanctify, with Thy word and Holy
Spirit, these Thy gifts and creatures of bread and wine, that
they may become the body and blood of Thy most dearly
beloved Son. And we earnestly desire Thy fatherly goodness
mercifully to accept this our sacrifice of praise and thanks
giving, &c.' Now, as we have seen, there is much to
recommend to us this general form of invocation. But
when we learn that the abrupt expression of its design
(may become . . . Son), without any qualification following,
or any specification of the persons for whose use, or the
purposes for which, this great mysterious change is intended,
was only introduced in this form by Bishop Wm. Falconar,
of Moray, and Bishop Eobert Forbes, of Eoss, in 1764,
and that it differs in this abruptness not only from the first
book of Edward VI. (1549), and from the Scottish Prayer
Book of 1637, but from the Western and Oriental Liturgies
of every age and country, we cannot be surprised at the
adverse criticism to which it has been subjected. The
point does not lie in the word become, but in the fact that
it is unscriptural * and contrary to all precedent to omit
1 Our Lord's words clearly define the purpose of the Sacrament, and it is
by them that we must justify the insistence of our Church upon the due use
of the Sacrament, and her refusal (at least in England) to sanction reservation
because of its misuse in local restriction of Christ's presence to the Tabernacle
or Monstrance. There can be no mistake about the emphasis, ' This is my
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 75
reference to the covenant relation which the Lord from the
first stamped upon His ordinance. This relation was well
brought out in the Prayer Book of 1549:
Hear us (0 merciful Father) we beseech Thee: and with
Thy holy Spirit and word vouchsafe to bless and sanctify these
Thy gifts and creatures of bread and wine that they may be unto
us the body and blood of Thy most dearly beloved Son Jesus
Christ. Who in the same night, &c.
and in the first Scottish Liturgy of 1637 :
Hear us, merciful Father, we most humbly beseech Thee,
and of Thy Almighty goodness, vouchsafe so to bless and sanctify
with Thy word and holy Spirit these Thy gifts and creatures of
bread and wine, that they may be unto us the Body and Blood
of Thy most dearly-beloved Son; so that we receiving them
according to Thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ's holy institution,
in remembrance of His death and passion may be partakers of
the same His most precious Body and Blood: who in the
night, &c.
The Bishop of St. Andrews did not at first observe this
latter point. In his ' Three Short Sermons,' p. 23, he
treats the form of Consecration as ' substantially the same
in both ' the English and the Scottish Offices. On the
other hand, in his ' Plain Tract on the Scotch Communion
Office,' which was delivered as an address to the Congre-
Body which is given for you ' (Luke xxii. 19, R. V.) ; ' This is my blood of
the covenant which is shed for many imto remission of sins ' (Matt. xxvi.
28, R. V.) ; or, ' This cup is the new covenant in my blood, even that which is
poured out for you ' (Luke xxii. 20, R. V., cp. 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25, ivhich is for
you, and the new covenant in my blood, R. V.). On the alteration of 1764, see
Bishop John Dowden, of Edinburgh, The Annotated Scottish Communion
Office, Appendix L, p. 339, Edinb. 1884. The revisers supposed themselves
to be following the Clementine Liturgy ; but (1) that Liturgy was not, as
far as we know, in use anywhere, and (2) after the clause praying that the
Holy Spirit may make or show (aTroQ-nvri) the bread the Body of Christ,
and the cup His Blood, it immediately proceeds, ' so that those who partake
of it may be confirmed in godliness, may obtain remission of sins,' &c.,
which is orthodox enough.
76 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
gation at Muthill, March 20, 1859, and had the effect of
confirming the congregation there in their old attachment
to the Office, he touches directly upon the disputed point.
He explains ' become ' as equivalent to ' come to be,' and
defends the whole expression as no more open to the charge
of teaching transubstantiation than our Lord's own words,
* This is my body,' while the Church in Article xxviii.
explicitly rejects that doctrine. But three years later, in
September 1862, on further consideration, and probably
after arriving at a more detailed knowledge of the historical
facts, he was clearly of opinion that this particular expres
sion was open to reasonable objection and required alter
ation. He observes in his Charge addressed to the Synod
of that year that one of their body [Kev. G. H. Forbes,
brother of the Bishop of Brechin] proposed to meet the
difficulty by adding the following words drawn from the
Liturgy of St. James : ' for the forgiveness of our sins,
for our growth in grace, for the bringing forth of good
works, and for obtaining life everlasting ' ; and notes that a
similar modification had since been suggested both by Mr.
Freeman and Mr. Keble.
He then further proposed (p. 22) :
1. That the Consecration Prayer in the Scotch Office be
reconsidered, more especially with a view of altering the phrase
1 may become ' &c. &c.
2. That the Prayer, when altered, be accepted by the Church
as a duplicate formula, together with the Consecration Prayer
in the English Office; as we already have duplicate forms of
collects for the Easter weeks, for the Sovereign (after the
commandments), &c. &c.
3. That the use of this duplicate formula be subject to
canonical regulation, upon these or similar terms : ' It shall be
lawful for the priest to introduce it, at his discretion, provided
its use shall be desired by not less than two-thirds of the male
adult Communicants. This rule to apply to all congregations.'
CH.III EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 77
This proposal was made in consequence of the discussion
at the General Synod held in July 1862, and continued by
successive adjournments to 13 February, 1863, which ended,
however, in an unfortunate conclusion. The text of the
Office remained unaltered, but it was removed from its
position of 'primary authority.' The English Book of
Common Prayer was adopted as the service book of the
Church, and the use of its Communion office enjoined at all
Consecrations, Ordinations, and Synods. Difficult condi
tions were laid down as to the introduction of the Scottish
Office into new congregations, while (arguing ex silentio) it
could not be introduced into old ones where it was not
already in use. Its continuance where it was in use was
tolerated, but it might be removed by a concurrence of the
clergyman and a majority of the Communicants.
This somewhat harsh treatment of an old and much
loved formula was partly due to a wish to conciliate English
prejudice, as negotiations were then going on for a removal
of the disabilities of Scottish clergy in England, 1 partly to
the growth in power of the Southern Dioceses, which were,
generally speaking, against the Office, in opposition to the
old pre-eminence of the North. It was vehemently resisted
by G. H. Forbes of Burntisland, who protested against the
competence ot the General Synod to legislate on such a
matter, and carried his protest after a time by appeal into
the House of Lords but naturally in vain.
Bishop Wordsworth recurred to the subject by re-
1 These were carried to a successful issue by the Duke of Buccleuch,
and others, in 1864, 27 & 28 Viet. c. 94. As to the views of the Anglicising
party, the reader may consult a printed letter of Bishop Ewing, of Glasgow,
to Primus Terrot, dated Bishopston, 1 May, 1858 (Grant, Edinburgh), in
which he urges ' uniformity and, if possible, incorporation with the Church
of England ' (p. 17, proposed resolution at a General Synod). He was an
uncompromising opponent of the Scottish Office, ascribing the misfortunes
of the Eucharistic Controversy mainly to it.
78 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
printing his Charge of 1862, with other matter, as a contri
bution to the Seabury Commemoration in 1884 under the
title ' English, Scotch, and American Communion Offices.'
His last printed utterance upon it was in his Charge of
1889, in connection with the last General Synod, when
he suggested the substitution of the form used by the Old
Catholics in Germany and Switzerland proposed, if I
recollect rightly, in that community by my friend Bishop
Edward Herzog, of Berne ' may be the Communion of
the Body and Blood.' But the matter was shelved.
When revision takes place, if a forecast may be hazarded,
it will probably follow the precedents of 1549 and 1637 in
reading ' may be unto us.' The formula ' may become
unto us ' would have one peculiar feature, which might
seem of value, and might be held to avoid certain difficulties,
viz. that of literal agreement with the words of the Koman
Canon Missae. But then the difference of the Scottish
Office from the Koman, in that it places the Invocation
after the words of Institution, is so marked, that this literal
agreement in phrase, so dislocated, would have really the
opposite effect. It would emphasise the thought that con
secration was not effected by the words of Institution, but
by the Invocation of the Holy Spirit, which to some might
be welcome and to others much the reverse. Altogether,
the matter is much less simple than it might appear, and I
am not surprised that the General Synod thought it wisest
to leave it alone. But some day I should venture to hope
that the Scottish Church will return, as regards the con
secration prayer, to the first Prayer Book of Edward VI.,
which is in this order : first Invocation, then Institution,
then Oblation, the prayer of the Invocation being in the
form * may be unto us.' l This would bring the Office into
closer union both with the East and the West, and with
1 This, I imagine, was intended to be a version of ' ut fiat nobis.'
OH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 79
our own Church in the first and most learned period of its
liturgical efforts, and substantially too with the Old Catholics.
I do not myself, as a student of Liturgies, believe that the
relative position of these different parts of the prayer of
consecration is very important in itself, or that the presence
of any particular one of them was, according to primitive
usage, considered to be absolutely necessary. I have
considered the evidence on this subject at some length in a
book on ' The Holy Communion.' l But as a Bishop of the
Church, and as interested in the question of Eeunion, I feel
very strongly that anything which makes for external
agreement is of the greatest possible practical importance :
and that the Scottish Office as it stands is unnecessarily
angular.
I do not think that I can conclude this subject better
than by giving the reader the Bishop of St. Andrews' own
words in which he sums up his final judgment on the
Scottish Office taken from his last note-books. 2
1. I cannot pretend to be an enthusiastic admirer of the
S. C. Office. Still less can I join in ascribing any exorbitant
share of merit to our Scotch Church in regard to it. The
feature which gives to it its distinctive value viz. the Invocation
was derived from the first English Reformed Prayer Book. 3
2. In regard to the Office itself, in my opinion the praise has
been extravagant, and the blame has been extravagant. If we
are to follow the guidance and the records of antiquity (as we
claim to follow them in other matters), it would seem desirable
to have a form of Consecration more full than that of the English
Office, including a more formal presentation of the elements and
a direct invocation of the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, we
cannot suppose that the simpler scriptural record which the
English Office is content to follow is insufficient. There seems
1 Pages 132-152, ed. 2, 1892.
2 MS. Note-books, iii. 38, v. 6, 7, 21.
3 See Neale's Life of Bishop Torry, pp. 209 and 316, for the Bishop's
opinion on this point.
80 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
little room for extravagant feeling on either side, and still less
for vaunting and contending for the S. 0. as a badge of
nationality, considering that the sources from which it was
immediately derived were mainly English, and little can be
pleaded as Scotch except the unhappy alteration of 1764 in the
Consecration Prayer, which the American Church has wisely
avoided ; and no less wisely, in my opinion, has preferred the
English Order in the arrangement of the several parts of the
service. I have no sympathy with the frame of mind which
would magnify matters of that sort into the importance of
fundamental verities and would expose the Church to continual
turmoil and dissension on their account. There was nothing in
our Lord's conduct upon earth to indicate a desire to lay stress
upon such formalities, but much to the contrary.
3. In my opinion the Church will not be doing right, or
acting fairly by its members as a whole, if it consents to alter
the present canon without an alteration in the Office itself. It
is idle and untrue to allege the example and authority of our
Brethren in America in behalf of the Office until we have done
what they have had the wisdom to do by altering the phrase
introduced unadvisedly and with no Synodal Authority in 1764,
which gave reasonable offence, and rather takes from than adds
to the real value of the Office.
After leaving Muthill the Wordsworths removed, at
Whitsuntide 1855, to Birnam Cottage, just outside Dunkeld,
near where the present Bishop for a time resided. It was
in a beautiful, but rather relaxing situation on the banks of
the Tay. The Bishop's work here no doubt led greatly to
the growth of the Church in Dunkeld in after years. The
congregation then met in an upper room over a stable, but
in June 1857 he had the happiness of seeing the first stone
of the present excellent church laid.
The Synod of 1855 was held at Perth on 28 August,
the chief subjects discussed being the * Diocesan Association
for Church Purposes,' the practice of Baptism by immersion,
which was insisted upon by Mr. G. H. Forbes contrary to
CH. in EARLY EPISCOPATE. 1853-1856 81
the Bishop's judgment, and the admission of Irvingites to
Communion. The Diocesan Association was a large scheme,
but one of its objects, the endowment of the Bishopric to the
extent of fully 500 a year, was attained chiefly by the
energy of Lord Kollo, the Bishop's constant friend and
ever ready host.
The family were driven from Birnam Cottage by sick
ness, and spent the winter, as was often the case, in visits to
Burghclere and Winchester, while the Bishop composed his
lectures on ' Unity and the Christian Ministry,' which were
delivered next year with considerable success at Edinburgh,
Forfar, Perth, and St. Andrews. These lectures were never
published, but large portions were used in his ' Outlines of
the Christian Ministry/ published in 1872.
The Bishop left Birnam Cottage shortly after Easter
1856 (April 1), and about Whitsuntide took up his abode at
Pitcullen Bank, on the East of Perth, which was his home
till the spring of 1858. He had been longing for a home
for some three years, and wrote in his pocket almanack at
Birnam : ' When wilt thou come unto me ? I will walk in
my house with a perfect heart.' These years had been
years of considerable anxiety and discomfort, which he
bore with his usual faith and patience. He was now able
to have his family again about him, a society in which he
took great delight, and to enjoy once more the use of his
valuable library, of which he had been deprived for this
period. The Synod and Visitation were held at St.
Ninian's 26 and 27 August, and appear to have been of
a very satisfactory character to all present. The Charge,
like that of the previous year, contributed materials to the
' Outlines of the Christian Ministry.' At this point the
' Annals ' unfortunately cease.
It should be noticed that in this year (October 1856)
the question of the relation of Trinity College to the Church
82 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. in
was finally settled. * The College was dissevered from the
Diocese of St. Andrews and made a Peculiar under the
jurisdiction of the College of Bishops, the Bishop of St.
Andrews still consenting to hold the necessary Confirma
tions when requested by the Warden.' J
In the same year the Bishop reprinted an article which
he had contributed to the * Scottish Ecclesiastical Journal '
under the title of * Papal Aggression in the East ; or, the
Protestantism of the Oriental Church,' which contains some
valuable extracts from the answer of the Patriarchs of the
East to the Letter of Pius IX. of 1848. The Oriental
letter was sent to him by Mr. Wm. Palmer. The reason
for this publication at this time was the existence of
rumours of the establishment of Koman Catholic Dioceses
and Bishops in Scotland : an event long in contemplation
which actually took place in 1877.
As the next chapter is occupied chiefly with controversy,
I may mention here that in October 1858 the Bishop
moved into his final home at Perth, the Feu House, of
which he took a lease of nineteen years. He made it a
delightful residence. He had, I may remark, great taste
in architecture and in the laying out of grounds and gardens,
the result of which is now conspicuous at Glenalmond.
He thought it necessary to plan a terrace walk wherever he
made his abode a predilection which other members of
the family, beginning with William Wordsworth, and in
cluding my father, have shared with him. At the Feu a
broad walk of smooth-mown turf, which he designed, under
overshadowing trees, was his constant resort for a daily
4 constitutional.' To a man of his temperament these
plans and improvements were a great relief in the midst of
the controversies which we have now to describe.
1 See Gordon's Scotichronicon, vi. 395.
83
CHAPTEK IV.
THE EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN's. 1857-1860.
' The truth exploring with an equal mind,
In doctrine and communion they have sought
Firmly between the two extremes to steer ;
But theirs the wise man's ordinary lot,
To trace right courses for the stubborn blind,
And prophesy to ears that will not hear.'
WM. WORDSWORTH'S Eccl. Sonnets, pt. ii. 40. 1
The Eucharistic controversy Bishop Forbes's Primary Charge (August
1857) Its connection with the controversy in England Previous works
of Pusey and Keble Summary of Forbes's Charge : the Presence, Adora
tion, Sacrifice ; Scottish Office Part taken by Bishop of St. Andrews
reserved and laborious, and tending to united action The Charge dis
cussed in the Episcopal Synod Agitation Three Bishops' Declaration
Clerical and Lay Addresses Keble's Letter to the Primus Publica
tion of Mr. Cheyne's ' Six Sermons ' (February 1858) prevents a settle
ment Their aggressive character Presented to Bishop Suther : his
attempted restriction Synodal Letter of 27 May, 1858, drafted by
Bishop of St. Andrews and signed by all but Bishop Forbes Comments
on it The Bishop's explanatory letter to Sir A. Edmonstone E.
Palmer's ' Opinion ' Bishop Trower's ' Pastoral ' Keble's ' Considera
tions ' Mr. Cheyne suspended at Aberdeen (August 1858) Bishop of
St. Andrews' ' Notes on the Eucharistic Controversy ' : summary of them
Pacific Charge of 1858 Mr. Cheyne's first appeal Death of Eev. Wm.
B. Barter His character Mr. Cheyne's obstinacy His second trial
(May 1859), appeal, and sentence (November 1859) His restoration
(1863).
Rupture between the Bishop and the Chapter of St. Ninian's
History of their relations Bishop's view of his position in the Cathedral
Mr. D. Chambers's 'Opinion' Perth Cathedral School - Announces
his withdrawal (May 1859) More outspoken Charge of September,
1859 Eastward Position given up Pamphlets of Mr. Humble and Mr.
Lendrum.
1 I have chosen this motto as one which applies generally to the subject
of this memoir, not as thinking that truth lay absolutely on his side. My
own judgment is given at the end of the chapter.
G 2
84 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. IT
Legal proceedings against Bishop Forbes (October 1859) His
'Letter to the Congregation of St. Paul's, Dundee' Anonymous
' Proposals for Peace,' by Bishop of St. Andrews Language of Anglican
and Scottish Divines Further proceedings Interview with Keble
(8 February, I860) Judgment in the case (15 March, 1860).
The Bishop of St. Andrews' own remarks Painful circumstances
George Forbes's approval of his ' Opinion ' The chief questions at issue :
Is there a Real Presence on the altar ' in ' the consecrated elements, and a
Sacrifice identical with the Sacrifice of the Cross ? Criticism of this
position from Scripture and antiquity Quotation from his ' Opinion '
on the Melchizedekian Priesthood.
The writer's own judgment Disturbance of the proportion of faith
in the doctrine of the adoration of Christ ' in the gifts ' Danger of
pressing logic to extremes Our ignorance of the conditions of Christ's
existence in the unseen world Equal difficulties of a ' presence of virtue
and efficacy ' and of a ' supra-local presence ' The writer inclined to
the theory of Sacrifice which regards the Church on Earth as uniting
with our Lord in Heaven Scripture again teaches a distinction between
different modes of our Lord's Presence Forbes passes from the Sacrifice
of the Cross to the Sacrifice of the Upper Room without seeing the
difference between them The Church repeats the second, but not the
first.
The Principalship of St Andrews desired for the Bishop.
IN the summer of 1857 Bishop Alexander Penrose Forbes,
of Brechin, delivered his Primary Charge, which introduced l
the Eucharistic controversy in a somewhat acute form into
Scotland. As the subject of this memoir devoted a great
part of his time and strength for several years to the
scrutiny of this Charge, and to the parallel utterances of
Mr. Patrick Cheyne, which were unfortunately entangled
1 It is true that five of the Rev. Patrick Cheyne's Six Sermons on the
Doctrine of the most Holy EzwJiarist were delivered in Lent, 1857, at St.
John the Evangelist's, Aberdeen, and may have caused some local stir at
the time. But they were not published till the spring of the next year.
The preface is dated Septuagesima 1858 ; and, therefore, they were prac
tically later than the Charge, and one of them is partly based upon it. In
discussing the controversies reviewed in this chapter I have used particularly
two volumes of pamphlets &c., thirty-five altogether in number, lent to me
by the kindness of their collector, Rev. J. W. Hunter, of Birnam, some of
which must be very scarce. I have also three volumes of my own, containing
thirty-two pamphlets, which were, I imagine, the property of Rev. Henry
Aubrey, at one time Chaplain to the Earl of Morton, but lately beneficed
near Salisbury. Fourteen of these are elsewhere unknown to me, making
up forty-nine in all. I have also referred, of course, to Liddon's Life of
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 85
with it, it is necessary for us to review both the Charge
itself and the criticism to which it was subjected, particu
larly by the Bishop of St. Andrews. In the discharge of this
task I shall have no temptation to partisanship, as I had a
sincere admiration and affection for Bishop Forbes, whose
little Bible, used by him with noble dutifulness during the
cholera at Dundee, is one of my cherished possessions. I
shall attempt faithfully to represent the opinions and argu
ments of both sides, and shall also (as in regard to other
controversies described in this volume) endeavour to help
the reader to form a judgment for himself. For, as I have
before remarked, no one is likely to read this book, except
he be really interested in the questions discussed in it, as
well as in the outward life of its principal subject.
It was on Wednesday, 7 August, 1857, that Bishop
Forbes delivered his first Charge at the Synod of the
clergy of his Diocese held in the little city of Brechin.
He had been Bishop nearly ten years, but was still
a young man, just turned forty, 1 and, perhaps, partly for
that reason he had hitherto shrunk from addressing the
clergy in this formal manner. He tells us, at any rate, in
the opening sentences, that such was the case, and that it
was only on an occasion when he felt called upon to say
something that he broke in upon the reserve which he had
hitherto imposed upon himself (p. 5). The occasion was,
no doubt, afforded him by the controversy which had some
time been going on in England. Archdeacon Denison's
case had broken down in the Archbishop's Court, the Court
of Arches, on a technical point (23 April, 1857) ; but, though
Pusey, iii. chap, xviii., ' Second Period of Eucharistic Controversy,' and to
Boss's Memoir of Alexander Ewing and to Mackey's Bishop Forbes, &c.
The latter is a poor book, but has some useful documents. My uncle has
left some MS. notes on the subject, but they are not as full as could be
wished. But I have used a complete collection of his printed papers
belonging to his family.
1 He was born 6 June, 1817, and consecrated Bishop 28 October, 1847.
86 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
it was dismissed there, the question was still, in some
degree, subject to appeal, and the appeal lay to the Judicial
Committee of the Privy Council. Bishop Forbes refers
slightly, and perhaps a little harshly, to the circumstances
of this case in the first division of this Charge (pp. 12, 13),
but no doubt he represented the feelings and anxieties of
many in England at this time. His two friends, Dr. Pusey
and Mr. Keble,*had, both of them, lately been engaged upon
treatises dealing with special aspects of the same contro
versy, which saw the light somewhat before his own Charge.
Dr. Pusey wrote his dry but laborious book, 1 the preface to
which is dated * Christ Church, Easter 1857,' entitled 'The
Eeal Presence of the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Doctrine of the English Church,' in order to
show in detail that his Eucharistic teaching was consistent
with honest subscription to the formularies of the Church
of England. 2 Mr. Keble's contribution was of a different
nature his treatise, ' On Eucharistical Adoration ' which
has many elements of beauty and attractiveness, but fails
somewhat in strength of argument. In regard to this
treatise a good critic 3 specially instances the commentary
on the title ' Son of Man ' (pp. 31-56) as, beyond question,
the most valuable portion of the essay. A certain weakness
1 Dr. Pusey had already published three collections of passages bearing
on the subject : (1) At the end of his sermon of 1843, TJie Holy Eucharist
a Comfort to the Penitent, from English divines ; (2) The Doctrine of the
Real Presence, as set forth in the Works of Divines and others of the
English Church from the Reformation, part i., Oxford, 1855 (advertisement
dated London, January 11, 1855) ; (3) The Doctrine of tJie Real Presence as
contained in the Fathers from the Death of St. John the Evangelist to the
Fourth General Council, vindicated in Notes on a Sermon, ' The Presence of
Christ in the Holy Eucharist, 1 preached in 1853 (Oxford, 1855 ; a volume
of 722 pp. dated, at the end, Thursday in Holy Week). It was this last
volume that was so laboriously attacked by Dr. John Harrison in 1871.
* See Liddon's Life of Pusey, iii. 447, and the whole chapter.
8 Dr. H. P. Liddon, in his notice of the Treatise in the Christian
Remembrancer for January, 1858, xxxv. 235.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 87
is evident in the more argumentative parts, e.g. in those
that refer to the practice of bowing at the name of Jesus
(as based on Philippians ii. 10). In one particular, indeed,
Keble goes further than Forbes, when he says : ' I must
take leave to say that, granting the doctrine of the Keal
Objective Presence, Adoration is not only permitted, but
enjoined by the Church of England in her Prayer Book :
those who would prove that she prohibits the one must first
make out that she denies the other ; which they can never
do as long as her Catechism and her Communion office
remain' (p. 130). The logic of this passage leaves much
to be desired. It would seem to make the absence of pro
hibition equivalent to positive injunction. But the treatise,
read cautiously, has much that is fruitful in it.
In chivalrous and warm-hearted co-operation with these
two friends Bishop Forbes composed his first official
deliverance ' on a great theological subject. He wished to
help them and their cause ; he wished also, but as a subordi
nate object, to defend the Scottish Office, which, as we have
seen, was then subject to much attack, owing particularly
to the agitation for the removal of the disabilities of the
Scottish clergy. His Charge, however, is chiefly occupied
with the four questions then debated in England the
doctrine of the Presence, the reception by the wicked,
Eucharistic Adoration, and the Eucharistic Sacrifice. The
Charge is, in fact, a theological treatise on a small scale
(pp. 5-42) on these four points, with an appendix, so to call
it, on the Scottish Office (pp. 42-48). I shall enumerate
the principal topics as they stand, with special emphasis on
those expressions concerning them which were most subject
to criticism.
Section 1 (pp. 6-26) deals with the 'Keal Presence.'
1 He had published in 1852 his Short Explanation of the Nicene Creed>
written at the suggestion of Dr. Pusey.
88 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
The question is said to be, * Is [Christ] Himself, according
to His own word, really present in the Holy Sacrament, as
the supernatural Bread which cometh down from Heaven ;
the strengthening and refreshing of the weary soul of man
during his pilgrimage here ? . . . Is the Sacrament of the
Lord's Supper the partaking of the Living Christ, or merely
the memorial of the Dead ? ' In examining the sense of our
formularies on this question, he first states that the Articles
are conditions of clerical admission to ministry, not creeds,
and then shows what other authorities have to be taken
into consideration by loyal Churchmen. There is a fivefold
test to be supplied: (1) The Articles and Catechism; (2)
the whole language of prayer ; (3) exhortations, rubrics and
directions ; (4) Fathers and decrees of Councils ; (5) Holy
Scripture not ' development.' These are applied in turn.
Under (1) is quoted my predecessor, Bishop Geste's letter
(as Bishop of Eochester), dated December 22, 1566, to Sir
William Cecil, on the 29th Article (of which he claims the
authorship), in which he explains the words of the Article,
' after an heavenly and spirituall maner oiiely,' as not
excluding ' the presence of Christ's body from the Sacra
ment, but only the grossenes and sensiblenes in the
receavinge thereof (p. 15). l The patristic interpretation
of Scripture occupies considerable space. Then follows a
just enough criticism of the doctrine of Transubstantiation,
and another, very superficial, of the ' rationalistic theory
1 With this letter should be compared another printed (in part) for the
first time by Mr. Wm. Goode (afterwards Dean of Ripon) in A Supplement
to his work on tlie Eucharist, pp. 8 foil. (London, 1858). In it Geste sug
gests to Lord Burleigh (probably in May 1571) that it would be best for the
Bishop of Gloucester (Cheney), who was then under censure, that the word
4 only ' should be put out of the Book of Articles, which was then in
Burleigh's hands to put before the Queen. He objects, also, strongly to the
29th Article, on the wicked, &c. : and wishes to add the word ' profit
ably ' in the previous Article, so that it should run ' [But] the mean
whereby the Body of Christ is profitably received and eaten in the Supper
is Faith.'
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 89
of the presence which makes it one of power and efficacy
only,' with a further disparaging reference to ' the nonjuring
Catechisms.' 1 These hasty expressions naturally gave great
offence, though the Bishop professed to speak ' with great
reserve and tenderness.' For these expressions seemed to
be an indictment, at least constructively, of a very large
body of divines, both in England and Scotland, some of
them of the highest reputation beginning with Hooker and
ending with the authors of the usual Scottish Episcopalian
Catechisms, and the Bishop's own father, Lord Medwyn, all
of whom had used the terms, ' virtue and efficacy,' ' power
and effect,' &c. to explain the mystery of Christ's Presence.
This passage was, therefore, somewhat enlarged in the third
1 The reader will naturally compare Forbes's remarks on this point with
the fuller and more sympathetic treatment of the topic by Keble, the editor
of Hooker, to whose Ecclesiastical Polity, I suppose, is chiefly due the pre
valence of this opinion in the Church of England (Euch. Ad. chap. iv. 3,
124). Keble himself had, of course, also given currency to it in his
Christian Year ' Gunpowder Treason '
' come to our Communion Feast :
There present, in the heart,
Not in the hands, th' eternal Priest
Will His true self impart.'
The Not, as is well known, was afterwards changed by his permission, given
on his death-bed, to As, but neither seems very appropriate. Christ's
presence as an eternal Priest is, strictly speaking, neither in the heart nor
in the hands. We might say justly enough ' to the heart Through reverent
hands,' i.e. of both the minister and the communicant. I do not wonder that
Keble was reluctant to make the alteration, because he was speaking of the
presence of the ' eternal Priest ' rather than of His body apart from Him ;
and though he might not be satisfied with the first wording of his poem, he
could hardly, as a poet and as a theologian desiring to give a clear concep
tion, have approved of the last. The presence of ' power and efficacy ' was
the doctrine not only of Hooker, but of Ken (see Works, iv. 84 and 120) and
Wilson, not to speak of Jeremy Taylor, of the famous Scottish Bishops
Rattray and Jolly, and of later Bishops, long after the time of the non-
jurors. See [Bishop of St. Andrews'] Proposals for Peace, passim, and The
Recent Decision of the Episcopal Synod of the Church in Scotland, by a
Presbyter (Edin. 1859), being four articles from the English Churchman,
especially pp. 4-6 and 18.
90 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
edition (pp. 19 foil.), but without any concession as to the
possible orthodoxy of those who were thus censured.
Section II. (26-29) concerns the reception by the wicked,
on which Pusey and Keble somewhat differed. It does not
appear to need much comment. The conclusion is, 'We
may not speculate on these things ; it is enough to believe
that in some sense the wicked do receive CHRIST indeed, to
their condemnation and loss, for thus and thus only can
they become guilty of the Body and Blood of CHRIST.' He
has previously noticed that the words quoted in Article xxix.
as St. Augustine's are not really his, but those of the
Venerable Bede commenting on Augustine. The point,
however, is overlooked that the Article says, in its own
language, ' in no wise are they partakers of Christ.' This
surely required his phrase to be modified.
Sections III. (29-35), on Eucharistic Adoration, and IV.
(35-42), on the doctrine of the Christian Sacrifice, contain the
passages which were most subject to remark and criticism.
In III. the duty of adoration is logically deduced from
acceptance of the Presence.
If the Body and the Blood of Christ be there really [i.e. in
the Sacrament] (inasmuch as the Humanity of our Lord hypo-
statically united to the Divinity is itself an object of worship)
it follows that supreme adoration is due to the Body and Blood
of CHRIST mysteriously present in the gifts, which yet retain
their own substance. The worship is due not to the gifts, but
to Christ in the gifts, and this seems to be what Bishop Andrewes
meant when he says ' CHRIST the inward part of the Sacrament,
in the Sacrament, and out of the Sacrament, wheresoever He is,
is to be worshipped ' ; l and our own great theologian, Bishop
William Forbes, 2 of Edinburgh, quoting the Bishop of Spalatro, 3
says : ' Christ in the Eucharist is to be adored with divine worship,
1 Ad Card. Bellarmin. resp. 195, 266, Anglo-Cath. Lib.
2 Forbesii Consider -ationes Modestae, p. 545, Anglo-Cath. Lib. Several
paragraphs are quoted at length in the note.
3 That is to say, Marco Antonio De Dominis, who for a time resided in
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 91
as His living and glorified Body is present therein.' ... It
seems to be a logical necessity. Either CHRIST is present, or
He is not. If He is, He ought to be adored ; if He is not, cadit
Forbes then proceeds to clear this doctrine from certain
extreme results (p. 31 foil.). It does not imply acceptance
of ' the ceremonies of the festival of Corpus Christi or of
the forty hours' adoration.' The words of the Article
' the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was not by Christ's
ordinance . . . worshipped ' may still be accepted.
Our Lord ordained the Sacrament to be the perpetual
application of His Sacrifice and to be the means of Union with
Him. He did not ordain it to be a Palladium to confine His
Presence to certain local bounds. Historically, we find evidence
of the reservation of the Sacrament in the very earliest times
for the purpose of communicating the sick. The reservation for
the purpose of adoration was much later.
This is a valuable passage which may be commended to
the notice of any amongst ourselves who favour the intro
duction of the modern Koman Service of Benediction with
the reserved Sacrament.
He then goes on to argue that the Declaration on Kneel
ing at the end of the Communion office, on which many
arguments had been founded, condemns the Lutheran error
of ubiquitism and enunciates St. Thomas Aquinas' doctrine
of the supra-local nature of the Body of Christ in the
Sacrament (p. 32, cp. p. 10), a somewhat bold incursion
into his opponents' ground, but not wholly without justifica
tion. He also notices, with more evident reason, 1 the
England as an English Churchman, and took part in some of our Episcopal
consecrations, but afterwards reverted to Eome.
1 The reader may be reminded that this ' black rubric,' as it is some
times called, which is really in its origin a declaration or explanation added
to some copies of the rare Second Prayer Book of Edward VI., was not part
of the Prayer Book in the following reigns of Elizabeth, James I. and
92 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
change made in the wording of this document at the last
revision from Real and Essential to ' Corporal Presence of
Christ's natural Flesh and Blood.' He implies that while
we do not adore the Corporal Presence, we certainly do not
deny the Real and Essential Presence. 1
Another argument which found favour with Bishop
Forbes is that drawn from the alteration in the position of
the ' Gloria in E^celsis ' from the beginning to the end of the
service, after the consecration and before the consumption
of what remains of the gifts. The suggestion that it favours
Eucharistic adoration in virtue of the phrase, ' Lord God,
Lamb of God, Son of the Father, that takest away the sins of
the world, have mercy upon us ! ' was afterwards withdrawn
by Forbes himself (see p. 135). It is probable that the
Keformers placed the ' Gloria ' where it is, in order to make
the early part of the service, which was and is often used
without Communion, less festal, and to reserve this great
thanksgiving for occasions when Communion had actually
taken place. The Lutheran plan of using the ' Gloria in
Excelsis,' even when there is no Communion, is hardly
satisfactory.
He draws an argument also in favour of adoration from
the custom among us that the priest receives kneeling,
whereas in the older rites he stands, as in Primitive times
it was customary for all communicants to do. Certainly
reception by the priest kneeling is a good custom of the
Church, both in England and Scotland, being enjoined by
Charles I., and was only restored in that of Charles II. in the modified
form above indicated. The alteration acquires more importance when it is
seen to have been, presumably at least, a condition of the restoration of the
document. Thus C. Wheatley, in his well-known book, On the Common
Prayer, draws attention to the change, and quotes the Catechism and
Homilies as showing the belief of the Church of England in the Real
Presence.
1 He does not use the term ' objective presence ' in this section, but in
the next, p. 40.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 93
Bishop Andrewes and Bishop William Forbes of Edinburgh. 1
But the most natural interpretation of it seems to me to be
that he thereby recognises and adores the Presence of the
invisible High Priest and King, Who ministers the Sacra
ment to him, and afterwards by him to the people, rather
than that he is then adoring His Presence in the gifts.
In IV. we have a discussion of the Doctrine of Sacrifice.
This section is largely occupied with quotations, in the
midst of which occurs the sentence which was made part
of the charge against him (p. 38) : * Moreover the ancient
doctors teach that the Eucharistic Sacrifice is the same
substantially with that of the Cross (Chrys. " In Heb. Horn."
xvii. 3, St. Greg. " Dial." iv. 58), and that Jesus Christ
Himself is the chief and principal minister of the Eucha
ristic Sacrifice (St. Ambrose " de bened. Patr." c. ix., " In
Ps." 38, n. 25; St. Chrys. "Prod. Jud."i. 6; "2 Tim. Horn."
ii. 4; St. Aug. "Civ. Dei," x. 20) 'St. Ambrose and St.
Augustine being quoted at length at the foot of the page.
Then follow paragraphs about the Eucharist being a
* proper sacrifice,' and a ' continual sacrifice,' offered by
our Saviour as the Priest after the order of Melchizedek.
The reader will notice that he does not use the Tridentine
expression * propitiatory.' This part of the Charge contains
passages of much feeling and beauty, which show the
writer's soul soaring upward in a sort of mystical rapture,
and thereby overcoming, or at least striving to overcome,
the logical and practical difficulties which beset any attempt
to describe the Eucharistic Sacrifice as truly identical with,
or a continuance of, the Sacrifice of the Cross.
1 For their opinions see my Holy Communion, ed. 2, p. 250 (1892).
Mr. Humble seems to say that Bishop Andrewes decides in favour of the
priest receiving standing. See his Letter (1859), p. 74, quoting Elementa
Liturgica, by G. Walker, p. 112, ed. 2, and ' Bishop Cosin's Notes, 1st series,'
v. p. 105. But whoever wrote these Notes is arguing against standing
which was the puritan attitude (p. 112).
94 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
We rise (he says, p. 41) from the relative to the absolute.
The nature of man is now introduced into the deepest recess of
the heavenly choir, in the person of Jesus both God and Man,
while on Earth every prayer is only accepted through Him;
every thanksgiving only received in union with that thanks
giving which He is ever offering in His Humanity ; and every
praise, in conjunction with that high and eternal laud which is
made by all the Saints and Angels on high, and by the Eternal
High Priest after the order of Melchizedek.
Use is also made of the vision of the Lamb of God seen
by St. John in the Apocalypse :
The same Lamb of God, whom the rapt Apostle in Patmos
saw in Heaven ' as it had been slain,' is now mystically offered
in the Church below . . . and by virtue of the Holy Ghost our
mystic sacrifice is now the Body and Blood of Him who offereth
it. Yet this august solemnity, in which the Church of God
glories, is purely spiritual, and in every way worthy of the
Gospel covenant. In a Sacrament is the Lord's death shown
forth in representation. The very image has taken place of the
shadow.
Section V. on the Scottish Office calls for no remark,
except that he defends it largely as bringing us closer to
antiquity and as thereby being a protection against new
and false revelations
which exhibit themselves most offensively in Mormonism, less
coarsely in Irvingism and in that school of the modern Roman
Catholic Church which not only rests on the theory of develop
ment, but which lays so much store by that additional religion
drawn from the visions and experiences of the Saints which
began early in the history of the Church, and has continued
through a long line, of which the most distinguished are St.
Hildegard and St. Bridget, to this day (p. 44).
There was much in this Charge that was elevating and
conducive to faith, to reverence, and even to awe. It must
be read sympathetically to be fairly judged. There was
CH. iv EUCIIARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 95
much evidence in it, too, of a desire to avoid offence, and to
define the writer's position as a loyal Churchman, who
understood the dangers of Eoman teaching and wished to
warn his hearers against them. But, nevertheless, it was
not surprising that it created great excitement and alarm.
It was not like the parallel treatises of Pusey and Keble,
apologetic ^in character, justifying a position that was
assailed, and in the main asking for toleration for un
popular or suspected opinions. It was a Bishop's teaching
addressed ex cathedra to his flock. It seemed to drive
its conclusions home with rigorous logic, and to force their
acceptance on pain of incurring the suspicion of heterodoxy.
Serious dilemmas are proposed to the reader, and the very
moderation of the language, and the reverence and solemnity
of its tone, make him feel uncomfortable if he demurs to
teaching so evidently part of the life and faith of him who
gave it. Occasionally, too, there is a sharp edge and a
slighting treatment of opponents which could not but cause
pain. On the whole, a plain man might well ask himself :
' Since the subject is confessedly so mysterious, and the
conclusions are so much a matter of inference and not of
direct revelation, has the Bishop any right to press me so
hard ? ' I think this natural reluctance to be driven by
so-called ' logic ' had much to do with the temper in which
the Charge was criticised, and especially considering how
small the community was to which it was addressed ; so
that even an individual presbyter might feel he was called
upon to accept its teaching ; or, if he could not do so,
obliged to clear himself from the imputation of accepting it.
So, again, the fear of giving countenance to some insidious
form of idolatry by adoring a Presence in the gifts an
expression much more restricted and local than those of
Bishops Andrewes and William Forbes, which he quotes to
justify it a dislike to scholastic explanations such as that
96 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
of the ' supra-local presence ' ; a suspicion of distinctions
like that between the active and the passive sacrifice, which
was afterwards used to explain the alleged identity of the
Eucharistic Sacrifice with the Sacrifice of the Cross ; a fear
above all of weakening faith in the one mediation of Christ
and His one sacrifice for sin ; all these not unworthy
motives combined to make even careful men very anxious
at this crisis, and inflamed the passions of many others
who were easily roused by party cries.
The part taken by the Bishop of St. Andrews in the
controversy was, as far as theological discussion went, a
leading one. His nature and scholarly training prompted
him to do eagerly and thoroughly whatever he undertook,
and his power of stating his case, and his evident sincerity
and desire to reach the bottom of his subject, made his
authority great in the Councils of the Scottish Church at
this juncture. His own experience no doubt made him
specially anxious as to the result. He remarks in one of
his notes on this case that, with the exception of Mr.
Cheyne, all the * esprits forts ' of the Scottish Church were
centred in the Diocese of St. Andrews, and all were men of
the same party colour any one of whom (he implies)
would have been enough to throw a Diocese into a state of
confusion. But while he was a leader in counsel on this
great subject, and felt it necessary that both public and
private remonstrances should be addressed to Bishop
Forbes, he was anxious that action should be united, and
not that of single Bishops engaging in controversy with
their brethren. A great part of his activity was devoted to
the end of securing joint action in anything that was done.
As regards his own part in the conflict two things are
abundantly manifest : first that he was very reserved in
publishing his own opinions merely as his own ; and
secondly, that he studied very hard to form a right judg-
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 97
ment as one who must give account of his stewardship.
He was perfectly justified in writing at a later date : ' If
any man ever set himself honestly to endeavour to ascer
tain God's truth on the subject of the Holy Eucharist, I
did so ' (' MS. Note-book,' v. 19). Nor did he publish any
thing, through the booksellers, directly against Bishop
Forbes. His ' Notes ' and his * Opinion ' were printed only
for private circulation. The ' Charge ' of 1858 deals only
with the fringe of the matter. The 'Charge' of 1859,
published at the formal request of the Synod, did indeed
necessarily contain some matter bearing on the Eucharistic
controversy occasioned by the ' St. Ninian's Declaration ' ;
and in an Appendix to it he reprinted his ' Pastoral Letter
to the Laity of his Diocese,' dated 16 February, 1858,
which dealt slightly with the controversy, but without
mentioning the Bishop of Brechin by name. Besides this
the only direct public and personal contribution he made to
the controversy was an anonymous pamphlet entitled ' Pro
posals for Peace,' of which something will be said below. 1
Bishop Forbes naturally felt pained by the opposition
of his brethren, especially, no doubt, that of his neighbour
the Bishop of St. Andrews, but, as the latter says, ' the
difference never led to personal estrangement or (I believe
I may say) to cessation of esteem and regard on either
side' ('MS. Note-book,' v. 19).
Without entering too much into detail I will mention
the chief points in the progress of the controversy, which
was not settled for two and a half years. The Charge was
delivered 5 August, 1857, and judgment was given upon
it 15 March, 1860. The first step was a discussion at a
Synod of the Bishops held on 29 September, and again,
more formally, at another on 11 December, 1857, both at
Edinburgh. The Bishop of St. Andrews has preserved the
1 See on this point Gordon's Scotichronicon, vi. 398 foil.
H
98 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
substance of what he said on the first of these two
occasions. See his 'Charge ' for 1858, p. 11 foil.
I said I felt how very unworthy and how little qualified I
was to pass a judgment upon what our right reverend brother
had written upon such a subject I had no doubt after much
study and earnest prayer; taken in connection with other
symptoms abroad the perusal of the Charge had made me, I
confessed, not a little uneasy ; that it seemed to me to go beyond
the teaching to which we had been accustomed ; more particularly
that the tendency of its parts was to disturb, as I thought, the
proportions of the faith ; and I instanced the Articles of our
Lord's Ascension and of the Descent of the Holy Ghost. I also
remarked upon the disparaging manner in which our Bishops of
the last century, whom we had hitherto regarded as among our
first authorities on Eucharistic doctrine, are referred to in the
Charge ; and still more upon what appeared to me to be the
unwarrantable assumption that the ancient Fathers of the Church
would be found to teach what the Bishop ascribes to them as
to the Eucharistic Sacrifice.
It is necessary just to mention this, as Bishop Forbes,
through some confusion or inadvertence, forgot to notice
this opinion, and represented the Bishop of Glasgow
(Trower), who certainly showed the most active hostility, as
alone having read and criticised the Charge at this Synod. 1
It was proposed to issue a declaration upon the subject of
the Holy Eucharist in order to reassure the minds of those
who might have been disturbed, but the proposal was lost
or rather adjourned till next year. 2 The Bishop of St.
Andrews, however, obtained from his brethren a declara
tion 3 on a minor point on which he was now in contro
versy with Provost Fortescue, and which of course was
closely connected in his mind with the sacrificial view of
1 Forbes's Charge, ed. 2 (Lent 1858), Appendix, p. 66, repeated unaltered
in ed. 3 (Easter 1858), p. 61. Cp. Bishop Trower's Pastoral Letter, p. 2.
2 See on this some letters from Bishop Ewing, dated 13 December, 1857,
in Ross's Memoir, p. 275.
8 See his Charge for 1858, p. 14.
CH. iv EUCHAFJSTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 99
the Eucharist, viz. the attendance of persons at Holy
Communion without receiving. It was, as we have seen,
the deliberate judgment of Bishop Torry that such
persons should withdraw, and the Bishops, in agreement
with the tradition on the subject, declared :
The custom of the Scottish Church does not authorise or
sanction, but rather forbids, the practice of presence at Holy
Communion of persons who are not to receive the Sacrament,
and this Synod decidedly disapproves the practice. The Synod
sees no sufficient reason for making an exception to the above
declaration in the case of persons who have previously received
the Holy Communion on the same day, or in the case of choirs.
This was a point on which many persons then felt
strongly, and probably more strongly than at present,
when the great frequency of Communion services makes it
less natural for all communicants who are in the church to
be prepared to communicate. But in Mr. Keble's judg
ment, as well as in that of the Bishop of St. Andrews, the
practice, at least in its broader form, was open to serious
criticism, and it must be carefully watched. 1
When the Synod was over those of the Bishops who
felt themselves most concerned made use of the individual
liberty reserved to them by the resolution finally adopted, 2
to issue a joint Pastoral a proceeding which seems rather
1 See Keble's Letters of Spiritual Counsel, L. cxvi. 207: 'I have a
strong feeling against the foreign custom of encouraging all sorts of persons
to " assist " at the Holy Eucharist without communicating. It seems to
me open to two grave objections : it cannot be without danger of profane-
ness and irreverence to very many, and of consequent dishonour to the
Holy Sacrament ; and it has brought in or encouraged, or both (at least,
so I greatly suspect), a notion of a quasi-sacramental virtue in such atten
dance, which I take to be great part of the error stigmatised in our xxxist
Article. Even in such a good book as the Imitatio Christi, and still more in
the Paradisus Animce, one finds participating " in Missa vel Communione "
spoken of as if one brought a spiritual benefit of the same order as the
other. This I believe to be utterly unauthorised by Scripture and antiquity ;
and I can imagine it of very dangerous consequence.'
2 See Bishops Eden and Wordsworth's Statement of 29 December 1857.
100 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
calculated to weaken the authority of the general body.
The resolution clearly only contemplated single Bishops
addressing their own Dioceses.
The agitation was chiefly in the Dioceses of Edinburgh
and Glasgow, and Bishops Terrot (Primus) and Trower
were joined by Bishop Ewing of Argyll a warm-hearted,
poetical, and impulsive man in publishing a declaration
of their own orrthe subject of the Eucharist, without, how
ever, mentioning any names. 1 Almost at the same time
Bishops Eden and Wordsworth put out a ' Statement ' ex
plaining why for the present they withheld any expres
sion of their own opinion (29 December, 1857) . 2 A copy of
the ' Three Bishops' Declaration,' as it may be called, was
sent by someone to Mr. Keble. He mistakenly supposed
that it was sent him by the Bishop of Edinburgh and that
his teaching was specially censured in it. His reason for
so doing was that he had sent his treatise on ' Eucharistic
1 There may be some doubt how far Bishop Terrot, who was a great
mathematician but not much of a theologian, really wished this Declaration
to be published. See Rumble's Letter to the Bishop of St. Andrews (1859),
p. 18, note. There is very little on this controversy in Eev. Win. Walker's
pleasant sketch of Bishop Terrot in his Three Churchmen (Edinb. 1893).
Bishop Trower was certainly the leading spirit in the matter. The Declara
tion may be found in his Pastoral Letter, published in June 1858, p. 15 foil.
Bishop Ewing was very half-hearted about it : see his Memoir, by Eoss,
p. 275. It may be found also in Kev. Donald J. Mackey's Bishop Forbes,
p. 98 foil. (1888), but in neither copy is it dated. It must, however, have
been between 14 and 24 December, 1857, since it is mentioned as in hand
in Bishop Ewing's letter of the 13th, and occasioned the Clerical declaration
to which Bishop Terrot replied on the 26th. Bishop Trower's action at this
time led also to the loss of [Dr.] Wm. Bright's services to the Church in
Scotland. He was then Bell Lecturer and Tutor at Glenalmond, and is now
the honoured Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Oxford : see his
Statement of Facts (London, Masters, 1858).
2 The Statement, by Bishops Eden and Wordsworth, may be found
printed in a disagreeable pamphlet, entitled Romanism and Scottish
Episcopacy, a word with the Scottish Bishops on their declaration and
statement, &c. by Veritas. Edinb. T. Constable & Co. &c. (1858), pp. 31
foil. The Clerical address to Bishop Trower, and his reply on 26 December,
aje also printed, p. 34.
CH. iv EUCHAKISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 101
Adoration ' to the Scottish Bishops, and supposed that this
was an answer to it ; though he certainly should have
been undeceived when he observed that particular expres
sions were censured, which he had not used, and which had
been used by Bishop Forbes. Mr. Keble probably con
sidered (as on a later occasion) that as a Canon of Cumbrae
he had also a sort of locus standi in the matter. His letter
is in the rather provocative form of a series of inter-
rogatives. It seems to me chiefly important from the
suggestion that the ' substantial identity of the Sacrifice of
the Eucharist with the Sacrifice of the Cross ' might be
explained by the supposition that the former was a repe
tition of our Lord's sacrifice before His Passion in the
Upper Eoom. If the disputants had meant this generally
no doubt the controversy could have been settled more
readily. This letter was published by Mr. Keble himself in
the * Scottish Ecclesiastical Journal,' a proceeding, like
many others at this time, which was hardly considerate or
conciliatory.
In Scotland itself the Declaration of the Three Bishops
was met by an address from the Dean and nineteen clergy
of the Diocese of Edinburgh, expressing their full con
currence, but still making no reference to Bishop Forbes.
A similar address was adopted by the clergy in the Diocese
of Glasgow. Early, however, in February 1858 a me
morial, signed eventually by nearly six hundred laymen,
was presented to the Bishops in which he was named, and
this of course made a peaceful solution less easy, and,
indeed, may be said to have forced the Bishops into action.
On the 16th of the same month the Bishop of St.
Andrews addressed a short ' Pastoral Letter to the Laity
of his Diocese,' l in which he states that he departed from
1 This letter was printed by him as an appendix to his Charge of 1859,
pp. 31-33. He did not reprint it with his Charge of 1858, in accordance
with his desire to act with reserve as far as he was an individual.
102 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
his resolution not to take any part in the controversy that
had arisen, except as a member of the Episcopal Synod, in
deference to the urgent representation of several of his
clergy. Bishop Forbes is not mentioned, and the letter is
directed generally to discourage excitement and too con
fident definition of mysterious truths. In it the question
of Adoration is hardly touched ; but, as regards the Sacri
fice, the Bishop commits himself to the use of the terms
' virtue and effect,' of which Bishop Forbes had spoken so
slightingly.
On the other hand the Bishops received another
address, signed eventually by about sixty l of the clergy
a large number for Scotland pointing out the incon
venience of the issue by the Bishops of declarations on
points of doctrine which wore the aspect of definitions, and
deprecating quasi-definitions of faith by individual pre
lates. 2
Nevertheless, very possibly the storm might have
passed over without an open rupture between Bishop
Forbes and his brethren, had it not been for the inoppor
tune appearance of Mr. Patrick Cheyne's ' Six Sermons on
the Doctrine of the most Holy Eucharist,' with a preface,
dated Septuagesima [31 January], 1858. These sermons,
with one exception, that on ' Adoration ' which shows
evident traces of the influence of Keble and Forbes had
been preached in Lent 1857. Their publication now was
distinctly a stirring up of strife. It was also one of the
unfortunate features of Scottish Church History at this time
that the antagonisms incident to contested elections to
Bishoprics were prolonged afterwards, and sometimes
1 This is the number of signatures given by Mr. Humble, Letter, &c. t
1859, p. 19. He gives the Clerical Address as Appendix H.
2 See also Mackey's Forbes, p. 106. This and the Lay Memorial, and
other papers, may be found in Documents <&c. circulated to the Lay
Memorialists by tlwir Committee. Edinb. K. Grant & Son, 1858.
CH.IV EUCHAR1STIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 103
became very like personal conflicts. This was not only
the case in the Diocese of St. Andrews, but also in those of
Aberdeen and Brechin.
Mr. Cheyne, who had been Incumbent of St. John's,
Aberdeen, for nearly forty years, and was much respected in
that city, was a candidate for the office of Bishop after the
death (15 April, 1857) of the then Primus, the third Bishop
Skinner, when Bishop Suther was elected. 1 Mr. Hender
son, who afterwards promoted the case against Bishop
Forbes, was in a similar position in the Diocese of Brechin.
Mr. Cheyne's sermons were, as he himself calls them,
' mere sketches,' with almost no justificatory notes, but
they were sufficiently aggressive to call forth immediate
criticism. They were published evidently in consequence
of the three Bishops' Pastoral, and were a sort of challenge
to the Bishop of Aberdeen, who had so far remained
neutral. 2
Mr. Cheyne's teaching was indeed, in its general result,
much the same as that of the Bishop of Brechin, but it
was expressed in a hard and irritating manner, and without
the balancing considerations and explanations and respect
for the feelings of opponents often, though not always,
manifest in the Charge.
Bishop Forbes himself says of the sermons, at the com
mencement of his ' Opinion ' on Cheyne's appeal, ' Under the
circumstances I have regretted very much the publication
of these sermons.' ' There is a baldness of statement in
1 Bishop Suther was consecrated at Edinburgh 24 June, 1857.
2 On Quinquagesima Sunday [14 February] 1858 Keble wrote to Pusey :
' I am so sorry this storm has reached your ears. But if Bishop Forbes will
be quite patient, as I trust he will, there seems hope of its turning to good.
I believe the Bishops of St. Andrews and Moray [Eden] and Aberdeen are
all peaceably inclined. But the pressure from the Edinburgh and other
laity is excessive.' Liddon's Pusey, iii. 450. Cp. his reference to Cheyne's
sermons on the next page.
104 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
some parts of the sermons more apt to startle than convince.'
* It is barely charity to men's souls to state doctrines in a
provocative form ; ' l and other things to the same effect.
What others thought of them may therefore easily be
imagined. The following notes will give a fair notion, I
trust, of their contents.
In Sermon L, ' The Great Act of Christian Worship,' the
Eucharist is treated as ' the daily sacrifice of the new law '
(p. 15).
In II. ' The Eeal Presence ' is thus defined, * I mean
as the Church means, that, after Consecration, whole Christ,
God and Man, is really, truly and substantially present in
the Eucharist under the form of bread and wine ' (p. 22).
In III. ' The Sacrifice ... in the Eucharist is sub
stantially the same as the Sacrifice of the Cross, because the
Priest is the same in both, and the Victim the same in both,'
but there is an obvious difference in the manner of offering.
' Yet our offering is not bread and wine, which would be in
consistent with the unity of Christ's Sacrifice, and something
more worthless than the sacrifices under the law. What we
offer is the Body and Blood of Christ under the form of
Bread and Wine. That is the substance of our sacrifice.'
This was not unnaturally interpreted as a teaching of
Transubstantiation. 2
It is then explained that the only thing necessary to the
completion of the Sacrifice is the Communion of the Priest,
1 Opinion of the Bishop of Brechin in the Appeal of the Rev. P. Cheyne.
Edinb. R. Lendrum & Co. ; London, J. Masters and Co. 1858. Mr. Malcolm
MacColl, in I860, in his letter to Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Cheyne and the Bishop
of Brechin, argues that their opinions were practically the same, and that
the gentle treatment given to Bishop Forbes should be extended to Mr.
Cheyne.
2 Mr. Cheyne says in his Reasons of Appeal, p. 17, that he asserted that
' the substance of Bread and Wine remains together with the Body and
Blood.' I cannot find the words in any of the Six Sermons in Mr. Hunter's
copy. This would be Lutheran consubstantiation. Cp. Forbes's Opinion,
p. 25.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 105
and it is not necessary that all who join in offering it
should at the same time receive the Communion ; though
'it is desirable, and to their great benefit, if they could
(p. 34) ; but they may plead the merits of the one Sacrifice,
and in a degree share them, when circumstances prevent
them from communicating ; and the Church has always
allowed it.' This reservation ' in a degree ' is emphasised
by Bishop Forbes in his ' Opinion ' defending, or rather
acquitting, the Defendant (p. 20).
Lastly, ' the Eucharist is called a Sacrifice for the Living
and the Dead.'
IV., ' The Adoration,' is, as I have hinted, based on
Keble and Forbes. We do not kneel to the outward visible
signs in the Sacrament ; we kneel to the Lord Himself
invisibly present < under the form of bread and wine ;
though even to these outward things, after consecration, we
give religious honour ' (p. 46).
V., ' The Communion,' contains an exaggerated state
ment : ' To us men there is no other way of partaking of
Christ's Flesh and Blood but receiving them, sacramentally
in the Eucharist, because there alone has He vouchsafed
them to be really and substantially present.' This is
practically to assert that our Lord's language in St.
John vi. relates only to the Eucharist ; whereas some ortho
dox commentators have doubted whether there is any, or at
least any principal, reference to the Eucharist in that
chapter, 1 and many of the Fathers certainly include other
ways of feeding upon Christ besides the one. 2 Our own
Church in the ' Prayer of humble access ' no doubt inter-
1 On a later page, however, Cheyne makes an exception in regard to
Spiritual Communion when the Eucharist cannot be obtained (p. 57).
2 See the evidence collected by Dr. John Harrison in his Dr. Pusey^s
Challenge Answered, 2 vols. (1871), and summarised in his Letter to Rev.
E. B. Pusey, D.D., on his unfair treatment of the testimony of the Fathers
36 onwards.
106 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
prets this language of the Eucharistic feeding, but not
necessarily in any exclusive way. For my own part I do
not doubt that our Lord's language is largely Eucharistic
here, and occupies a place in the Gospel parallel to His
teaching as to Baptism in dealing with Nicodemus, but I
could not restrict its application to the Sacrament. Further,
the receivers, whether they be good or bad, * Whatever
they are, all receive the same thing sacramentally all
receive the sign and the thing signified. The Body and Blood
of Christ are received both by good and bad ' &c. (p. 56).
In VI. ' The Intention ' is not worked out as clearly
and fully as the rest. It seems desired to make more
frequent celebrations useful to those who attend them, by
fixing the minds of the worshippers either on some special
object of their own or on that chosen by the priest. Probably
the mention of intercession for the faithful departed in a
note to p. 69 reveals the chief thought in the preacher's
mind.
Such teaching, in the temper of those times, could not
pass without an attempt at least to secure its condemna
tion. Pressure was put upon the Bishop from Edinburgh
through a lay friend, who represented that a serious schism,
far surpassing the Drummond Schism, would ensue if
Mr. Cheyne's sermons were allowed to pass unchallenged,
and certain passages, which the reader will easily gather
from the foregoing summary, were ' presented ' to Bishop
Suther by the Eev. Gilbert Eorison (an able man, then
influential in the Diocese), Incumbent of St. Peter's,
Peterhead, and two others on 23 April, 1858. l On the
26th of the same month Bishop Suther found that there
were primCi facie grounds for the accusation and present-
1 Most of the documents in this case are collected in a convenient form
in Reasons of Appeal, by the Rev. Patrick Cheyne, &c., Aberdeen, A. Brown
& Co. ; Edinb. Lendrum ; London, J. Masters & Co. (1858) one of Mr.
Hunter's pamphlets.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVEKSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 107
ment, and summoned the Prosecutors and Defendant to
appear at a Special Diocesan Synod to be held on Tuesday,
15 June, advising the parties to restrict their arguments to
the formularies of the Scottish and English Reformed
Churches, and to the authority of theological writers of
those Churches a restriction which produced much excited
and adverse comment. 1
In the meantime Bishop Forbes had given further
circulation to his Charge, which was issued in a second
edition, the preface of which bears date ' Lent 1858,' and in
a third and cheaper form dated * Eastertide.' The second
edition is very much larger than the first, and contains not
only new passages in square brackets, but a Preface, 2
authorities, notes, and appendix covering many pages.
It contains certain explanations or modifications tending to
make his language slightly more acceptable, and notably
two : on p. 36 ' the external irpoa-Kvv^cns that is due to it '
(i.e. the Sacrament) is changed to ' due to CHKIST therein
given to be verily and indeed taken and received ; ' and on
p. 41 foil, the distinction between the active and the
passive Sacrifice is introduced : ' actively it is the rite,
passively it is the victim.' Strangely enough, he makes
the same tacit transition as Keble does to the Sacrifice of the
Upper Room, first identifying the Sacrifice (i.e. the Victim)
of the Eucharist with the Sacrifice of the Cross, and then
quoting St. Chrysostom on 1 Tim. i. 8-12, who says, ' It is
1 See, for some remarks on this point, an anonymous Letter to the Dean
of Moray, dated Edinb. 17 January, 1859, in reply to an invitation to attend
a conference at Laurencekirk (held Thursday, 20 January) to protest against
the treatment of Mr. Cheyne, pp. 2 foil.
2 The Bishop of St. Andrews, in a MS. note, criticises the tone of this
Preface rather severely, and speaks of it as determining him in the opinion
that some answer was necessary. It describes his cause as ' the cause of
truth,' and states his confidence in the ' eventual triumph ' of his teaching,
as in accordance with all authority. If Forbes had said that the teaching was
worthy of toleration as a contribution to theology on a mysterious subject,
it would have been more to the purpose.
108 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
the same (Oblation) which Christ gave to His disciples and
which is now made by His priests ' (p. 42). l The third
edition contains additional matter on 'the power and
efficacy theory of the Eeal Presence,' see pp. 19 foil.
Here again we may regret that the Bishop thought it
necessary to push his Charge so prominently into notice.
Keble, in writing to Pusey in February, had expressed a
hope that Bishop Forbes might be ' quite patient,' and
perhaps had desired to draw on himself, by his letter to
Bishop Terrot, the electric fire which would otherwise dis
charge upon his friend. But Keble was not very prudent
in his manner of entrance into the contest, and Forbes was
not naturally ' quite patient ' ; and so it came to pass, by a
concurrence of all these circumstances, and by a wish to
relieve and quiet the growing agitation, especially among
the laity, that at the Special Synod held at Edinburgh on
27 May, Bishop Forbes's teaching was openly but affec
tionately censured, and the Bishop himself admonished by
all his six brethren in a Synodal or Pastoral Letter. 2 This
letter, addressed ' to all faithful members of the Church in
Scotland,' was drafted by the Bishop of St. Andrews and
accepted by the other Bishops, after a few verbal alterations. 3
It was no slight achievement to unite such different men in
a document of some length on such a difficult subject. It
1 On this see below, p. 146, and my uncle's Notes, Chap. I. p. 7.
2 It was hence called, especially by its opponents, the Six Bishops'
Pastoral. It might, perhaps, have been more Synodal in character if the
signatures had been differently arranged, the Primus signing it ' in the name
of the Synod,' and the others 'subscribing ' as giving their assent to it. But
the Scottish system has been jealous of Primacy.
3 See the Scotichronicon, vi. 398, ed. by Eev. J. F. S. Gordon, D.D. My
uncle had an interleaved copy of the section relating to his own life (up to
1868), in which he inserted a few corrections. What he did not correct
may, therefore, probably be accepted as accurate. I find from a note in the
Bishop's handwriting that this memoir was mainly drawn up under his
directions by his sister-in-law, Miss Mary Barter, and his former pupil and
friend, Eev. W. Shaw, Incumbent of Forfar.
CH. iv EUCHAKISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 109
became, of course, the subject of much controversy, not
only as to its matter, but as to the right which the Synod
exercised on censuring the writings of a brother Bishop, and
as to the opportuneness of its act. As regards the Synodal
Letter itself, the matter of which was roughly handled in
some quarters, it appears to me to be dignified, reasonable,
and moderate, and on that account it was not pleasing to the
agitators who clamoured for an unequivocal condemna
tion. 1 In some points, indeed, the Synodal Letter would, a
few years earlier, have been considered rather a High
Church document. It touched naturally for censure on
two salient points : the enforcement of supreme adoration
as due to Christ, mysteriously present in the gifts, and the
assertion of the substantial unity or identity of the Sacrifice
of the Altar and the Sacrifice of the Cross. 2 The rejection
of this teaching as unscriptural and having led to corrup
tions and superstitions, and the exhortation to the faithful
members of the Church, especially to the clergy, not to
exceed or fall short in their teaching of the Truth in regard
to the Blessed Sacrament, is justified as a right essentially
inherent in a Provincial Episcopate. 3 This last was a point
1 See for the opinions of such critics the pamphlet Romanism and
Scottish Episcopacy, by Veritas, published early in 1858, and before the
Synodal Letter was issued.
2 Dr. Pusey, in Keble's Considerations, p. 48 foil., complains that it is a
hardship that the Pastoral attributes to Bishop Forbes language which is
not his, and is ' itself in part not carefully worded ; ' and compares it to the
procedure in the case of ' the members of the Porte Eoyale,' who were
called upon to condemn propositions which they declared were not in the
works of Jansenius as being there. I cannot see that any real injustice is
done, though it might have been better to have drawn attention to Forbes'
lately introduced distinction between the active and the passive sacrifice. The
' Sacrifice of the Altar,' as used by the Bishops in a later paragraph, means
the ritual of the altar ; as explained by Forbes, in his second edition, it
means ' the Victim of the Altar Sacrifice.'
3 See Appendix II. The Synodal Letter may be also found in Bishop
Trower's Pastoral, in Keble's Considerations, in the Bishop of St. Andrews'
Notes on the Eucharist and in his Charges for 1858 and 1859 &c.
110 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH en. iv
on which Bishop Forbes vehemently protested, and chiefly
on the grounds that the duties of the Episcopal Synod were
denned by the canons, and that to assume other powers was
ultra vires.
His protest was, however, disregarded, and the letter,
after being read by the Primus, was adopted as a Synodal
act on the motion of Bishop Eden of Moray, whose adhesion
to the policy embodied in it had been previously doubted
in some quarters, and was important on account of the weight
and influence of his character. It was then resolved, on the
motion of the Bishop of St. Andrews, that it should be
formally communicated to the Diocesan Synods, so that
the clergy might, if they chose, take it into consideration.
The two following letters from the Bishop's father-in-
law Eev. William Brudenell Barter, and his brother
Christopher show how the Pastoral was received by strong
and critically minded men in his own circle. That from
Mr. Barter is remarkable, as he had not long before written
a pamphlet in defence of Archdeacon Denison. 1
The first is dated ' Burghclere, 31 May, 1858 ' :
As you are kind enough to ask my opinion, I think that, if
you were obliged to do anything of the kind, you could not have
done better than you have done, but I would not go one hair's
breadth further. My view of the subject, which I have often
printed, is this : That the consecrated Elements are verily and
indeed the Body and Blood of Christ to the Communicants and
to the Communicants only not the Body and Blood of Christ to
be held up for adoration. I think St. Paul's words plainly imply
this when he says the Bread and Wine are ' the Communion '
&c. May God prosper your single-hearted labor in His ser
vice I am most happy to see that all the Bishops are
unanimous ; this is indeed a good sign. I trust none will be
1 Remarks on the Proceedings in the Case of Archdeacon Denison. As
there is no date or publisher's name I presume this was not published.
The point specially touched is that of reception by the wicked.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 111
tempted by popular favor to go further. The ' few words ' * in
which your decrees have gone forth will give them real weight.
The second letter is as follows :
Stanford-in-the-Vale, Faringdon : 31 May, 1858.
Thank God for the Pastoral. It is indeed a blessed mani
festation of His Love in overruling ^vil for good ; and the happy
unanimity of the Six Bishops of the Church of Christ in Scotland
will do more good than the unhappy declension of the one.
Your packet arrived yesterday, on a blessed day, Trinity Sunday,
and was in happy harmony with its holy services. I am going
to stay with the Bishop of Oxford this evening and to-morrow,
and am sure that he will rejoice with you and your brethren.
The following letter of the Bishop to Sir Archibald
Edmonstone, 2 a religious layman, who wrote to him in
some anxiety as to the claim disputed by the Bishop of
Brechin, and as to the position of the letter as an authori
tative judgment, throws considerable light on the attitude
of the Synod. It is dated Perth, 7 June, 1858.
MY DEAB SIK ARCHIBALD, The case of our late Pastoral
letter appears to me to be simply this : We have undertaken in
Synod to censure a book and that Book a Brother-Bishop's
Charge.
Is such censorship allowable in the Church ? and if so, who
are to exercise it ? In England it has been exercised by both
Houses of Convocation, and even by the lower House alone in
the case of a publication by a Bishop, e.g. Bishop Burnet's book
on the ' Thirty-nine Articles,' and Bishop Hoadly's notorious
sermon on ' Christ's Kingdom.' No one questioned the right of
the Church, qua Church, to exercise the power by the Represen
tative Synod ; the only question raised was whether it would be
an interference with the Queen's supremacy ; and this was
decided in the Church's favour by the Privy Council, upon an
opinion given by the Judges, who were 8 to 4 on that side
1 This is an allusion to the Bishop's habit of bantering him on the titles
of his pamphlets, ' a few words on ' so and so.
2 Lady Edmonstone was a Miss Wilbraham.
112 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
(see Lathbury's ' History of Convocation,' chap, xii., where eight
distinct cases are mentioned). In this country, where the
principles of Bishop Sage have been adopted l (whether rightly
or wrongly), the Episcopal Synod is the Church's ordinary
Representative Council to the exclusion of the Presbytery. And
I suppose no one will doubt that if the Lower House of Convo
cation could properly censure a Bishop's book (which certainly
does seem a questionable proceeding), much more may our
Episcopal Synod do the same. In short, we have claimed a
power of censorship, as a right of the Church, and a right
belonging, by the constitution of our own Church, to the
Episcopal Synod. And now, what is this power worth? I
imagine it is worth very little except to reassure the minds of
our people when they have been disturbed. As against the
Bishop of Brechin, and those who think with him, the only
measure of their authority is their disposition to be guided by it.
They can still, if they will, not only hold, but teach and preach
as before. And for my own part, if any of them were to be
brought to a formal trial, I should not allow the Pastoral letter
to have any weight otherwise than as a ground for repeating the
same censure, in a case of preaching and publishing. Of course
in this way a charge might arise on the plea of insubordination,
but every such charge rests obviously upon a very precarious
foundation, where the authority pleaded on our side would have
nothing in it of a strictly legal force.
Perhaps I need not say more than this : however, to show
how cheerfully I accept your kind overture for correspondence on
the subject painful as it is I will add :
1. Where we speak of the Bishop's teaching we merely make
known what we think ; and, of course, we are liable to think
wrong as well as he.
'2. When we exhort the clergy we refer simply to Scripture
and the Formularies of the Church, which the Bishop's Charge
appears to us to narrow in a very exclusive and intolerant way.
3. We notice the terms 'Real objective presence,' not as
objecting to the truth which they are intended to convey (I, for
1 Keference is made, I presume, to Sage's Principles of the Cyprianic
Age, and to his Vindication of the same treatise, esp. chap. vii. 69, 70
of the latter, p. 447 foil., in vol. ii. of Sage's Works, ed. Spottiswoode Soc.
1846. Bishop Sage died in 1711.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 113
one, could not join in any such objection and in all that you
have written on this subject I quite concur), but simply to draw
attention to the fact (not an unimportant one) that they are
novel ; and as wishing to guard against any attempt to fix the
mind of the Church within narrower limits than she herself has
prescribed, by the intervention of new Phrases. . . .
As to the powers of the Episcopal Synod, the Bishop of
St. Andrews obtained an important opinion from his friend,
Boun.dell Palmer, afterwards Lord Selborne. He held that
it had no coercive or disciplinary powers, and could do no
disciplinary act, having a binding or efficacious force, in
excess of those expressly or implicitly conferred by the
Canons of the Church. But he also held that it was clearly
capable of exercising large powers of pastoral instruction
and of the utterance of counsels on matters of doctrine, and
that such proceedings were manifestly appropriate to the
position and functions of its members as Bishops. 1
The real question was probably not so much whether
the Bishops had the right, but whether it was wise to
exercise it at the moment. On this it is not very easy to
form an opinion. In December 1857 the Bishops of Moray
and St. Andrews 2 had declined, as we have seen, to join
their three colleagues, on the ground that the subject would
probably be discussed again at the next annual Synod, and
because they had been informed that the charges against
Bishop Forbes were likely to lead to judicial proceedings
against him, which would, of course, come before the Synod
in another capacity. Now, the meeting in May was not the
annual Synod, but a special one ; and judicial proceedings,
though then dormant, did actually take place later. It is
impossible not to wish that their attitude of reserve could
1 See the quotations from this Opinion in the Bishop's Charge for 1859,
p. 27.
2 See their Statement, dated 29 December, 1857, referred to above,
p. 100.
114 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
have been maintained longer, as extra-judicial proceedings
by a body which may be called to act judicially are always
liable to be misunderstood. The Bishop's letter to Sir A.
Edmonstone shows that he felt this to be a difficulty. We
can only suppose that the outside pressure of unsettlement,
especially among laymen, was felt to be extreme ; and that
it was hoped by the Bishops that the issue of the Letter
would discharge them from the necessity of entering further
into the matter. The defenders, too, of the Charge^vere,
it seems, triumphantly proclaiming that its doctrine was
that of the Church and this, of course, was a serious
difficulty, due in a great degree to the way in which Bishop
Forbes expressed himself, as if his teaching on this difficult
subject was not only to be tolerated, but to be accepted as
authoritative and as the mind of the Church at large.
The Synodal Letter, so issued, was followed very shortly
by a separate and lengthy Pastoral by Bishop Trower,
reviewing the proceedings that had followed the Brechin
Charge. It had been written, and mainly printed, in
February, but was held back until after the Synod. Some
time later in the year in June or July Mr. Keble again
came forward with his ' Considerations Suggested by a Late
Pastoral Letter on the Doctrine of the most Holy Eucharist,'
a pamphlet of fifty-four pages of small print, in which Pusey
took a considerable share J in revising the proofs and writing
an appendix. But he was then in bad health, and conse
quently the greater share of the work fell upon Keble. 2 He
writes as a Presbyter to his brother Presbyters, urging that
the Pastoral Letter was not a Synodical Act, * because
Presbyters have a right to be present in Synods, and
because the discussion was carried on with closed doors,
1 See Liddon's Pusey, iii. 452 foil.
2 In the following sentences I am much indebted to my friend Prof.
Walter Lock's John Keble, pp. 166 foil., 7th ed. 1895.
CH. iv EUCIIARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 115
and the judgment given without any statement of the
reasons ; hence the Presbyters are not bound to accept it
as authoritative.' He acknowledges what he considered
the good points of the Pastoral, especially its reserve and
its positive statements, but criticises its negative statements
as tending to Nestorianism the separation of Christ into
two persons. He holds, however, himself (and in this he
seems to vary from the view of Bishop Forbes), that the
Sacrifice of the Eucharist is not so much identical with the
Sacrifice of the Cross as with that which Christ offered
in the Upper Koom and is now offering in Heaven. He
pleads further for toleration and for not being afraid of the
mere word ' Koman,' since we ought to be glad to agree
with any branch of the Church in a matter of truth. We
must not shrink from any fulness of devotion, but 'put
forth all our strength ' (Ecclus. xliii. 30), since our tempta
tion to undervalue the atmosphere of mysteries and miracles
in which we live is so great.
It may surely be questioned how far it was fit and proper
that Mr. Keble should thus intervene to suggest opposition
on the part of one order of the ministry in Scotland against
the other, and I imagine that this was a point on which
his own conscience touched him afterwards. But the
matter of the tract is full of interest, though it had, perhaps,
little immediate result. Then followed, on 5 August, the
condemnation and suspension of Mr. Cheyne by the Bishop
of Aberdeen, in a very short and technically assailable
judgment, in which, however, he acquitted him formally
of the charge of teaching Transubstantiation.
In September 1858 the Bishop of St. Andrews for the
first time gave any full expression to his own personal views
on the subject. He circulated amongst the clergy of his
Diocese and the Scottish Presbyters generally but not to
the general public a large quarto pamphlet of sixty- six
i 2
116 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WOEDSWOKTH CH. iv
a g es now very scarce entitled, ' Notes to Assist towards
a Eight Judgment on the Eucharistic Controversy,' at the
end of which the Pastoral is printed with the title * Copy of
the Synodal Letter.' The Bishop explains that his ' Notes '
were written some months before for his own use, and now
circulated in consequence, as is clearly implied, of Mr.
Keble's ' Considerations.' These * Notes ' are, in my opinion,
of great value as really adding to the information possessed
by the parties in regard to the documents quoted and the
authorities referred to. They were never published ; but
the Bishop at one time revised them and prepared them
for publication. The reader will profit by the following
summary, short as it is.
In Chapter I. On the testimony of the Fathers, and
especially on the statement that ' the ancient doctors teach
that the Eucharistic Sacrifice is the same substantially u'ith
that of the Cross ' the author goes through the testimonies
alleged by Bishop Forbes, and certainly, it seems to me,
makes good his objections to almost all the passages quoted.
The passages from St. Chrysostom on Heb. x. 1-9 and
1 Tim. i. 8-12 are treated with great justice. As to the
first he shows that Chrysostom three times corrects himself,
and so guards himself against being supposed to extend
the identity of Sacrifice, which he recognises, to a substantial
sameness. Under the second his note is exactly just :
* Here is a testimony to prove what we all believe that our
Eucharistic Sacrifice is the same in substance as that which
our Lord Himself first administered, but nothing whatever
to show that St. Chrysostom regarded the Sacrifice of the
Eucharist as substantially the same with the Sacrifice of
the Cross. There is a passage precisely similar in Homily
i. 3 on St. Matthew, viii. 581' (p. 7). The observa
tions on St. Augustine and Theodoret are also forcible.
St. Augustine is not a very consistent writer, but the balance
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 117
of his teaching on the whole is in favour of the doctrine of
a commemorative sacrifice, both in the active and the passive
sense * peracti iam sacrificii memoria.' The teaching of
Theodoret on Heb. viii. 4 is distinctly of a cold and low type,
and as a whole it could not be cited in favour of the Charge.
Chapter II., on the use of the words ' substantial ' and
' objective ' in this controversy, is full of interesting matter.
While criticising Forbes and his supporters, he says, ' I
would no less maintain, with all the great Anglican divines,
that the elements through consecration undergo a change,'
and he guards himself and the other signatories of the
Synodal Letter from being supposed ' to confine the Presence
simply to the Eecipient ' (p. 19).
Chapter III. is on Eucharistic Adoration and the English
Canons of 1640.
Chapter IV., on the alleged testimony of Bishop Andrewes
(pp. 34-36), and other great English Divines, seems to me
very judicious and fair. The Bishop goes so far as to say,
* I am persuaded that Anglican theology must be re- written
before it can be fairly brought to support either of the
conclusions which the Synod has disapproved ' (p. 41).
Chapter V., on the fallacious reasoning attributed to the
censured Charge, is also full of point.
Chapter VI., on the tendency of the same Charge to under
mine the great foundations on tvhich our formularies rest d'c.,
is shorter and less effective ; but the Bishop makes a fair
point of the slighting treatment of the Scottish divines of
the last century by Bishop Forbes (p. 51).
Chapter VII., on the imputation of narrowing the terms of
Communion and on the authority of the Synodal Letter, takes
up the precedent of the declaration on Baptism in 1850,
when the Scottish Church so cleared itself from complicity
with the Gorharn Judgment, and describes the Synodal
Letter as an ' act of censorship ' not having any force of
118 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
law, but ' a godly admonition having more than ordinary
weight, because collective and Synodical.'
The following passage on the Sacrifice may suffice as a
specimen of what the Scottish Bishops intended positively
to teach. It is taken from a sort of catena of Anglican
divines.
They have followed Archbishop Bramhall, who acknowledges
' an Eucharisticai Sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving : a com
memorative Sacrifice, or memorial of the Sacrifice of the Cross ;
a representative Sacrifice, or a representation of the Passion of
Christ before the Eyes of His Heavenly Father ; an impetrative
Sacrifice, or an impetration of the Fruit and benefits of His
Passion, by way of real prayer ; and lastly an applicative
Sacrifice, or an application of His merits to our souls : ' all
which is expressed in the Synodal Letter ; and he adds, ' Let
him that dare, go one step further than we do.' ii. 276
(p. 59).
On Tuesday, the 14th of the same month of September
1858, at St. Ninian's, Perth, the Bishop of St. Andrews
delivered his Charge at the Synod, at which Canon Humble
preached. It was, as usual, followed next day by the Visi
tation. Among the subjects of the Charge were naturally
' the Pastoral Letter,' explaining his reasons for moving
that it should be communicated to the Diocesan Synod ;
the declaration on non-recipient attendance, on which he did
not ask for Synodal action on the part of the Diocese, but
rather trusted to the influence of forbearance, quoting St.
Augustine, ' Aliud est quod docemus, aliud quod susti-
nemus ' l ; and the ' Clerical Address to the College of
Bishops,' whom he defends with some warmth. The
treatment of these points is on the whole in a reserved,
conciliatory, and rather apologetic tone. The author shows,
however, a certain natural resentment at the suppression
1 Printed ' sustenemus,' but corrected tacitly to ' sustinemus ' (Charge of
1859, 26 note).
CH. iv EUCHARIST1C CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 119
by Bishop Forbes of any reference to his own action at the
Episcopal Synod in September 1857 (p. 11), and at the use
of his name, in some quarters not specified, ' as of one who
generally concurred in the teaching of the Charge ' (p. 12).
The issue of the Pastoral or Synodal Letter is defended as
a practical step required by the pressure of those who
desired to have guidance both those clergy and laity
who signed memorials, and by those multitudes who did
not do so, but waited patiently trusting that the Bishops
would do their duty.
The strained condition of affairs at the Cathedral is not
referred to with any detail, but mention is made of the
' Eesignation of Five Prebendaries ' (p. 19), ' in consequence
of differences between them and the resident clergy, solely
upon public grounds/ and the closing of the Grammar
School ' which has been so ably conducted by Mr. Sellar in
this place during the last four years, and maintained chiefly
through the liberality of Mr. G. Boyle and his friends ; the
premises not being sufficient to receive such a number of
pupils as would be required to make the institution remu
nerative and self -supporting ' (p. 20).
At the end of the month (30 September), Mr. Cheyne
made his first appeal to the College of Bishops, in the
technical part of which he had the assistance of an able
Aberdeen advocate Mr. Grub. 1 The latter part of his
* Eeasons of Appeal ' (dated 2 October, pp. 15-69) is
remarkable for its frequent references to the teaching of
the Scottish divines of the previous century.
A meeting of the Bishops took place on 2 November,
and a Synod, to hear this case, on the 4th. The Primus
1 This was no doubt the eminent historian of the Church of Scotland,
Dr. George Grub, who did not, however, agree with the advanced views of
his friends : see Eev. Wm. Walker (of Monymusk), Three Churchmen, p. 206,
Edinb. 1893. He did not sign the address to Mr. Cheyne from the
congregation of St. John's.
120 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WOKDS WORTH CH. IT
(Bishop Terrot) was prevented from attending by a stroke
of paralysis, and Bishop Ewing, of Argyll, as senior Bishop,
took the chair. But as he disliked definitions on such
mysterious subjects and religious prosecutions in general,
though he was much opposed to what he called ' materia
listic ' teaching on the Eucharist, he took no active part in
the proceedings, and did not vote or give an opinion. 1 We
have upon this case the printed ' Opinions ' of the Bishop
of Brechin and the Bishop of St. Andrews. I have already
quoted some of the opening sentences of the former showing
how dissatisfied Bishop Forbes was with the form and
expression of the sermons. In the body of the ' Opinion '
the arguments in favour of Mr. Cheyne are ably stated, and
the sermons explained in the best sense they are capable of.
The Bishop of St. Andrews' * Opinion ' is, as might be
expected, severe, and is directed to show, what certainly
was a natural inference from the sermons, that they con
tained a general scheme of doctrine tending in a Koman
direction. But his actual judgment is not severe, and
suggests that the Appellant should be invited to make
satisfaction to the Church by recalling certain passages.
The three statements 2 censured were : (1) ' The Sacrifice
of the Eucharist is substantially the same as the Sacrific
of the Cross, differing only in the manner of offering.' (2)
' In the Lord's Supper we kneel to the Lord Himself in
visibly present under the form, or under the veils, of Bread
and Wine.' (3) * The only thing necessary to the comple
tion of the Sacrifice is the Communion of the Priest.' In
regard to these the Court adopted the Bishop of St.
Andrews' opinion, finding ' that the teaching of the Appel
lant complained of in the Presentment is erroneous and
more or less subversive of the doctrines of the Church, as
1 See A. J. Boss, Memoir of Alex. Ewing (1877), p. 284 foil.
z See [Bishop of St. Andrews'] Proposals for Peace, pp. 31, 32.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 121
explained in the opinions of the majority of the Court now
delivered.' l The Court was adjourned to 2 December to
give Mr. Cheyne an opportunity of retracting.
On 16 November, 1858, Mr. W. B. Barter, father of
Mrs. Wordsworth, died at his Eectory of Burghclere in his
71st year. 2 He was a High Churchman, and had been long
intimate with Newman, as he continued to be with Pusey
and Keble, having been in 1811 elected Fellow of Oriel
College, at the same time as Whately and Keble. As a
man of strong and active intelligence, always disposed to
think for himself, but in entire submission to Church prin
ciples, he had taken an independent part in most of the
controversies of the period, and might almost be said to be
the leader of a school. 3 He was a determined English
Churchman, especially keen in his denunciation of the
Calvinist doctrine of * unconditional salvation,' which he
thought might easily be allied with Antinomianism, social
ism, and infidelity. He was, like his younger brother, the
Warden of Winchester, a man not only of robust physique
and manly character, but also very warm-hearted, and
attractive in his personality and devoted to duty. He
1 The Bishops of Glasgow, Moray and Ross, and St. Andrews formed
the majority, the Bishop of Brechin dissenting, and the Bishop of Argyll
abstaining from voting.
2 Mr. Barter was second son of the Rev. Charles Barter, who was Vicar
of Cornworthy, on the banks of the Dart, for seventy years, and who died at
the age of ninety-six. The eldest son, Charles, was a scholar at Tiverton
and Fellow of Balliol, and was Rector of Sarsden and Churchill, Oxon, for
many years. He died in 1868. William Brudenell Barter was also educated
at Tiverton, whence he went to Westminster and Christ Church, where he
rather weakened himself with hard reading. The third brother, Robert
Speckott, was at Tiverton, Winchester, and New College, and was for many
years the much-loved Warden of Winchester College.
3 The Ecclesiastic of August 1852 has an article entitled ' The Barter
Tracts and School,' founded on his volume Tracts in Defence of the Chris
tian Sabbath, the Church, her Priesthood and Sacraments (London, 1851),
containing some fourteen separate publications. In the following year he
published six other tracts, the last (in 1858) being Irreverence the Precursor
of Infidelity.
122 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES VYORDSWOKTH CH. iv
shone in the management of his parish, and especially in
his method of teaching the young, and in his visits to the
sick, and was greatly loved both within and outside his
parish. His character is well sketched by his son-in-law
in his preface to ' Burghclere Sunday School Exercises.'
The Bishop of St. Andrews, who had been so constantly
with him, was naturally present at the funeral at Burgh
clere, and remained to preach on the Sunday (21 Novem
ber). The funeral is described as very touching in the out
burst of grief which accompanied it. Very affectionate and
appreciative letters were also received by members of the
family from Pusey and Keble.
At Advent 1858 the Bishop of St. Andrews issued a
* Supplement to Notes on the Eucharistic Controversy ' of
14 quarto pages, dealing in a very instructive way with the
opinions of Bishops Andrewes, Jeremy Taylor, and others,
and giving some interesting particulars of the life and
works of Professor John Forbes of Corse justifying him
from undue disparagement and explaining the singular
position of Thorndike in 1659. In it he touches mainly
upon the authorities quoted in the ' Appeal ' of Mr. Cheyne,
whose case was now heard again. He had unfortunately
not been willing to listen to the admonition given to him
in November, and on 2 December, as he made no retracta
tion, the judgment of the Bishop of Aberdeen was affirmed
by the Episcopal Synod, the Bishop of Brechin protesting.
Mr. Cheyne was, therefore, now under sentence of sus
pension from his office of Presbyter, and did not deny that
it was a legal sentence which he was bound to obey.
Notwithstanding this sentence, he continued to officiate
as a Deacon, and to do other acts of a pastoral character,
though he did not preach, justifying himself by declaring
that he had only been suspended as Presbyter, and was
still Incumbent of St. John's Church. He was consequently
OH. iv EUCIIARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 123
again cited before Bishop Suther and the Synod of Aber
deen on the charge of disobedience to the sentence of the
Courts, and for a breach of his ordination vow. He was
found guilty, and on 27 May, 1859, was adjudged to be no
longer a clergyman of the Episcopal Church in Scotland,
i.e. to be subject to suspension for an unlimited period.
He had, it must be remarked, not only put himself much
in the wrong by his contumacy, and by his justification of
it by what, to many persons, seemed a quibble, but he had
perhaps even more prejudiced his case by a letter to his
congregation dated Epiphany 1859 in which he accused
the Bishops and all who agreed with them of heterodoxy,
if not heresy, and did not even entirely spare Bishop
Forbes. 1 He had, however, some legal opinions in his favour.
He appealed, therefore, from the Diocesan Court to the
Episcopal Synod, and on 9 November following received its
final judgment affirming the sentence of the Court below.
The majority, consisting of the Primus (Terrot) and the
Bishops of St. Andrews and Glasgow (now Wilson), 2 acted on
1 I was able to see a copy of this scarce publication through the kindness
of Dr. Danson, when I was at Aberdeen, 23 September, 1896. It is entitled :
A Letter to the Congregation of St. John the Evangelist's, Aberdeen, in
answer to their Address, together with the Protest of the Incumbent and
Lay Communicants, by Kev. P. Cheyne, Incumbent of St. John the Evan
gelist, Aberdeen (Brown & Co. 1859). It seems to sneer at Bishop Forbes
for describing his language as ' provocative.' On p. 13 we read : ' The
majority of our Bishops have condemned the doctrine which I have taught
and you received, and in so doing they have virtually denied the Catholic
faith concerning the most sacred mystery of the Eucharist.' On p. 15 he
speaks of ' the erroneous doctrine fixed upon (the Church) by the decision
of the Bishops.' On pp. 17-18 we read : As long as there stands unrevoked
a sentence of suspension against a priest for teaching the true doctrine of
the Eucharist as the Church has believed it, so long will there remain a
standing witness that the Scotch Church is committed to the heterodoxies
which received their final sanction on 2 December last.' See also Malcolm
McColl's letter to Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Cheyne and the Bishop of Brechin
(London: Masters, 1860), pp. 16, 20, 24, and Lendrum's Rights of the
Second Order, p. Ixxvii.
2 Bishop Trower, who had been particularly eager in the controversy,
124 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
the opinion of their legal adviser. The Bishop of Moray
(Eden) now joined the Bishop of Brechin in the minority.
Bishop Ewing was absent, but would apparently have voted
with the majority if he had been present. 1 Bishop Suther
could not, of course, vote on such an appeal.
The sentence, though not unexpected, was a severe one,
and a few years later Mr. Cheyne made such explanations
as were accepted by the Bishops. He explained his con
tumacy by alleging the ambiguity of the sentence, and
asserting that Bishop Suther knew of his ministering as a
Deacon for some time before he interfered ; and for his
doctrinal statements he substituted certain patristic texts.
These explanations were tendered in February 1863, and
he was formally freed from his deposition. The Bishop of
Aberdeen also withdrew his suspension on 18 June of the
same year. Mr. Cheyne died, at the age of 85, 18 Novem
ber, 1878. Bishop Suther died 23 January, 1883.
The year 1859, to which Mr. Cheyne's suspension or
deposition belongs, was further saddened for the Bishop of
St. Andrews in consequence of the open rupture between
himself and the Cathedral clergy and Mr. Lendrum, now
Incumbent of Crieff, who was the only Prebendary who
had not resigned. Some difficulty would, in any case,
probably have arisen when the Bishop came permanently
to reside at Perth, and attempted to make the Cathedral in
a real sense his own church, but it would not have taken
so acute a form apart from the Eucharistic controversy. As
time went on the Bishop's part in the latter naturally
became more eager, and questions of detail and practice
gathered importance in his eyes as expressing certain dis-
had retired early in 1859, and was succeeded by Dean Wilson, who was
consecrated Easter Monday, 26 April, in that year, and was, therefore, a
new element in these debates.
1 See Ross's Memoir of Bishop Ewing, p. 289 foil.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 125
puted points of doctrine. He was constitutionally sensitive
and particular, and this will account for his insisting on
minutiae in a manner which his opponents described as
' harassing.' But his mind was specially exercised as
regards two points, attendance of non-Communicants
(including celebration with an insufficient number) and
the position of the celebrant the latter of which contro
versies was forced by circumstances, both in England and
Scotland, into what now seems to most persons very un
reasonable prominence.
We must sketch, lightly though it be, the history of
these troubles, and for this purpose must turn back a little.
The Bishop, as we have seen, came permanently to reside
at Perth in April 1856. In May, at his suggestion, certain
considerable alterations were made in the ritual of the
Cathedral, and he constantly attended the services and
preached, though rarely being present at the early celebra
tion. It became the custom at such times to celebrate
with only one Communicant, a practice l which it was stated
he had agreed to sanction in an interview with Provost
Fortescue on 23 August, 1853. The Bishop much objected
to this, when he heard of it later (at Whitsuntide 1857),
and he made a public remonstrance on the subject at a
Confirmation on Whit-Tuesday (2 June). This was the
beginning of the open conflict, though it did not come to
a head for some two years afterwards. The Bishop's fears
about the tendency of the ritual at St. Ninian's could not
but be intensified by two secessions to Eome one of the
Eev. K. Campbell, who had resigned his Canonical stall in
1 It is said to have been an old practice of the Scottish Church. See
Humble's Letter (1859), pp. 8 and 74. This might well be the case in
times when the Liturgy was said under severe restrictions. The Bishop's
sanction of it was asserted by the Provost (see Appendix I. to Humble's
Letter, p. 96). It was permitted in Bishop Torry's Prayer Book in cases of
necessity.
126 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
1856 for lack of income, the other of a lady who was the
Provost's principal friend and assistant in the congregation,
and who continued to reside in Perth. The conflict
gradually became so acute that the parties to it began to
consider closely their legal relations to one another, and
entered upon a careful examination of the Statutes drawn
up by the Bishop in 1853, in order to discover where the
power really resided.
In drawing up these Statutes the Bishop had intended
to make his position clear and secure, and practically to
become Incumbent of the Church, 1 with the Provost as his
assistant and deputy when he was absent or otherwise em
ployed. Mr. Boyle's letters, quoted in the foregoing chapter,
show that the promoters of the Cathedral were willing to
put themselves entirely in his hands ; and Mr. Humble
acknowledges 2 that both he and the Provost supposed, in
the early years of their relations, that his power was quite
uncontrolled. He was not only Visitor and Ordinary, but
the Provost, by Article iv. of the Statutes, was to be ' under
the Bishop ' in his government and management of the
Church. But the peculiarly trying temper of Mr. Humble,
and the change in the Bishop's own attitude and practice
as regards the Eucharist, consequent upon his experience
of the controversy and its results though his actual
opinions did not vary much made this form of close
association and divided authority almost impossible.
1 I have before me a MS. Memorandum on St. Ninian's Cathedral,
Perth, dated February 1885, in which he says, on p. 4: 'In support of the
claim which I have mentioned as made by and for the Provost, and against
the opposite view which I maintained, it was argued that the latter tended
to make the Provost no more than the Bishop's Curate. If we take the
word Curate in its highest signification, it may be admitted that this plea
was well founded. But no one is required to accept the office who dislikes
such a position ; and there can be no question whatever that it is the position
clearly and unmistakably defined for the Provost under the constitution of
the Cathedral at Inverness,' <fec.
2 In his printed Letter (1859), p. 71 note.
CH. iv EUCHAEISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 127
Nor were the Provost and Precentor quite their own
masters, depending so much as they did on the generosity
of their two lay supporters. 1
Hence it was not unnatural that in the summer of
1857 they took the opinion of Mr. J. D. Chambers, Ke-
corder of Sarum, well known as a student of Kitual, on
three points : (1)' whether the Bishop could oblige the
Provost to alter the hours of Divine service, a question
intended especially to touch the early celebration; (2) whether
he could oblige the Provost to take means to prevent persons
from assisting at the Holy Eucharist without receiving ;
(3) whether he could proceed against the Provost or other
Canons for continuing to be present in Choir without
receiving. They also asked whether the Bishop could
claim authority alone to interpret the Statutes. To all
these questions Mr. Chambers gave an answer, both general
and particular, in the negative, 2 and this naturally en
couraged the members of the Chapter to further resistance.
Nevertheless, as we have seen, the Synod of 1858 passed
off amicably, with only a passing reference to the re
signation of five Prebendaries and to the closing of the
Cathedral Grammar School on the resignation of Mr. Sellar.
It was the attempt to re-establish this school without
1 The Provost had 200Z. from Hon. G. F. Boyle, and the Precentor 100Z.
from Lord Forbes. Both were supposed to have been secured ' for ever,'
but the former sum was not. Mr. Boyle, when Lord Glasgow, largely
increased his annual payments in 1869, adding 150Z. to the Provost, 100Z. to
the Precentor, and 150Z. for the maintenance of the Cathedral services. In
1878 Lord Forbes undertook the 100Z. for the Precentor, and Lord Glasgow
gave 60Z. for house rent. All Lord Glasgow's benefactions came to an end in
1885.
2 See Mr. Humble's Letter (1859), Appendix F. Mr. Chambers stated
his conclusion in general terms : ' The jurisdiction of the Bishop
over the Provost is confined to the enforcement of the Provincial and
Diocesan Canons, of the observance of the Liturgy of the Episcopal Church
of Scotland, and limited by those Canons and Liturgy ' (p. 87). This
opinion is dated Lincoln's Inn, 13 August, 1857.
128 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. rv
the concurrence and against the will of the Bishop, and
the issue of the Cathedral Declaration on the Eucharist, 1
which occasioned the final rupture. The first led to the
withdrawal of the Bishop from attendance at the Cathedral
(announced 12 May, 1859) ; the second, which was pre
sented to him on 19 June, made it almost impossible for
him to return. This Declaration was indeed so carefully
and skilfully worded consisting of a cento of phrases from
Holy Scripture, the Prayer Book, Articles, and Homilies,
and short texts of Fathers and Divines that it would
have been difficult to find any definite independent state
ment in it. But it was so evidently intended as a reply to
the Bishops' first decision in Mr. Cheyne's case that its
circulation as a manifesto, signed by all sorts of com
municant persons connected with the Cathedral congrega
tion over a hundred in number 2 could not but be
interpreted as an attack upon the Bishops in general and
the Bishop of St. Andrews in particular. For, rightly or
wrongly, the supporters of Mr. Cheyne fixed on the Bishop
of St. Andrews almost the whole odium of his condem
nation.
The Bishop practically removed his ' throne ' to St.
John's Church, Perth, and remained closely connected
with it till 1866, and, though still resident in Perth, he did
not attend the Cathedral except to perform some Episcopal
acts, such as Confirmation, for more than twelve years
(1859-7<2). 3
The rupture became more pronounced after the pub-
1 It may be found as Appendix K to Mr. Rumble's Letter, p. 97. It was,
I imagine, drawn up by him.
2 According to the analysis which the Bishop gives of it elsewhere, it was
signed by 105 persons, including 64 females, and 17 boys and girls of and
under sixteen years of age. Some of the elder persons were in receipt of
alms from the Church.
3 See the MS. Memorandum above quoted, p. 5.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 129
lication (at the formal request of the Synod) of his Charge
of 13 September, 1859. 1 This dealt rather fully and
frankly (perhaps too frankly) with the St. Ninian's De
claration, the Perth Collegiate School, and the postpone
ment of a Confirmation at Crieff in consequence of a
newspaper letter and advertisement signed by Mr. Lendrum,
and concluded with stating his reasons for ceasing to take
the Eastward Position as celebrant at Holy Communion.
He had always in Scotland taken this position at the
Consecration prayer, arid at St. Ninian's had done so from
the first Lord's Prayer onwards. The first he had done
believing it to be the meaning of the rubric ; the second
contrary to his own feeling and judgment, but as an act of
conciliation. He now had given up both, being persuaded
that he had understood the English rubric wrongly. For
his later interpretation of the rubric he quotes Wheatley,
Blunt (of Cambridge), and Kobertson, who thought that
the words ' before the table ' only referred to the
* ordering ' of the elements, and that the priest was then
intended to return to the ' north side ' or end. 2 The
Bishop's other reason for his change was in order that
he might no longer seem to encourage certain views on
the doctrine of Sacrifice. He did not, however, intend
to enforce his opinion upon those who were unwilling to
accept the same view (any more than that on non-
recipient attendance) unless the law of the Church required
him to do so. The Charge concludes with ; some sad and
affectionate words as to the opposition with which he was
met.
1 This Synod was held at Dunkeld in consequence of the strained relations
with the Cathedral Chapter.
2 Though practice was largely in favour of this interpretation, grammar
seems against it ; and certainly, as the Bishop saw, so ambiguous a direction
could hardly be quoted as involving penalties if variously interpreted.
130 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
It can never be my wish to stand towards any of my clergy
in any other relation than that of one whose solemn duty and
whose fervent desire it is to work with you, heartily and lovingly,
in a common cause a cause the noblest and most precious that
can devolve upon man. And whenever this relation is disturbed
whenever I am precluded from showing the affection which I
would fain cherish towards you all whenever my constant
prayer, ' that we may love as Brethren, being all of one accord
and of one mind,' would seem for a season, in regard to some
one or other among you, to return unto me void, the trial and
the pain are greater than I can express. It is not merely that
my feelings as a man are wounded and my natural sympathies
as your spiritual friend and adviser are obstructed and driven
back from the course in which they ought to flow ; but I lie
oppressed under the conviction that nothing which we have to
do can prosper as we wish, and that much, very much, which
might and ought to be done by us, must be left undone unless we
can act together, not only in peace and harmony, but with
mutual confidence and esteem (p. 29 j.
The reply to the Charge was disheartening. It took
the form of two pamphlets, appearing almost simul
taneously, but after it was known that proceedings would
be taken against Bishop Forbes. The first, a * Letter ' by
Precentor Humble, is a detailed and, it must be said, in
some respects able indictment of the Bishop in regard to
his whole connection with St. Ninian's, and particularly in
regard to the matters mentioned in his Charge of 1859.
It has an appendix of documents arranged in a very
convenient manner. But the tone and character of the
Letter are exceedingly disagreeable, and sometimes very
unworthy of the writer.
The other pamphlet, entitled ' The Eights of the Second
Order of the Clergy,' and dated Advent 1859, also a letter
to the Bishop, was the work of Mr. Lendrum. It was not
so able as Mr. Humble's and more rhetorical, but of the
same general character. The author soon afterwards left
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 131
the country, and his name will now disappear from this
memoir. 1 It is painful to reflect on the waste of time
and nervous energy in these and similar effusions, and in
the letters written to the newspapers and journals, and the
even more painful articles in reviews and periodicals.
But in judging of the bitterness of tone manifested at this
time we must remember that on 3 October, 1859, not
withstanding negotiations which had gone on with the
hope of averting the shock to public opinion, a formal
presentment was made against Bishop Forbes by Kev. W.
Henderson and two vestrymen of the church of St. Mary's,
Arbroath, and that on 9 November Mr. Cheyne received
his final sentence from the three Bishops, which removed
him for a time from the ranks of the clergy.
On 5 November Bishop Forbes had written a letter to
the congregation of St. Paul's, Dundee, of which he was
Incumbent, dated from Oxford, where he was engaged with
Dr. Pusey in preparing his defence. In it he cites Bishops
Ken, Wilson, and Jeremy Taylor as having used more
fervid and positive language than he had himself, and
stated that in his Charge he had written with a view to the
reunion of Christendom, and in a way which he hoped
might tone down the acerbities of polemics. The letter
was written in Bishop Forbes's usual winning manner, and
no doubt made an impression on those who were wondering
what the issue might be. Bishop Wordsworth replied to it
in a way which was unusual to him an anonymous
pamphlet, apparently intended at the time really to conceal
his personality, 2 entitled ' Proposals for Peace ; or, a few
1 Mr. Lendrum became Rector of Blatherwycke, Dio. Peterborough, and
died 14 Jan. 1890.
2 By one friend it was conjectured to be my father's work. The letter to
my father which mentions this also mentions an anonymous gift of 100Z.,
put into the offertory at Forfar, as ' the humble offering of a sincere Church
man for the Bishop of St. Andrews in token of sympathy,' on Christmas
Day 1859. On 5 November, 1871, he writes to his brother (then Bishop of
K2
132 EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
remarks on the Eucharistic Doctrine of Bishops Taylor,
Ken, and Wilson with reference to the recent pastoral of
the Bishop of Brechin, with a Postscript on the case of Mr.
Cheyne.' In these he showed, as he had several times
done already, that these Anglican divines, like St. Chry-
sostom and St. Augustine in older days, while using fervid
and rhetorical language in some places, yet balance, ex
plain, and justify it in others, so as to approach and
sometimes to touch what had been stigmatised as 'the
theory of virtue and efficacy.' He showed, too, that Ken
altered a passage of his ' Practice of Divine Love,' which
ran in 1685 ' how Thou Who art in Heaven art present on
the altar I can by no means explain ' into * after what
extraordinary manner Thou Who art in Heaven art
present throughout the whole sacramental action to every
devout receiver ... I cannot comprehend, but I firmly
believe all Thou hast said ' (pp. 5, 6). At the close he calls
upon the Bishop of Brechin, who had referred to these three
authorities, to accept their teaching fully and fairly.
The postscript on the case of Mr. Cheyne is also valuable,
especially in its quotations from the Catechisms of Bishop
George Innes, of Brechin (used by Bishop Jolly for half a
century at Fraserburgh, and practically by Bishop Torry),
of Bishop William Abernethy Drummond (of Brechin, and
Edinburgh and Glasgow), of Primus John Skinner, and of
David Moir, Bishop Forbes's immediate predecessor at
Brechin. It should be remembered that Mr. Cheyne had
frequently referred to the authority of Bishop Jolly and
others in his Keasons of Appeal ' ; hence the quotations
from Bishop Innes's Catechism are very much to the point.
This Catechism clearly teaches the presence of Christ's
Lincoln) that two bachelor brothers named Stewart, whom he only knew
very slightly, members of the congregation of St. John's, Perth, had left
him a legacy of 200Z. apiece, and 500Z. towards the endowment of the see.
CH. iv EUCHAKISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 133
' natural Body and Blood,' and that ' in mystery and sig
nification,' ' in power and virtue,' or < in power and effect,'
or * in power and efficacy ' this qualifying or explanatory
phrase being constantly repeated.
At the same time the Bishop of St. Andrews made in
direct communications with the presenters, endeavouring
thereby to stave off the trial ; and Mr. Gladstone and Sir
John Coleridge also used their influence to effect a peaceful
settlement. 1 But these efforts failed. It could hardly be
expected that the appeal in * Proposals for Peace ' would
have much effect on Bishop Forbes, though it could
scarcely fail to make him feel that he had spoken very
hastily in assuming that Anglican theology, in its general
result, justified his expressions. He spent the winter, I
believe in Oxford, in preparing his able * Theological
Defence,' which was the joint work of Dr. Pusey, Mr. Keble,
and himself. 2 This ' Defence ' a treatise of 235 pages
was sent in on 7 January, 1860, and when the Synod met
on 7 February it was read by the Bishop to the Court on
two successive days. Mr. Keble was present then, and on
the second day had an interview with the Bishop of St.
Andrews, of which the following contemporary note was
made in the Bishop's ' Churchman's Almanack ' :
8 February. Interview with Mr. Keble at his request, at Mr.
W. Forbes's, in which he took and kissed my hand and begged
me to forgive anything he had done amiss in the controversy
respecting the Bishop of Br[echin]. We were alone. The
interview lasted more than half an hour. We parted lovingly.
I trust 3 there was no guile on either side. (He had sent a
message to me through the Bishop of Mforay ?] to ask if I
1 See my uncle's MS. Note-book, v. 17, and Liddon's Pusey, iii. 456.
2 See Preface to Keble's Occasional Papers, p. xxi. note. Cp. Liddon's
Pusey, iii. 456.
3 I understand this to mean : ' I believe we were both of us sincere.'
Keble had been intimate with the Bishop at Winchester.
134 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
would allow him to call upon me. But I thought it more proper
to go to him.)
On the following day Mr. Henderson read his ' Pleadings/
which was, in its first edition, a pamphlet of eighty-nine
pages. The Court then adjourned till 14 March, having
fixed 23 February as the day on or before which the Bishop
of Brechin should present his printed reply. This consists
of fifty-five pages. Between this time and 14 March, when
the trial finally came on, attempts were still made to bring
the Bishop of Brechin to make such further explanations
as would enable the Synod to pass over the matter without
definite answer. 1 But they were unsuccessful. On the
14th the * Reply to the Pleadings ' was taken as read, and on
the following day judgment was given, the Primus (Bishop
Terrot), Bishop Eden, and Bishop Wordsworth reading
their opinions. The unanimous finding of the Court was
read by Bishop Wilson of Glasgow. Bishop Ewing was
again unable to be present, through severe illness. He was
averse to any penal sentence, though extremely opposed to
Bishop Forbes's views.
The finding of the Court, divested from technicalities,
was, that the presentment of Bishop Forbes's teaching
(1) on the identity of the Sacrifice of the Eucharist and
the Sacrifice of the Cross, and (2) as to the supreme adora
tion due to Christ's Body and Blood mysteriously present
in the gifts, is proven, and that the teaching itself is un-
sanctioned by the Articles and Formularies of the Church,
and to a certain extent inconsistent with them ; (3) that
the charge of tmsoundness as to the reception by the wicked
1 See Liddon's Pusey, iii. 456 : ' The Bishop of Brechin was sounded as
to the possibility of his putting forth an explanation of his language, which
might make it possible for the Synod to confine itself to a brotherly exhorta
tion on the disadvantage of polemical discussion, and several letters passed
between him and Pusey in regard to the proposals thus made. But nothing
came of this effort.'
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 135
is not proven ; (4) that the charge of depraving the Articles
and Formularies, viz. as to the ' Declaration on Kneeling,'
the * Gloria in Excelsis,' and the 28th Article is partly
dealt with in the first finding, and partly unnecessary, since
the argument about the ' Gloria in Excelsis ' is withdrawn
by the Kespondent. The judgment ends as follows :
But in consideration of the explanations and modifications
offered by the Respondent in his Answers, in reference to the
first Charge, and in consideration that the Respondent now only
asks for toleration of his opinions, but does not claim for them
the authority of the Church, or any right to enforce them on
those subject to his jurisdiction : we, the said College of Bishops,
feel that we shall best discharge our duty in this painful case
by limiting our sentence to a Declaration of Censure and
Admonition.
And we do now solemnly admonish, and in all brotherly
love entreat the Bishop of Brechin to be more careful for the
future, so that no fresh occasion may be given for trouble and
offence, such as have arisen from the delivery and publication
of the Primary Charge to his clergy complained of in the
Presentment.
At this point it will be convenient to the reader to
have before him the Bishop of St. Andrews' own remarks
upon the controversy as far as his own special part in it
was concerned. 1
One of my saddest experiences arising out of our Eucharistic
controversy was that it caused on my part a breach if so I may
call it, when there had never been more than a slight personal
acquaintance with Dr. Pusey. He took upon himself to write
to me in dictatorial terms, which I could not but feel to be quite
uncalled for. It was a painful thing for me to have to sit as a
judge upon a brother Bishop, and especially such a one as
Bishop Forbes, and I did what I properly could by indirect
communication with the presenters to stave off the trial ; but
when there was no escape from the duty I set myself to discharge
it with the utmost conscientiousness. I prepared an elaborate
1 From his MS. Note-book, v. 17 foil.
136 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
judgment, which lasted, I think, not less than two or three hours
in the delivery, and, in order to be fortified with the best opinion
I could obtain, on the day before the trial came on I went to
Burntisland and requested Mr. G. Forbes, the Bishop's brother,
who was known to have made a special study of the Eucharist,
to do me the favour to read carefully what I had written, and to
give me the benefit of any suggestions he would wish to offer
for its correction or improvement. He did so ; and in returning
the MS. assured me unreservedly, and with emphasis quite
beyond what I had ventured to expect, that he went along with
me in every word.
As regards the controversy itself I take the following
paragraphs from different note-books, sometimes supplying
necessary words in square brackets, sometimes omitting
what is incomplete or superfluous, but otherwise giving the
Bishop's own expressions, unrevised as they sometimes are.
On further revision I believe he would have guarded against
the inference which might be drawn from the last sentence.
What was the question at stake ? [It centred round the
doctrine of the] Real Presence an ambiguous expression, un
known to the New Testament, and [it is] unfortunate that it was
ever introduced.
[The Church teaches] a Presence [of Christ] :
1. In the individual Christian, when in Baptism he is made
a member [of Christ].
2. In the Church at large as Christ's mystical Body.
3. In meetings of Christians for Public worship.
4. In the consecration of Bread and Wine to become Christ's
sacramental Body and Blood.
Is there in this last a Presence so far more real and different
from all the rest that it involves a Presence on the altar in the
elements (1) which ought to be adored, (2) which involves a
repetition or continuation of the Sacrifice of the Cross ? This
is what the advocates of the new doctrine of the Real Objective
Presence maintained [and] which our Church, by its highest and
purely spiritual Tribunal, denied. [In doing so it acted in union
with the] opinion of my predecessor, Bishop Torry, the Champion
of the Scottish Office and the Scotch tradition of the High
CH, iv EUCHAKISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 137
Church School ; [and in agreement with the] opinion of Dr.
Routh, President of Magdalen College for [63] years [1791-1854],
the learned representative of the Anglican tradition of the
Highest Church School [of the generation previous to my own].
Now there is no getting over the argument from the fact that
the most eminent of the Fathers again and again [not only]
speak of the consecrated elements as the Body and Blood of
Christ but also as symbols of the Body and Blood. A symbol
of a thing may be called the thing itself, as we say of a portrait
that it is Mr. So-and-So. 1 But the thing itself cannot be called
a symbol (MS. v. 41, 49).
As regards the doctrine of the Sacrifice, he expresses
himself thus, the point being substantially one which had
struck him at once on reading the Charge, as he said at
the Episcopal Synod of 1857, that it disturbed the pro
portion of the faith especially as regards our Lord's Ascen
sion and the coming of the Holy Ghost.
The doctrine of the Session [of our Lord Jesus Christ] at the
right hand of God, plainly taught in no less than a dozen passages
of the New Testament, involving [not only] (1) perpetual inter
cession, [but also] (2) [sending down the Holy Spirit to dwell in
His Church], (3) [acceptance of our gifts and presentation of
them to the Father], and (4) [feeding His people on His
Sacrifice], has been swallowed up by the notion of a continuous
Sacrifice carried on in Heaven, as though the great Sacrifice on
the Cross had been grudgingly accepted, or can be held to be
less than perfect. The notion has arisen out of the prestige
which it gives to the priesthood of the Clergy ; but it has no
foundation in the word of God, and, as I have said, it obliterates
the doctrine which has abundant foundation in that word
(MS. iii. 114).
1 This is a well-known illustration used by St. Thomas Aquinas,
Summa III. quaest. 83, art. 1 : ' Utrum in hoc sacramento Christus
immoletur.' His doctrine on the Sacrifice is certainly what would now be
called Low Church doctrine. He says, we may say that Christ is ' immo
lated ' in the Sacrament (1) because it is a representative image of the
Passion of Christ ; (2) because through it we are made partakers of the
fruits of the Lord's Passion. For Bishop Torry's opinion see Neale's Life,
p. 377. Cp. also Cosin, Works, iv. p. 207.
138 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
I confess I do not like the notion (now so popular) of our
Lord's pleading His Sacrifice. 1 It seems to clash with the
doctrine of the Session. . . . The one Sacrifice on the Cross
was full, perfect, and sufficient : the pleading of it seems to suggest
either that the Sacrifice was insufficient or grudgingly accepted.
.... That we on Earth should plead it in prayers and
Eucharists is right and natural (MS. iii. 121).
In other passages he deals with the Liturgical develop
ments respecting the Melchizedekian Priesthood and the
celestial altar, which have been struck out or passed over
by our Eeformed Church, but are now ' insisted upon by
the Tractarians.' In regard to Heb. viii. 3, if we are
to translate it with Bengel and Westcott ' it was necessary
that this man have somewhat to offer ' it refers ( he says)
to the Sacrifice of the Cross. If we are to follow our
authorised and revised versions * it is necessary ' &c.
then it refers to Christ's offerings of our prayers and our
pleadings of the one great all sufficient Sacrifice when He
intercedes for us at the right hand of God. This is the
meaning, too, of the celestial altar in the Apocalypse. It is
an altar of incense, on which is offered the incense of
Christ's intercession added to the prayers of the saints.
The * other angel ' (Eev. viii. 3) is Christ.
And all the teaching that Christ in some way repeats or
continues and pleads His own Sacrifice upon the heavenly altar
has no foundation in Holy Scripture (MS. v. 28, 29).
It is fair to the Bishop of St. Andrews to exhibit part
of this argument in fuller detail from his unpublished
* Opinion,' pp. 19, 20.
1 The teaching that Christ pleads His Sacrifice is not a modern one in
the Church of England, nor specially connected with Sacerdotalism. It is
embodied in well-known hymns of the last century, and I find it stated,
with other similar points, in an interesting sermon of Henry Melvill's on
Heb. viii. 2, Christ the Minister of the Church, which has many points of
contact with doctrine usually connected with the Oxford Movement.
See his Sermons, ed. 2 (1834), pp. 35-65, and esp. pp. 50 foil.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 139
Christ, as He was a Priest over the true Israel, was a Priest
typified by Aaron and his descendants. As such, He made once
for all the great Atonement. As such, He ascended into the
true Holy of Holies, i.e. into Heaven itself, ' by His own Blood '
(observe it is not said ' with his own Blood,' but ' by ' Sia,
(Heb. ix. 12) there ' to appear in the presence of GOD for us '
(Heb. ix. 24). This was the final completion at once of the
time of His Humiliation, and of His Aaronical Priesthood.
Henceforth He became both a King for ever and a Priest for
ever. And as a Priest for ever, He is a Priest after the order of
Melchizedek. Wherefore, according to the strict and proper
interpretation of His Melchizedekian Office, as actually set forth
in Holy Scripture and unravelled from its intertexture with the
Levitical, our Lord is no longer a Priest who has to deal with
victims, or with the making of atonement. No ; He does only
what Melchizedek did. First, He receives, in GOD'S name, and
in GOD'S behalf, our tithes that is, a type of our Alms, our
Oblations, our Souls and Bodies, of all that we have and are.
Again, He blesses the most High GOD, in our name, and in our
behalf- that is, He presents our praises and Eucharists at the
Throne of Grace. These are the Sacrifices the only Sacrifices
that are specified in the Epistle to the Hebrews (see xiii. 15,
16), and doubtless they include the Eucharistic Sacrifice in all
its parts : for, as it is written in the same place (verse 10), 'we
have an altar, &c.' l Above all, He brings forth bread and wine
His gifts of Grace, His Benedictions, and His Sacraments, most
especially that precious and most comfortable Sacrament of His
own Body and Blood, wherewith, as from ' the Altar,' He feasts
us, i.e. all who are the true sons of Abraham, as we return from
the slaughter of our Spiritual Enemies, and at the same time
enables us to become still more victorious. And this He does
' for ever ' : not after the order of a transitory Priesthood such
as Aaron's, but of Melchizedek a Priesthood which the Author
of the Epistle to the Hebrews has summed up in one word,
where he says that ' He ever liveth to make intercession for us '
(Heb. vii. 23). He stands between us and GOD, both to give
and to receive (so far I would accept the Respondent's statement
that ' Our Lord's intercession is an act of not mere prayer ; but
1 Original Note. See St. Ignatius, quoted Answers, p. 28, and Irenaeus,
ib. p. 33 seq.
140 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
of oblation ') : to receive as Priest to Goo-ward to give as King
to us-ward ; or rather for we may not separate the two, even in
thought to execute at once a Royal Priesthood and a Priestly
Royalty. He does this in Heaven ; He has continued to do it
from the day of Pentecost, when, in token of His established
sacerdotal Kingship, He sent down the Holy Ghost to abide in
His stead with His Church on earth ; while He Himself occupies,
for our sake no less than for His own, the Seat of Glory which
He has won at $e Father's Right Hand; according as it is
written in that same 110th Psalm, c The Lord said unto my
Lord, sit Thou on My Right Hand, until I make Thine enemies
Thy footstool.' Here, then, we see no room left for any identity
between the Sacrifice of the Eucharist and the Sacrifice of the
Cross our Lord's so-called Melchizedekian Sacrifice of Himself,
which served as the connecting link l between the two, being
altogether taken away. I do not absolutely say of Melchizedek,
1 Sacrificium nullum obtulit ' [as Bishop Andrewes did] because
I am aware that many of the Fathers, after St. Cyprian, have
said otherwise ; but I do say (and I reverence and admire the
silence of Holy Scripture in this respect) that as regards the
Type and Antitype of Melchizedek, the notion of a Sacrifice
otherwise than Eucharistical is not Scriptural.
I must now redeem my promise to state, as shortly as
possible, my own judgment on this mysterious and solemn
subject. I will first make a few preliminary observations.
I agree with the Bishop of St. Andrews that the general
criticism to be passed upon the views on Eucharistic
Adoration and Eucharistic Sacrifice, which are the main
subject of this controversy, by whomsoever they are put
forward, is that they ' disturb the proportion of the faith.'
The Holy Eucharist is a great act of worship as well
as a means of grace, but it is worship primarily and
1 Original Note. See Answers, p. 72: ' The Sacrifice here below is part
of His own Melchizedekian Priesthood. He invisibly consecrates. He
invisibly offers. He now, too, in St. Augustine's words, is the Offerer and
Oblation.' For the true meaning of these words of St. Augustine, see Notes
of the Eucharistic Controversy, pp. 12 and 47, and below p. 48, note.
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 141
specially addressed to the Father as representing the Blessed
Trinity, through the Son, by the power of the Holy Ghost.
To make so much of Eucharistic worship addressed to the
presence of Christ, as distinct from the Almighty Father,
is seriously to withdraw men's finite minds from the main
object of their assembling together. Our minds are so
constituted that they cannot think adequately of more than
one thing at a time, and if we press, as a great duty, one
species or detail of Adoration, we occupy the mind and so
practically negative (though of course we do not verbally
deny) the fitting and proper attention which they ought to
pay to the other and the principal end of their worship.
In the next place, so-called logical teaching as to the
presence such as Bishop Forbes and Mr. Cheyne en
forced is justly feared and suspected in this country on
account of its medieval associations. It is a characteristic
of that scholastic theology, which dominated the un-
reformed Church from the twelfth century onwards, to
drive its conclusions to extremes and so to become dis
proportionate, when not absolutely heretical. This was a
matter of comparatively less importance when the contro
versies so raised were free to run their course and were
confined to the schools. If the controversy on Transubstan-
tiation, for instance, had been let alone by authority, as that
on Ubiquity was in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,
it would have made its proper contribution to thought and
then have passed into the background. Unfortunately, in
the unreformed Church the scholastic temper was, for a
time, united to a commanding position and a legal and
lawgiving instinct in its centre, the Church of Kome. As
far, therefore, as that Church was able to give laws to
Christendom it set itself to achieve two tasks : first, to
make everything as plain and definite as possible ; and
secondly, to make discipline easy and so to limit contro-
142 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. TV
versy. The second end was attained by making conciliar
definitions, which were sometimes only arrived at by
secondary processes of logic, necessary articles of faith to
be accepted under pain of anathemas. Eome acted, in fact,
upon the principle that a thing must either be wrong or
right, a proposition either false or true. And it held,
further, that if the matter were a religious one, the view
taken must either be tremendously and eternally wrong
and false, or tremendously and eternally right and true.
Thus the old fallacy of the Stoics came in some degree to
be repeated that all faults are equal, * omnia peccata paria ' ;
and the great truth was forgotten that truths arrived at by
human logic are almost necessarily incomplete. A half-
truth is in one sense a truth, but relatively it may be a
most dangerous error.
Hence those who resisted the claims of logic put
forward at this time, did so with a sense that they were
resisting a feature of Eoman theology, which has been the
cause of a great deal of the misery of the Church, whether
it is described as ' unscriptural ' or ' being wise above that
which is written,' or as substituting the developments of
theological dogma for the more general vague and mys
terious teaching of the Primitive Church.
It is easy to say, e.g. Christ is either present or absent ;
if present He is certainly to be worshipped ; and if present
He must be present in His whole and perfect personality,
at once human and Divine, passible and glorified, otherwise
you are guilty of Nestorianism that is, of believing in two
personalities in Christ. Such logic can best, I think, be
met by considerations of the broader aspects of the mystery
to which the argument is applied, such as that which I
have stated at the outset, and by others akin to it,
especially by developing the thought that the Eucharist
is a great act of worship presented to the eternal Father
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 143
through the Son, and by recollecting that we have very im
perfect knowledge of the condition of Christ's existence in
the unseen world. Those who have tried to make the
mystery plain have shown that they were quite lost in the
attempt, by resorting to the substitute, for the teaching of
a presence of virtue and efficacy which they censured, or
of a presence of Christ's Person in some of its attributes
apart from others, of an equally unintelligible doctrine of
a supra-local presence. Indeed, if you consider them as
explanations, one has very little advantage over the other.
Personally I am more inclined, than the Bishop of St.
Andrews at this time was, to look hopefully to the theology
which makes much of the symbolic language of Scripture
and the Fathers about the eternal Priesthood and the
celestial altar. I shrink, indeed, from accepting the
extreme statement of the identity of the Sacrifice of the
Eucharist with the Sacrifice of the Cross, which was
surely made unwisely and in for get fulness of the priest's
true part in Sacrifice, namely, the application and presen
tation of the Blood, especially within the veil in some
measure by the Council of the Later an and more ex-
explicitly by that of Trent, and by others who have used
their language. But I cannot think that our Lord, as our
Priest for ever, can divest Himself of His attitude as a
Sacrifice for sin when He intercedes for us on High. I do
not think that it is a sufficient criticism to say that this
mode of speaking implies that the Sacrifice is insufficient
or is grudgingly accepted. The relation of the Persons of
the Blessed Trinity to one another is indeed absolutely
inscrutable, but if Our Lord can be spoken of as ' the Lamb
that hath been slain from the foundation of the world '
(Apoc. xiii. 8), and if He stands in the Vision of Patmos in
the midst of the throne no doubt in fulness of life and
power ' as a Lamb that hath been slain ' (Apoc. v. 6, 12),
144 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
this seems to make the attitude of His pleading the Sacri
fice something more than temporary. It is also to be
remembered that there are evidently two altars in heaven,
one of sacrifice and one of incense, as in the Tabernacle
and Temple. For the symbolism of the souls of those that
have been slain in martyrdom crying under the altar, of
Apoc. vi. 9, can only refer to the altar of sacrifice and not
to that of incense. It is evidently taken from the ritual
of the old covenant in which the blood (that is the soul
or life, Hebrew nephesh) of sin offerings was poured under
the altar (Lev. iv. 7 &c.) or at its base, and it is to be con
nected with the imagery of the life-giving stream issuing
from under the altar as described by Ezekiel (xlvii. 1) and
as repeated in the last chapter of the Apocalypse (xxii. 1),
where it proceeds from out of the throne of God and of the
Lamb. All these things are figures which must not be
pressed in detail (as when we read in several places of our
Lord's sitting at the right hand of God, and in another of
His standing), but the whole body of them taken together
means at least this, I imagine, that in the heart of God the
attributes of Justice and Love are working side by side, plead
ing, as it were, one against another, and will so work, united
by the bond of the Holy Spirit, at least to the end of time.
I should not shrink, then, from saying that Christ still
pleads His Sacrifice as our great High Priest, and that the
worship of the Eucharist is a union of the worship of
earth with that of heaven. Bather, however, I would
urge those who teach this to remember that His position
as a Priest is higher than His position as a Victim. It is
a broader conception and it is freer from any possible
tendency to localise and limit the Presence, and so does
not lead to the confusion of the sign and the thing signi
fied, which may become practically a source of Idolatry.
It reminds us of the great truth, which makes the
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 145
Eucharist always and essentially a sacrifice of Praise and
Thanksgiving, that our Lord is living, and that we come
to meet a risen and ascended Saviour. This is a truth
very apt to be forgotten if we turn merely to the symbolic
expressions of His Passion.
To my own mind Eucharistic adoration, in the
limited and special sense in which it is addressed to
Christ, is more truly understood by the Greek Church, which
adores specially when the elements are brought in to the
sanctuary, and again as a prelude to reception of the Com
munion, 1 than by the Eoman, which attaches adoration to
the moment of Consecration and more by Bishop Andrewes
and Bishop Wm. Forbes, who speak of adoration of Christ
' in the Sacrament ' or ' in the Eucharist,' than by those
who speak of it as ' in the gifts.' 2 The fuller expression,
both verbal and practical, is surely the nobler as well as the
safer. There is something open to the charge of material
ism in the ringing of a bell to call wandering attention to
a particular moment when a certain tribute of religious
feeling is due. Bishop A. P. Forbes of course would have
shrunk from this, but his teaching leads naturally to it.
Again as to the charge of Nestorianism made against
those who demur to the teaching as to the Presence ' in the
gifts ' of Christ's body, soul, and Divinity, while I feel that
it is perilous to enlarge upon such a point in one direction
or the other, I cannot help remembering that there is a
parallel distinction surely to be made between the Presence
1 See my Considerations on Public Worship, &c., p. 21, 1898.
2 There is a passage from Bishop Beveridge, On Frequent Communion,
p. 107, quoted by Forbes, Charge, 2nd ed. p. xi., which seems to me to
show just the difference between his point of view and that of the older
Anglicans : ' How can I, by faith, behold my Saviour coming to me, and
offering to me His own Body and Blood, and not fall down and worship
Him ? ' &c. The Presence is that of Christ as Minister of the Sacrament
rather than in the consecrated species, of Christ the giver rather than of
Christ in the gifts.
146 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. iv
of Christ in Paradise and His Divine Presence on the
throne of God. The penitent robber was at once with
Jesus in Paradise. St. Paul speaks of death as to depart
and be * with Christ.' Yet the beatific vision is something
still in prospect for dwellers in Paradise, and even, as we
Anglicans believe, for the greatest Saints. There is a
sense, then, in which our Saviour can be present, for
certain purposes which may be described by the words
' grace and efficacy,' * virtue and power ' without being
present in the fulness of His Godhead. I do not dogma
tise as to whether this is so or not in the Eucharist, but
I shrink from the hard words used by those who speak of
the doctrine of a ' Eeal Presence of grace and efficacy ' as
if it was only a subterfuge for a ' Real Absence.' l This
is not the caution and moderation of a large theology
or of a loving charity which makes the best of the opinions
of our brother Christians who are trying to speak rightly
of an inscrutable mystery.
I will only add one point in conclusion. We have
noticed several times the tacit transition made by those who
assert the identity of the two sacrifices, from the Sacrifice
of the Cross to that of the Upper Eoom. This shows a
defective apprehension of the meaning of language. It
would surely have been far better if Bishop Forbes could
have confessed that he had spoken somewhat hastily on
this point. If he had said ' the Sacrifice of the Eucharist
is the repetition of the Sacrifice of the Upper Eoom as far
1 The phrase ' Eeal Absence ' is sometimes attributed to Bishop A. P.
Forbes. My uncle, however, in a letter to Bev. J. S. Wilson (of Edinburgh),
23 April, 1888, attributes it to his brother George. The story is, that when
he appealed to the House of Lords in regard to the Scottish Office, he made
a speech some five hours long, and completely mystified the judges. One of
them perhaps Lord Westbury interposed : 'I am not sure that I quite
follow your argument, Mr. Forbes ; but as I understand it, you appear to
be contending for the doctrine of the Keal Presence.' ' no, my Lord,
quite the contrary,' was his reply ; ' my contention is in favour of the
doctrine of the Keal Absence.'
CH. iv EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSY AND ST. NINIAN'S 147
as human power can be authorised by God to make it, and
bears a relation to the Sacrifice of the Cross similar to
that which the Sacrifice of the Upper Koom possesses,' the
wisest of his opponents would have agreed with him.
Unfortunately, instead of making concessions of this sort,
he added this sentence in a longer passage in the second
edition : ' Our Lord said this is my Body ; and no words
of man can strengthen the tremendous and absolute identity
of the two Sacrifices, or rather, as I should prefer to say, of
the one Sacrifice in its two aspects ' (ed. ii. p. 42). Then
in the next paragraph but one he quotes St. Chrysostom, as
if he was in agreement with him : ' It is the same which Christ
gave to His disciples which is now made by His priests.'
It is difficult for a Bishop to confess that he has been in
the wrong ; and doubtless Forbes had a hope and desire to
show to our fellow-Christians on the continent, with some
of whom he was intimate as with the learned and loveable
Gallican Professor Garcin de Tassy, whom I once had the
pleasure of visiting in Paris, and who then spoke warmly
about him that the Church in this country is in many
things nearer to their own than they had imagined. I am
far from thinking that the result of the controversy was
mere disputation. Many thought more clearly in con
sequence, and God brought good out of evil ; but there was
much distraction of energy, and it is difficult to imagine
that Presbyterians were not alienated and the day of Home
Reunion postponed.
I may add here that in 1859, when Sir G. C. Lewis was
Home Secretary, the claims of Bishop Wordsworth were put
forward, and it was hoped that he might become Principal
of St. Andrews. Professor James D. Forbes of Edinburgh
was, however, appointed. I have before me a letter from
the latter, dated 16 November, thanking my uncle for his con
gratulations as specially gratifying under the circumstances.
L 2
148
CHAPTER V
FIRST PART OF RESIDENCE AT PERTH REUNION WORK
1860-1867
1 Making his hardest task his best delight.' W. WORDSWORTH, Eccl. Sonnets,
ii. 16.
Kesolution to hold a General Synod carried in 1859 Its constitution
Committee on Canons Bishop Eden chosen Primus (1862) Meetings
in 1862-63 Canon on Episcopal elections Bishop Wordsworth offers
his resignation Work of the Synod.
Continuation of Reunion work Eevival in the Establishment
Dr. B. Lee, Principal Tulloch, Dr. N. Macleod, Dr. Bisset Bemoval
of clerical disabilities in 1864 Commemoration Addresses by Bishop of
St. Andrews, 1860, 1861, and 1862_Charges of 1863, 1864 Dr. Caird
and Dr. Pirie Dr. Rorison's attempt at a Beunion Conference
Synodal Address in 1866 Chichester sermon (Euodias and Syntyche),
1867.
Parallel attempts to use opportunities of educational changes
Advantages of Scotland as to Elementary Education Act of 1696 Act
of 1861 Attempt at ' A Common Catechism ' : not published ' A
National Catechism,' 1864 Charges of 1872 Call for united action in
this matter.
The Bishop's Greek Grammar adopted by the Head Masters of
England (1866)' Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible ' (1864),
and other Shakesperian publications Foundation of St. Andrews School
Chapel at Perth (1866) Closer intercourse with England useful, but not
wholly favourable to Reunion Movement Archbishop Longley at
Inverness (1866) Charles Wordsworth at Consecration of Bishop
Claughton (1867), at Lambeth Conference (September 1867), at Chiches
ter (November 1867) Suspension of his efforts for fifteen years.
Domestic events Death of Kenneth Wordsworth (1862) Death of
Warden Barter (1861) Bishop Hamilton's generosity (1864).
IN the following chapter I propose to record the chief
events of the second period of Bishop Charles Wordsworth's
Episcopate, which succeeded the close of the Eucharistic
CH. v FIRST PART OF RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-67 149
controversy in 1860 down to the end of the year 1867, the
year of the first Lambeth Conference.
At the annual Episcopal Synod held 9 November, 1859,
the Bishop of St. Andrews had moved for a General Synod for
the purpose of the revision of the canons, and his motion was
successful. Those who are not familiar with the internal
government of the Church in Scotland will need to be in
formed that this was by no means an every-day event. While
the Episcopal Synod meets every year, and more often if
necessary, and each Bishop likewise summons the clergy of
his Diocese round him once a year, a General or (as it has
been called since 1890) a Provincial Synod can only be
called by a special resolution of the Episcopal Synod.
When summoned it consists, like our own Convocations, of
Bishops and Presbyters l meeting in two Chambers ; but,
unlike them, it has no existence in the intervals between
one time of its assemblage and the next.
Such an assembly has in fact been created only in the
present century, and has been from various causes ob
structed in its development, a fact which is naturally
criticised by members of the Established Church, who are
accustomed to be governed almost entirely by public
assemblies. There is no provision respecting it in the
oldest code of special Scottish canons, the ' Sixteen Canons '
1 The second Chamber consists of the Deans of the various Dioceses
(not Cathedrals), the Principal of the Theological College, now at Edinburgh,
and the Pantonian Professor (if they are different persons), and one
representative Presbyter for every ten or fraction of ten Presbyters entitled
to vote in each Diocesan Synod. This Chamber elects a Prolocutor and a
Pro-prolocutor. No canon can be altered, abrogated, or adopted, except by
a majority in both Chambers of the Provincial Synod ; but the body has no
judicial powers. Possibly the example of the General Assembly, which
from time to time spends much of its energy in judicial business, has
deterred the Episcopal Church from entrusting such powers to its
Provincial Synod. But more probably the prepossession in favour of the
authority of Episcopal judges has been even more powerful in this matter.
For general details see Year Book of S. E. C. (1894), p. 50.
150 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
of 1743. The * Twenty-six Canons' of 1811 provide for
General Synods when they are needed ' to alter the Code of
Canons/ An attempt was indeed made in 1828 to secure
their regular meeting, and a resolution was passed that
this should take place every fifth year. But the decision
of the Synod of Laurencekirk to that effect was rescinded
the next year at Edinburgh (1829), mainly under the
influence of Bishop Jolly, who was afraid of any diminution
of the Episcopal prerogative. 1 It was not indeed till 1843
that the Episcopal Synod itself was required to meet
annually. When it does so it can determine by a majority
whether the Provincial Synod shall be summoned or not.
In preparation, then, for this important gathering a
mixed committee of clergy and laity was appointed in
1859 to report upon the existing canons ; and the Bishop
of St. Andrews naturally threw himself heartily into its
work during the years that followed. But an event
happened before the Synod met which necessarily discon
certed him not a little.
In March 1862 Bishop Terrot resigned his office as
Primus, though he retained his position as Bishop of
Edinburgh for ten years with the assistance of a coadjutor,
dying quite worn out in April 1872. Both Bishop Forbes and
Bishop Wordsworth had supporters in the College of Bishops ;
and there could hardly be a doubt which of them was
the abler man ; but the friends of the former, finding they
would be outvoted, withdrew in favour of Bishop Eden, and
so obtained the votes of Bishops Wilson and Suther, who
would otherwise have voted for Wordsworth. It was
naturally a serious and I may say a lifelong disappointment
to the latter, who justly felt that he could have made some
thing of the position, especially in the direction of Keunion.
The new Primus, with whom he was on very friendly terms,
1 See Dean W. Walker's Life of Bishop Jolly, ed. 2, p. 128, 1878.
CH. v FIRST PART OF RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-67 151
though not a great scholar, was an able, generous, active,
and popular man, with many friends and few (if any)
enemies. He was about two years older than his colleague,
and was a senior student at Christ Church while he was a
junior student, and they had many points besides their
college in common.
Like Charles Wordsworth he was a great athlete in his
youth, and retained a good deal of the boyish spirit and
temper ; as a man he was possessed with a similar spirit of
foundation, and he had interests considerably broader than
those of the communion of which he had become a Bishop.
His great foundation was Inverness Cathedral, on which he
spent a large part of his fortune. His breadth of sympathy
was shown in his gifts to foreign missions, especially to
Newfoundland, and in his attempts to promote a good
understanding with the Eussian Church. He was also,
like my uncle, a strong advocate for extending the influence
and position of laymen in the Church and its Councils, and
he may perhaps be considered the founder of the Kepresen-
tative Church Council. He also did much to establish
closer relations with England ; yet at the same time he
was a defender of the Scottish Office. He died in 1886. 1
The election of a Primus took place on 5 July, 1862,
and the General Synod sat from the 8th to the llth, and
then adjourned to 30 September. On 3 October it again
adjourned till 3 February of next year. On the last of
these occasions the Bishop of St. Andrews withdrew from
the discussion because a new rule was introduced into the
canons which he considered, not without some reason,
might be interpreted as a reflection upon himself. This
new rule prohibited a clergyman from voting at his own
1 The best printed account of Bishop Eden is that in Eev. John
Archibald's The Historic Episcopate in the Columban Church and in the
Diocese of Moray, Edinb. 1893, pp. 325-363.
152 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
election ; but it did not contain the provision which (as he
urged) was laid down in the old Canon Law, that if the
votes were equal an elector, who assented to his own election,
had a right to be preferred to one who was not an elector.
As this was the ground on which some of the Bishops who
confirmed his own election specially relied, it was natural
that he should regret that no notice of this principle should
be taken in the new canon. He resolved, on this account,
to offer his resignation ; but this was so strongly deprecated
by his brother Bishops and the clergy and laity of his own
Diocese, that he withdrew from his intention to take this
step. 1
The principal changes in the canons then enacted were
admission of lay representatives to vote in elections of
Bishops ; the admission of assistant curates and mission
clergy of a certain standing to Diocesan Synods ; the re
striction of clerical vestments to those now in use ; and the
removal of the Scottish Office from its position of primary
authority, and the adoption of the English Book of Com
mon Prayer as the service-book of the Church. 2
During the years which immediately succeeded the close
of the Eucharistic controversy a number of circumstances
combined to give new life and hopes to the Church in
Scotland, and especially to encourage the movement towards
Keunion. Charles Wordsworth's main contributions to it
consisted of various discourses and addresses, which he
linked with the special commemorations which fell in those
years, and of an attempt to make use of the opportunities
offered by the changes in public educational policy which
began in 1861. There was at the same time a revival in
1 The circumstances are fully set out in his printed Letter to Dean
Tarry, dated 19 February, 1863. See also above, p. 8.
2 See further in W. Stephen's History, ii. 644 (1896). The treatment
of the Scottish Office has been already discussed : see above, pp. 76-7.
CH. v KEUNION WORK. 1860-1867 153
the Established Church of Scotland, which had struggled
bravely, and to a great extent effectually, to recover the
ground lost in consequence of the great disruption of 1843.
The old bitterness and suspicion were also to some extent
disappearing, and many of the methods of the Episcopal
Churches were making themselves at home among Presby
terians. The reader may be recommended to study several
interesting chapters in the biographies of Dr. Eobert Lee
and Principal Tulloch, 1 which deal in the first case with
* Scotch Episcopacy ' and the Conference proposed by
Dr. Eorison, and with ' The Church Service Society,' and
in the second with ' The Kenaissance of the Scotch Church.'
Dr. Lee, of Greyfriars, Edinburgh, though a somewhat
severe critic of Episcopalianism, and even of the Prayer
Book, was, as is well known, the champion in the Establish
ment of Liturgical development and other so-called ' inno
vations,' and especially of fixed forms of prayer, for which
he gained at least toleration. This he effected at last at
the cost of a severe and prolonged struggle, entailing much
personal suffering, at the close of which he died 14 March,
1868. The following sentence from a speech of his at the
Synod of Lothian, 1 May, 1866, attracted the Bishop's
attention, and is worth quoting as a type of Dr. Lee's
downright mode of argument.
Then they were told that they were all sworn to maintain
uniformity ; but what was the uniformity they were bound to
maintain ? When he became a minister in 1833 it was almost
the universal custom not to use the Lord's Prayer and not to
1 See Dr. R. H. Story's Life and Regains of Robert Lee, D.D., i.
chaps. 3 and 4 (Lond. 1870), and Mrs. Oliphant's Memoir of Principal
Tulloch, chap. 8 (3rd ed. Lond. 1889). See also Dr. Lee's important book,
The Reform of the Church of Scotland in Worship, Government, and
Doctrine. Part I. Worship, Edinb. 1864. His remarks on the Prayer Book
may be found in that volume, pp. 170-179, and some harsher criticisms in
the Life, ii. 99-107.
164 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. v
read the Scriptures in public worship. He never for a moment
felt himself bound in conscience to comply with a uniformity
like that.
Principal Tulloch (who afterwards became a real friend
of Bishop Wordsworth, during his settlement at St. An
drews), was a yet broader-minded man, and would gladly
have seen Episcopacy introduced as a practical improve
ment into his own communion, though not seeing his way
clearly as to the'manner. He distinguished himself at this
time by his freedom in dealing with the Westminster Con
fession and the two Catechisms. Dr. Norman Macleod also
provoked a storm at Glasgow by a protest against rigid
Sabbatarianism. The nearest approach to a better under
standing from the Presbyterian side was made, however,
not by Lee or Tulloch, but by Dr. Bisset in his address as
Moderator to the General Assembly of 1862, in which
he spoke out bravely, though in general terms, of the duty
of unity and conciliation. ' No considerable progress,'
he said, ' will probably be made in what should be a
supreme object of longing supplication to every follower of
Christ the unification of His Church until different
Communions in a spirit of humility and charity concur in
a revision of their religious constitutions.' To the disrup
tion, and to schism generally, he traced a decline in morals ;
and spoke of the decay of faith which made it the duty of
all Christians ' to coalesce and combine for the good of our
Church and country.' In passing, too, he showed marked
sympathy with the services of the Church of England, and
consequently with the ' innovations ' of which Dr. Lee was
the champion. No wonder that the latter wrote in his
diary under 2 June (1862) : * This evening Dr. Bisset, the
Moderator, concluded the Assembly with an extraordinary
address, approving innovations and suggesting more. I
never expected to hear such things in the General
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
155
Assembly, much less from the Moderator's chair ' (' Life,'
ii. 32).
The year 1864 brought added strength to the Episcopal
Church through the removal of clerical disabilities by the
Act of Parliament (27 & 28 Viet. cap. 94) which was carried
mainly by the exertions of the Duke of Buccleuch and Sir
William Heathcote, assisted of course by Mr. Gladstone. 1
Many persons in Scotland naturally interested themselves
in this matter, the most prominent perhaps being the new
Primus, Bishop Eden 2 (whose personal friendship with the
Duke is said to have largely influenced the success of the
measure), and Bishop Ewing. 3 The latter, characteristi
cally enough, wrote to his friend, Bishop A. C. Tait, of
London, urging that the concession should be conditionally
limited in its duration, and especially should contain a
provision adverse to the extended use of his constant object
of criticism, the Scottish Office. The Bill, however, was
carried without conditions of this sort, and under it clergy
of the Episcopal Church are eligible for offices and benefices
in England, with the special consent, however, of the Bishop
of the Diocese. The substantial unity of the two bodies
is thus manifested.
There was a certain soreness on the subject among
members of the Established Church, which clings to the idea
of its parity with the Church of England, and especially in the
mind of Dr. Lee. But the opposition came to nothing, and
the occasion for a call to union on the north of the Tweed
was naturally not lost sight of. The Bishop of St. Andrews
1 See some letters of Bishop A. P. Forbes to him on this subject in
Mackey's Forbes, pp. 130-132.
2 Some notes on this point will be found in John Archibald's Historic
Episcopate in the Columban Church and in the Diocese of Moray, pp. 334,
336, 341. Bishop Eden's father-in-law, Mr. Justice James Allan Park, was
also keenly interested in the Bill.
3 See Boss's Memoir, p. 362. The letter is dated 15 January, 1864.
156 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
had been vigorously using the commemorations of the
previous years to enforce his own conceptions on Keunion.
At the close of the year 1860 he had delivered an elaborate
discourse on the tercentenary of the first meeting of the
General Assembly at Edinburgh (20 December, 1560). This
was given at St. Andrews 18 December, at Dunfermline
19 December, and at Perth 22 December. His object was
to show that the^first Scottish Reformers, like the English,
appealed to primitive antiquity, of which of course he was
now a skilled exponent, and consequently to advocate a
union between -the Established Churches in England and
Scotland without sacrifice of national independence. 1
Similar thoughts occupied his mind and his pen, espe
cially in connection with Archbishop Leighton, in his Charge
of 1861, delivered at Leighton's own little city of Dunblane
and dealing with the memories of 1661 and 176 1. 2 The
first year was that in which Leighton was appointed to the
See of Dunblane, the second the beginning of the reign of
King George III. and of the Primus- ship of Bishop William
Falconar, from which year the persecution of Episcopalians
began to abate.
In 1862 he took occasion from another bicentenary, that
of St. Bartholomew's Day 1662, when English noncon-
forming clergy were deprived of their benefices, to impress
the same argument on an English audience. This address,
entitled ' Eeunion of the Church in Great Britain,' was
delivered at Kidderminster 22 August, at the request of his
1 This discourse was published as a separate volume in 1861, with the
title, A United Church of England, Scotland, and Ireland advocated : a
Discourse on the Scottish Reformation. A second edition was published in
1863, with a slightly varying title. It was reprinted, with some curtailment,
in vol. i. of his Public Appeals in behalf of Christian Unity (No. 5) under
the title, The Scottish Reformation Impartially Examined (Discourse on
Tercentenary of Scottish Reformation).
2 This Charge, delivered on 29 August, was never published separately.
See, however, Scottish Eccl. Journal, p. 124, and Public Appeals, i. 281-286.
CH. v KEUNION WORK. 1860-1867. 157
lifelong and much valued friend, T. L. Claughton, afterwards
Bishop of Eochester, and then of the new See of St. Albans.
It was very well received, especially in Scotland, and it
naturally contains a number of references to the remark
able address of Dr. Bisset, delivered in the spring of 1862,
of which some notice has already been taken. He also
draws attention to the more amicable attitude of the Free
Church as expressed by its Moderator * the philanthropic
Dr. Guthrie.' '
His Charges of 1863 and 1864 dealt with closely allied
subjects, the first * On Uniformity in Church Government,'
in answer to Dr. Caird (afterwards Principal of the Uni
versity of Glasgow), and the second * The Principle of
Episcopalians a Basis of Unity,' in response to an appeal
made by the then Moderator, Dr. Pirie, Principal of Aber
deen well known as an opponent of Dr. K. Lee's who
invited those who were separated from the Presbyterian
Establishment to come forward and state their grounds.
A portion of the latter Charge was so highly approved by
the then excellent Bishop of Llandaff (Dr. Alfred Ollivant),
that it was, at his instance, translated into Welsh and
circulated by the Society for Promoting Christian Know
ledge. 2
This Charge led to some correspondence with Dr. Pirie,
but of no very effective character. His speech and that of
Dr. Bisset illustrate the lack of continuity in Presbyte-
rianism. A Moderator may make an impression for the
moment, but when his year of office is over he falls to his
former level.
The most practical effort towards reconciliation made at
1 This address is reprinted as No. 6 of Public Appeals, i. 289-334.
2 The Charges for 1863 and 1864 were separately published as
pamphlets, and also as Nos. 7 and 8 of Public Appeals, at the beginning of
vol. ii.
158 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
this period came, however, from a somewhat different
quarter. In the Autumn of 1864 Dr. Korison, Incumbent
of Peterhead who was mentioned before as the prosecutor
of Mr. Cheyne wrote certain letters to the * Scotsman,'
referring amongst other things to the recent improvement
of the position of the Episcopal Church by the Duke of
Buccleuch's Act, which led to a correspondence between
him and Dr. Lee, Dr. Eorison was himself satisfied that
he was the spokesman of a great majority in the Church. 1
* Nineteen-twentieths of the laity wish Eeunion ; the
southern clergy generally ; perhaps half the northern clergy,
and (I think) five or six of the Bishops. The ultra party
are noisy, but not now in the ascendant.' And he ventured
to add ' Of course I would never pen a line or stir a step in
this matter if I did not believe Eeunion practicable ivithout
the slightest disrespect to the clergy of the Established Church.
Their full recognition as ordained Presbyters is a sine qua
non' In consequence of these somewhat bold assertions,
preliminaries for a conference of a few leading clergy and
laity on both sides were considered; and Lord Eollo
(without pledging himself to the details of any scheme)
went so far as to offer that the meeting should take place
at Duncrub. But the conference was never held. Dr.
Eorison had clearly gone beyond what Episcopalians as a
body were prepared to offer, and feeling, such as it was,
in favour of such a conference among members of the
Establishment, became critical and suspicious. It was an
occasion lost ; but the negotiation cannot have been wholly
fruitless.
It was partly, perhaps, on account of this failure that
the Bishop of St. Andrews did not continue his series of
discourses until after the lapse of another year and then
dropped them for a considerable period. His last efforts
1 See Story's Life of Robert Lee, ii. 126 foil.
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
159
at this date were a Synodal address, 11 September, 1866,
' The Ministry of the Church Historically Considered,' which
contains matter afterwards worked up and enlarged in his
* Outlines of the Christian Ministry,' published in 1872, and
a sermon preached just before the Lambeth Conference and
repeated at the re-opening of Chichester Cathedral, after
the rebuilding of the spire, 14 November, 1867. Of the
Charge of 1866, which contained much interesting historical
matter, Major Hugh Scott of Gala, then editor of the
* Scottish Guardian,' writes (26 September) to the Bishop's
daughter : * There is a general agreement it is his most
telling Charge. In fact it nearly exhausts the branch of the
subject, and I hope he will not be deterred by the obstacles
in his way ; for, if he cannot accomplish the work under the
Providence of God, no one else can.' The sermon entitled
' Euodias and Syntyche : the Scottish Church in its relation
to the Church of England ' l is full of the historical know
ledge, and clear and fair statement of historical facts, which
I often regret was not used by the Bishop for the composi
tion of a book of larger volume than any that proceeded
from his pen. He would have done admirable work as a
university professor of Church history, not perhaps from
very minute insight into personal character, but from the
fairness and accuracy of his exposition, his broad view of
the tendency of ecclesiastical movements, and the scholarly
treatment of all that he handled.
The sermon in question was, as its title implies, an ex
hortation to the sister Churches in England and Scotland to
be of the same mind in the Lord (Ep. to Philippians, iv. 2).
In this sermon he well draws out the great misfortune of
the absence of anything like popular consent on the part
1 It should no doubt be Euodia and Syntyche, as it is in the Revised
Version of Philippians, iv. 2, as he notices in his reprint in Public
Appeals, ii. 555 note. The names are both female.
160 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
of Scotland to the consecrations of 1610 and 1661 and the
association of the Church with arbitrary power, especially
in the hands of the Stuarts.
In the same period (1865-6) falls a correspondence with
Principal Tulloch of St. Andrews, which was collected by
the Bishop, with some remarks of his own, under the title,
* A Plea for Justice to Presbyterian Students of Theology
and to the Scotch Episcopal Church.' It took occasion
from the admissions of Dr. Tulloch himself with regard
to the confession of faith, of Dr. N. Macleod in regard to the
observance of the Christian Sabbath, and of Dr. K. Lee in
respect to Liturgical worship, to point out that Presbyterian
students had also been unfairly treated in regard to the
evidence in favour of Episcopacy (p. 35). It deals par
ticularly with the testimonies of Hooker and Leighton and
with Tulloch' s statement of them and estimate of them in
an address to his students. Incidentally the Bishop rather
strongly blames Leighton for pusillanimity in retiring from
a position where his presence was much needed (p. 13).
The correspondence brought out amongst other things
Tulloch' s willingness to allow Episcopacy to be an Apostolical
institution and one of great practical utility. The Bishop
replied that it was also as scriptural as infant Baptism, the
observance of the Lord's Day, or the doctrine of the Trinity
(p. 51). This controversy would seem to have laid the
foundation of the friendship which afterwards existed
between them. He seems to have met not only Principal
Tulloch, but Dr. K. Lee and other leading men of that
group when on a visit to Mr. E. Skinner, Incumbent of the
Episcopal church at St. Andrews in March 1866.
Side by side with these general efforts in the cause of
Keunion, or rather of temperate statement of our position
accompanied by a growing insight into the strength of the
other side, was an attempt on the Bishop's part to use the
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
161
occasions of the changes in educational policy, which were
going on in Scotland as well as in England.
A few words on the history of popular education in
Scotland may not be out of place, as the main facts ought
to be in the minds of all who take a practical interest in
the welfare of that country. Scotland, though in earlier
days not so forward as England in some of those matters
which conduce to social comfort, has been far in advance
of the sister kingdom in the matter of elementary and
middle-class education, and has long brought her own type
of university training within the reach of boys of all classes.
The movement began by an Act passed in 1496 in the
reign of James IV. Ever since 1567 it has been closely
connected with religion. The ' First Book of Discipline '
had declared the policy that a school should be planted in
every parish and endowed out of the patrimony of the
Church. 1 But, though the credit of the policy lies with
Presbyterians, the inception of practical efforts in its execu
tion may be largely set down to Archbishop Spottiswoode
and the Assembly of 1616 in the reign of James I. of
England and VI. of Scotland. 2 An enabling Act of 1633
gave certain powers to the Bishops to found schools, which
were being acted upon by the clergy when the Civil War
broke out. In 1646 the first Act was passed to make such
schools imperative, but it was unfortunately repealed at
the Kestoration. In 1696, however, to the great honour
of the country, the policy, thus pursued for exactly two
centuries under many drawbacks and difficulties, received
its crown in the * Act for Settling of Schools ' (Acts of
William III. s. vi. c. 26) an encouragement to those
statesmen and social reformers who may be tempted to
1 See Dr. John Cunningham, Church History of Scotland, ii. 198 foil.,
ed. 2, 1882.
2 See W. Stephen, History of Scottish Church, ii. 217, 234, &c. 1896.
162 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
despair, when the cross currents of politics, time after time,
thwart their good desires and obstruct their progress. By
this it was enacted that the heritors or landed proprietors
should found a school, and provide a house and salary for the
master, in every parish. Scotland therefore has had a very
long start of England, both in theory and practice, and
she has profited accordingly. What an advantage this has
been to its strong young men, often of humble parentage
and small means, but endowed with aspiring genius or
dogged perseverance, is evident when we consider the very
large proportion of Scotsmen who have filled positions of
trust, both public and private, in every district and in
almost every corner of the world-wide British Empire. 1
The long and intimate connection of this education with
religion has been also no small factor in the honourable
and trustworthy character of these men, even when they
have in later days revolted from the narrow limits imposed
upon their hearts and consciences by the form in which
religious instruction was imparted.
But no one looking at the ' Shorter Catechism,' which
is the chief instrument of such instruction in Scotland,
from the standpoint of a broader theology, could be satisfied
with it or fail to wish to see it altered in some respects.
When we ask ourselves why law-abiding and sober-minded
Presbyterians in our colonies, such as Canada and New
Zealand, are often so impatient of permitting or encourag
ing religious instruction in our elementary schools, we
naturally regard their feeling as in some degree a reaction
from the system with which they were familiar at home. In
some cases, especially when they belong to the Free Church
or other dissenting bodies, they are doubtless affected by
1 The reader may be glad to be reminded of the effective handling of
this topic by Lord Macaulay in his speech on education in 1847. See his
Speeches, pp. 481-483, Lond. 1854.
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
163
the principles of Vinet, and wish absolutely to separate
religion from any association with State control a strange
hallucination and practical inconsistency on the part of
those who would compel parents to confide the whole
formation of character during school-hours to agents of the
State without taking any guarantee as to their religious
character. In other cases they may be jealous of the
activity of clergy and teachers of the Church of England,
who are honourably distinguished in many countries for a
zeal in education which is not possessed by all ministers of
religion. But reaction from the * Shorter Catechism ' would
seem the most potent influence of the three, and this not
only on account of its character but on account of the
means used to enforce its being learnt. * Is it a fact,'
asked the chairman of the Koyal Commission of 1864-5
when examining Dr. K. Lee ' Is it a fact that the " Shorter
Catechism" is taught more by whipping than any other
branches of instruction ? ' * Much more,' replied Dr. Lee,
* because it is much more difficult to learn than anything
else that man can conceive ' (' Life,' ii. p. 93). The mental
association of the ' tawse ' with the first principles of religion
is not only not desirable, but is in some cases little short
of disastrous.
It was natural, therefore, that the Bishop of St. Andrews
should wish to take advantage of the * Parochial Schools
Act ' of 1861 (24 & 25 Viet. cap. 107) to attempt something
in the way of an improvement in religious instruction,
especially as it seemed probable that Episcopalian schools
would be largely affected by it and perhaps absorbed into
the general system. 1 By that Act the hold of the Esta-
1 As a matter of fact there has been little change in the Diocese. In
1861-2 there were eight day schools belonging to the S. E. Church, with 634
pupils in average attendance. In 1894 there were nine, with 1,309 scholars
of the same character.
M 2
164 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
Wished Church on education was somewhat broken down.
The masterships of schools were thrown open to teachers of
all denominations. But also for the first time the ' Shorter
Catechism ' was recognised by the law of the land. No
teacher, indeed, was obliged to sign a Confession of Faith, but
he was required to subscribe a declaration that he would not
teach any opinions opposed to the Divine authority of Holy
Scripture or tp the doctrines contained in the * Shorter
Catechism,' and that he would faithfully conform thereto in
his teaching and do nothing to the prejudice or subversion
of the Established Church (sec. 12). This seemed to make
an opening for at least some broadening of the religious in
struction. The Bishop could not help observing that the
' Church Catechism ' and the ' Shorter Catechism ' covered
to a great extent different fields, though they had the great
advantage of a common groundwork in the Creed, the Com
mandments, and the Lord's Prayer, which also occur in
both in the same order. He was further not insensible to
the strong points of the Scottish Catechism l and to some
criticisms which may be passed upon our own. He therefore
attempted an amalgamation of the two documents, with
some slight additions to both, under the title of ' A Common
Catechism/ in which he omitted the abstruser parts of the
Scottish form, as well as those which might be liable to be
misunderstood and misapplied. Such were questions 7, 8,
and 20, on ' the Decrees of God,' and 31-35 on ' effectual
calling.' A few questions and answers were added to intro
duce subjects not in either Catechism, such as the three
fold ministry and the use of Confirmation, and the language
of both were slightly modified, partly for the sake of style.
His object was to combine those portions of the * Shorter
1 It was, of course, really English in origin, being the work of the
Westminster Assembly of Divines. It was adopted in Scotland, however, as
early as 1648.
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
165
Catechism' which lift the learner into a high region of
thought and feeling such as the answer which speaks of
man as being made ' to glorify God and to enjoy Him for
ever,' and the explanation of our Lord's three-fold office
as prophet, priest, and king and the fuller and more
detailed explanation of the Commandments and the like,
with the characteristic excellencies of the Church Catechism.
Among minor points suitable to a Catechism, the repetition
of the substance of the question in the answer may be
named as a merit of the Scottish form.
The extreme difficulty of such an undertaking in itself,
and the severe criticism to which it would certainly be
exposed on both sides, the probable accusations of un
faithfulness from one party, and of secret designs from
another, led the Bishop to abandon its publication in
accordance with his brother's advice. 1 He preserved a few
copies of it with careful annotations by certain friends to
whom he had sent it, the most elaborate being by G. H,
Forbes.
But it is worth while to recall that he made the attempt
and with a certain measure of success. The Catechism
was printed by Thomas Constable, Edinburgh, 1861 ; but
I have only seen his own copies of it, and imagine it must
be very scarce, if circulated at all.
In a later year (1864) he was examined before the
Eoyal Commission, then sitting at Edinburgh, on December
5, and besides the evidence he gave, which is printed in
the Keport of that Commission, pp. 231-240, he tendered
to it a ' National Catechism,' which he hoped might lead to
a system of combined religious instruction. This was a
much less hazardous venture than the ' Common Catechism '
1 He says in his letter of 12 August, 1861 : ' Mainly in deference to your
judgment.' He mentions that on that day he had received letters from two
brother Bishops deprecating its abandonment.
166 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
and simply consisted of so much of the * Shorter Catechism *
as relates to the Creed, the Commandments, and the Lord's
Prayer. I am not aware, however, that it excited much
attention or exercised much influence.
The time perhaps may come, nay, in my judgment, it
has already come, when we ought to take up these earlier
tentative efforts in a more practical way. A great change
took place in Scotland in 1872, though in some ways not
so violent as in England. Elementary education was then
removed entirely from the control of the Established
Church, the Presbyters of which had hitherto acted as
managers, and up to 1861 as examiners (though not, I think,
taking much part as teachers), and, generally speaking, had
acted to the advantage of the schools. Owing mainly to
the jealousy of the Free Church, which was ready to throw
up all its schools, school boards were made universal and
a board school established in every parish, though voluntary
schools were still permitted to receive Government grants.
The Act of 1872, however (35 & 36 Viet. cap. 62), was very
different in its attitude towards religion from the English
Elementary Education Act of 1870. Not only was religious
instruction given a prominent place in the preamble, and
was thereby made one of the main objects of the Act, but
there was no Cowper-Temple clause to limit the use of
catechisms or formularies. It was in fact taken for granted
that the custom in use would go on. Only emphasis was
laid on the conscience clause, and a limitation of the hours
of religious instruction and observance was provided, as
in England, restricting them to the beginning or ending
(or to the beginning and ending) of the school meetings
(sec. 68) . The ' Shorter Catechism ' is still largely taught ;
but it is growing less common, and means should be
devised for supplying its place. There is nothing to
prevent an alliance between Presbyterians and Episco-
CH. v REUNION WORK. 1860-1867 167
palians for this object, except mutual jealousy and mistrust,
and possibly the incapacity of our theologians to frame a
document suitable for children, and at the same time
orthodox and effective as an instrument of teaching, under
the limitations to full expression of doctrine which would
be felt on either side. Certainly such a common catechism,
if it could be framed, would have a great future before it,
both in English board schools and in the colonies, where at
present, for the most part, religious teaching is of the
scantiest and the most ineffective character. I am well
aware of the exceptional advantages afforded by the legis
lature in New South Wales and Tasmania, and more
recently in Western Australia ; but I know also something
of the difficulties of the other colonies, and of the great
mischief caused by the antagonism or want of harmony
between English Churchmen and Presbyterians. It seems
therefore opportune to emphasise the farsighted proposals
of the Bishop of St. Andrews, and to suggest to those who
read these pages to take up the matter again under perhaps
more favourable circumstances.
About this time (1866) the Bishop had the gratification of
receiving a remarkable testimony to the success of an earlier
educational work of his the ' School Greek Grammar ' *
which the Meeting of Head Masters of Public Schools asked
him to reduce in length (omitting the syntax), with a view
to its being adopted in all their schools . He was thus able
to claim the remarkable honour of producing a ' National
Elementary Greek Grammar ' (as my father had prophesied
he would do in an article prepared and printed for the
' Quarterly Eeview ' in 1840, but withdrawn in deference
to Etonian feeling). He was in this way more fortunate
in the field of classical learning than in that of theology ;
1 See his letter to Dr. Moberly, then Head Master of Winchester, with
this title. Edinb. 1866.
168
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
and indeed there can be no question that his small income
was most happily and worthily increased by the adoption of
this excellent and well-planned book, which still continues
in use after an existence of some sixty years. I remember
that about the same time my father had the mortification
to find his ' Edward the Sixth's Latin Grammar ' which
till then had been very successful superseded by Dr.
Kennedy's * Public School Latin Grammar.' The sale
almost suddenly stopped, a result which was I think not by
any means in proportion to the relative merit of the two
books. I may mention that my uncle's ' Greek Primer,'
translated by his second son, was published in January 1871,
and that 5,000 copies of it were sold in less than five months.
Another excellent and popular book by the Bishop of
St. Andrews had been published a few years earlier, on
' Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible,' which
appeared in April 18C4. It was connected in his own mind
with the wish to make Shakespeare familiar to young
people, arid was intended to be a prelude to a ' Shake-
Hpearo for the Young,' a project in which his old friend
J. 1). Wai lord the mathematical maHter beloved by many
generations of Wykehamists was much interested. The
following I'H bin own account of it :
I was provoked to undertake the tank partly by the want of
judgment which liowdler had shown in his expurgated edition,
which gocH in great measure upon a mistaken notion that every
reference to Holy Scripture must imply irreverence, and partly
hy the charge of profarieriesH brought against Shakespeare even
hy the critics of the highest repute, such as Johnson and such as
(Jillord charges which I believed I could show, and I have
shown, to he utterly unfounded. The hook was very favourably
received. l<Yon Mr. llalliwell Phillipps (who was acknowledged,
I believe, to know more about Shakespeare and everything
Shakespearian than any other literary man of his time, and
with whom i had no further acquaintance than that 1 had met
him once for a few moments in the street at Stratford during the
CH. T
RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1880-1887
of 18[Wj) I bad the
U Tr:,-:^r. I8B4,
is. :: my !**, la*
The book was published by
Co., who paid him fifty pounds for it ; and it shortly
into a second edition. But lor
though every copy of both edition
Cm 1871) estimated that they had lost
pounds upon it. It reached a third edition in 1880, 1 and a
fourth edition in 1898, and wflL I imagine, keep a per
manent place in our literature.
The reader of this book cannot fafl to grasp a very
important lesson namely, that much of the charm of
Shakespeare is due to his wonderful familiarity with Holy
Writ and to his mmtmrml use of its language, without cant,
slang, conventionality, or profancness such as too often
disfigures the pages of some, even of eminent writers, who
use Scripture freely. And through this familiarity lighter
English literature has gained a dignity both of style and
matter which has never entirely left it When we think of
Montaigne and Itibciliin we realise the Mi^mi^ of Rhakr-
speare.
Another Shakespearian publication was his admirable
Tercentenary Sermon at Stratford-on-Avon (Sunday,
24 April, 1864), 'Man's excellency a cause of praise and
thankfulness to God.' In it he draws inspiration from the
judgment of John Kehle in his ' Oxford Lectures on Poetry,*
one of the few books in modern Latin that have an *>^K^g
place in our literature of this century. He points out
Shakespeare's consistency, imperially in his
I- ;hc OM
170 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
and his perpetual reference to a high standard of virtue,
his consistency as the poet of the English nation and of
home life, his sympathy with classical literature as opposed
to mechanical and physical philosophy, marking his mind
as a kind of antithesis to that of his contemporary, Francis
Bacon. He points out also his claims to our regard in
virtue of his personal character, his meekness, modesty,
and gentleness. I wish that this sermon could be prefixed
to one of the 'many cheap editions of Shakespeare now
issuing from the press. It would be a great help to young
students as indicating to them what sort of beauties to
notice, instead of, or in addition to, those more or less
important philological and critical points to which
lecturers too often alone direct their attention.
The ' Shakespeare for the Young ' was never completed,
but three volumes, containing twelve of the ' Historical
Plays,' were published by Messrs. Blackwood in 1883, with
useful marginal explanations, introductions, and longer
notes. Had the whole been completed, and then each play
published cheaply in parts, the book might have met with
the success it deserved, and have been largely used for
reading in clubs or by the fireside, and for examinations.
As it is, I fear it is too little known, chiefly, perhaps,
because the plays most often desired for reading aloud were
left unedited.
The same period (1866) saw the beginning of a new
plan for the City of Perth, in which the Bishop and his
family took a deep and continuing interest the foundation
of St. Andrews School Chapel near the great railway
station. Since 1859 he had worshipped with, and ministered
to, a solid and well-to-do community in St. John's Church ;
but he now began to feel that more might be done for
the poor, and that the spirit of Congregationalism and the
system of pew-rents was injuring the religious life of the
CH. V
KESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867
171
Church. The scheme was put forward in a sermon before
the congregation of St. John's, ' The claims of the poorer
brethren in assemblies for Christian worship 'based
naturally on the teaching of St. James. He appealed for
funds to build a church to be called St. Andrews, intending
to add schools and a schoolmaster's house to it. The
school-chapel was all that was then built, and it was opened
23 August, 1868. An infants' school was added later. The
Bishop practically became its incumbent, being assisted by
the Bev. James Christie, who was ordained by him a month
before as his curate. It is pleasant to note the name of
Bishop Forbes, of Brechin, as a subscriber of ten guineas
to this new church, and to find the Bishop of St. Andrews
confirming for him at Dundee in April 1868. The
Bishop's correspondence contains many notes from the
Bishop of Brechin, asking for his services as a preacher, or
for help in regard to an inscription and the like.
The following letter, which belongs to this period, shows
the Bishop's thorough knowledge of Anglican theology. It
refers to a portion of Jeremy Taylor's famous work of
which I must candidly confess my previous ignorance. It
is dated 3 August, 1866.
In answer to an unknown correspondent who writes to me
from Dublin describing himself * a doubter,' but as he trusts ' a
humble and candid ' one, I would simply recommend a small
portion of Bishop Jeremy Taylor's ' Ductor Dubitantium,' which
contains * a moral demonstration, proving that the religion of
Jesus Christ is from God ' (see Book I., chap, iv., rule 2 ; Vol.
xii. 89-66, Heber's edition), and of which the pious Bishop
Home declared that ' no tract ever came from the pen of man
better calculated to dispel those doubts and difficulties which
may arise in the mind of a believer, or to work conviction in that
of an unbeliever who can bring himself to give it a fair and
attentive perusal.' And the reason why I give this advice is,
because it is not with us as it was with those to whom, as eye-
172 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
witnesses of them, the evidence of miracles and in many
instances the evidence of miracles alone was first offered, and,
to some of them at least, proved sufficient. But our case is that
of persons to whom God presents a combination, or rather an
accumulation of evidences all of which are to be taken in, as it
were, at once by the mind's eye, if we are to do justice to the
Divine Goodness and to the responsibility of our own position.
I have pleasure in complying with the request of my
correspondent, and I pray God to bless the advice which I have
offered.
Another letter in the same month (21 August, 1866),
and addressed to Major Scott, of Gala, is also of interest of
another kind :
Pecuniarily I can do little to promote the cause of ' Keble
College,' but all I can do (as I trust, honestly) I do most cheer
fully and thankfully by enclosing a cheque for Si.
My copy of the ' Christian Year ' was a gift, in 1829, from my
dear father one of the first to recognise in the book the merits
which are now universally acknowledged as may be seen from
a letter of his in the memoirs of that good layman, Joshua
Watson (vol. i. p. 311) : ' He is full of beauties and goodness.
I have given a copy to each of my three boys.'
I also possess a copy of the first edition, 1827.
You refer to the attitude assumed by Mr. Keble, on a painful
occasion, towards our Church, as a matter to be regretted but
also to be forgiven and, as far as may be, forgotten. I agree with
you entirely ; and I rejoice to think that several communications
which I had with him subsequently were all of a nature to render
that desirable course more easy and natural. Among the rest
he was so good as to send me * from the author ' a copy of his
' Life of Bishop Wilson,' the last work which he published. And
it is a circumstance not a little remarkable that on the very last
page of that work he had occasion to print in an ' Erratum '
certain words of Bishop Wilson's ' Sacra Privata ' which had
been omitted in their proper place, and which, while they are
irreconcileable with the teaching of ' Eucharistical Adoration,'
are strictly in accordance with that recommended and prescribed
by our Episcopal Synod.
CH. V
RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867
173
The years 1866-7 were marked in several ways by a
growing intercourse between the Church of England and
the Scottish Episcopal Church, which were of considerable
importance to the latter, and not without influence on the
development of the larger body helping it to throw off
something of its often unconscious Erastianism. The
laying of the first stone of Inverness Cathedral by the
Archbishop of Canterbury was an event which, at the
moment, excited no little comment. The annual Episcopal
Synod was held in that pleasant northern city on 16 October,
1866, and on the next day Archbishop Longley, who
had been tutor to Bishop Eden (as well as to Bishop
Wordsworth), laid the stone in the presence of all the
Scottish Bishops and of the Bishop of North Carolina,
U.S.A. (Bishop Thomas Atkinson). Bishop Wordsworth
chronicles this as ' a distinction won so deservedly by the
character which the esteemed Primus of our Church has
borne through the whole course of his life.' l A remarkable
feature of this gathering was the sympathy of Inverness
Presbyterians, many of whom contributed to the building
fund. 2 Nevertheless it stirred up no little controversy, in
which the newspapers took part. The London ' Times/
for instance, wrote strongly in condemnation of the Arch
bishop's action. Fortunately the * Scotsman ' took a more
impartial view. The Bishop of St. Andrews preserved the
memory of this incident in a Latin quatrain, which may be
inserted here : 3
Jupiter e coelo fulsit tonuitque sinistro
Anglus, et inde sequens nil nisi fumus erat.
Dextrorsum at Scotus respondit Jupiter, et mox
Inde sequens toto lux erat alma polo :
1 See TJie Lambeth Conference a Synodal Address, 1 November, 1867,
p. 1. 2 See Archibald's Historic Episcopate, &c., p. 349.
3 See Public Appeals, &c. ii. 530. The reader will again notice the
spelling coelum (as if from oTAos), which my father and uncle generally
374 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
which I may give in English :
Heaven lightened on the left : in thunder spoke
The English Jupiter : then all was smoke.
But on the right the Scottish Jove replied,
And genial light was spread on every side.
Another happy event to the Bishop of St. Andrews,
and to the Church at large, was the consecration of his
most intimate friend, Thomas Legh Claughton, Vicar of
Kidderminster, to the See of Eochester. He was naturally
invited to be one of the consecrators, probably the first
time for more than two centuries that an Archbishop of
Canterbury had accepted such aid from a Scottish prelate.
At the same time he received authority from the Bishop of
Oxford to confirm in two places in his Diocese for my
father at his benefice of Stanford-in-the-Vale, Berks,
where he confirmed forty candidates, and at St. Peter's
College, Kadley, between Abingdon and Oxford, where he
confirmed eighteen. At Kochester he was the guest of
Archdeacon Grant, well known for his stirring and instruc
tive Bampton Lectures on Missions,' who was afterwards,
to my great advantage, a near neighbour of my own when
I was Canon there (1883). Claughton was consecrated
in his own Cathedral by Archbishop Longley on 11 June,
1867, and Bishop Wordsworth was naturally interested on
such an occasion to trace out links of connection between
Kochester and Scotland, and his own Diocese in particular.
One there is which must strike every visitor to the Cathe
dral who inquires into its history. The Early English
choir, which has been added to the rather solemn Norman
nave the most ancient of any Cathedral in England was
erected with the proceeds of offerings at the shrine of St.
adopted, although scholars now agree that caelum, &c. is the more correct
form. My uncle adopted it in his later years. See p. 21.
CH. V
RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867
175
William, the good baker of Perth, who gave every tenth
loaf to the poor. His title to saintship was sealed, or
perhaps rather created, by his murder on a pilgrimage to
Canterbury in the year 1201 an opportune event for the
monks of Kochester, who thus became possessed of a
wonder-working shrine. 1 The remains of his tomb are
preserved in the north-east corner of the northern
transept. Later associations 2 attach to Bishop Kichard
Neale, one of the consecrators of Spottiswoode in 1610, and
to Bishop John Warner, who, in 1667, founded scholarships
at Balliol College, Oxford, for the support of the Episcopal
cause in Scotland. A yet closer friend to that communion
was good Bishop Horsley, who, in 1792 (while still Bishop
of St. David's), had first succeeded in repealing the op
pressive penal laws, which, amongst other things, forbade
clergy in Scottish orders from ministering to more than
five persons in the same room.
But there was a still more important business outside
Scotland in which the Bishop of St. Andrews took part in
this period, viz. the first Lambeth Conference of the Angli
can Episcopate, held in 1867 3 a great venture which was
much criticised at the time, but which has been abundantly
justified by its results.
The first suggestion of such a meeting came from the
Canadian Church in February 1866. After the proposal
1 My uncle preserved an interesting letter from Precentor Venables, of
Lincoln, on this subject (26 November, 1867), in which he describes how
the miracles worked at this tomb proved a convenient instrument for
assisting the monks of Kochester in their rivalry with other religious
foundations. St. William was formally canonised in 1256.
2 See The Lambeth Conferencea Synodal Address, Edinb. 1867, pp. 1
foil, and 17.
3 See Life of Bishop Wilberforce, by his son, B. G. Wilberforce, iii. 229
foil. (Lond. 1882), Life of A. C. Tait, Archbishop of Canterbury, by B. T.
Davidson and W. Benham, i. 574 foil. (Lond. 1891),. and The Lambeth
Conferences, S. P. C. K., ed. B. T. Davidson (now Bishop of Winchester), and
Bishop Wordsworth's Synodal Address.
176 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
had been under consideration for about a year it was deter
mined by Archishop Longley that the experiment should be
tried, and invitations were issued by him, dated 22 February,
1867, and addressed to all the Bishops of our communion, who
then numbered one hundred and forty-four. Of these, rather
more than half (seventy- six) met in the Guard-room of
Lambeth Palace where the Conference of 1897 also met
for a four days' private discussion, of which, however, a
report crept surreptitiously into the * Guardian ' from
24 to 27 September inclusive.
The chief figures at this gathering from the Colonial
Church were Bishop Gray of Capetown, and Bishop G. A.
Selwyn of New Zealand men, both of them, in a way, of
heroic character ; and of the home Church, Samuel Wilber-
force (then of Oxford) ; A. C. Tait of London, and Connop
Thirlwall of St. Davids. The chief subject of debate was,
naturally, the case of Bishop Colenso of Natal, who had been
deposed by Bishop Gray in a sentence signed December
1863, but who was in various ways upheld by the Civil Courts
to which he had appealed. This matter had been excluded
from the agenda paper; but it was found that so many
Bishops had come together in the hope of discussing it, that
it could not be kept back from consideration. While no one
defended Colenso's opinions and proceedings, there was a
good deal of feeling among members of the home Episco
pate of the danger of independent and, perhaps, overbearing
action on the part of the representatives of some of the
Colonial Churches. This feeling led to a division between
men like Gray and Selwyn, to whom Wilber force generally
lent his aid, on one side, and Tait and Thirlwall on the other.
The former were champions of colonial independence, and
thought that the Mother Church had much to learn from
the colonies ; the latter were in favour of the principle
of Establishment and desired to do nothing to provoke a
CH. v RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867 177
conflict with the State. Objection was taken to the consti
tution of the South African Court, and to the method of
trial ; and it was felt that a court of first instance, especially
if some of its members had previously expressed themselves
strongly on the subject afterwards brought before them
judicially, could hardly deliver a judgment from which
there was no appeal. We have seen this difficulty in the
the Forbes case ; it was even more acute in that of Colenso.
In regard to the principle of Establishment, Wordsworth
was at one with Tait, and, as the latter remarks, 1 endorsed
what he said. He further acknowledged certain imper
fections in Bishop Gray's procedure, but he thought them
almost inevitable under the difficult circumstances. He
did not, unfortunately, make any minute notes as to his
part in the Conference, but it is evident from Bishop Gray's
' Life,' and from letters addressed to him later by Archbishop
Longley and Bishop Tozer, that he had taken rather a
prominent part in amending and drafting various resolu
tions, particularly ' the paper signed by the great majority
of Bishops about the Natal difficulty,' as Bishop Tozer
describes it (13 February, 1868). This must have been the
following, signed by fifty-five Bishops : ' We, the under
signed Bishops declare our acceptance of the sentence pro
nounced upon Dr. Colenso by the Metropolitan of South
Africa, with his suffragans, as being spiritually a valid
sentence' (' Gray's Life,' ii. 350). His opinion on the sub
ject generally will be found more at length in the next
chapter.
Among the by-events connected with this Conference
was a series of sermons by Bishops in St. Laurence's,
Gresham Street, in the week preceding it. It was here
that Bishop Wordsworth first delivered his sermon on
' Euodias and Syntyche,' already referred to. Being
1 Life ofA.C. Tait, i. 380.
N
178 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
suddenly called to supply the place of the Primus on
another interesting occasion the reopening of Chichester
Cathedral (14 November) he repeated the same sermon,
for which he received the warm thanks of Dean Hook.
He wrote the same night :
Ten thousand thanks for your glorious, manly permit me to
say English sermon. I send you my sermon on the consecra
tion of Bishop Luscombe. I wrote to the Primus, Bishop Gleig,
to know how I was to describe the Bishops he would not hear
of their being named from their Sees. Bishop Sandford told me
that until his new chapel was built he never ventured to wear a
surplice when he first went to Scotland bis cbapel would have
been pulled about his ears. Bishop Jolly told [me] that when he
was preaching as a young man some soldiers were seen
approaching the village, and all his congregation fled, leaving
him in the pulpit alone in his glory.
In the previous month of October Bishop Wordsworth
had also taken part in the Wolverhampton Church Congress,
so that he was now well known and appreciated in England.
Dean Stanley, a few years later, wrote of the Chichester
sermon (after remarking that Oxford divines used to speak
of the Church of England as Judah, and the Church of
Scotland as Samaria) : The most accomplished scholar, the
most purely Oxford theologian among the Scottish Bishops,
has in these latter days spoken with a far truer and nobler
sense of the mutual relations of the two Churches, and
entreated them to be at one with another on the equal
terms of " Euodias and Syntyche." ' l
These incidents, which were refreshing to himself and
helpful to the Episcopal Church, were not, however, without
their bearing upon the Keunion movement in Scotland.
The Presbyterians of Inverness were, unhappily, not a type
of the general feeling towards Archbishops and Cathedrals ;
1 The Church of Scotland, p. 176, ed. 2, 1879.
CH. V
REUNION WORK. 1860-1867
179
and the Moderator of the General Assembly (Dr. Crawford)
delivered a rather unfriendly and disheartening address, in
which he committed himself to the strange position that
our Lord did not intend that the Church should have an
outward and organic unity. Various other causes com
bined to check the movement, political as well as ecclesiasti
cal ; and checked it certainly was. It was not till after an
interval of fifteen years (1867-82) that the Bishop of St.
Andrews took it up again with something of his old zeal.
Indeed, it can hardly be expected that movements of this
kind should go on at all, except in waves or steps and
steps of slight elevation followed by long intervals of level
ground, sometimes sloping downwards. But, if Christian
love has lifted us ever so little, the downward slope will not
descend quite to the old level. The Episcopal Church was
now more closely allied with the Church of England, and
this was resented by Presbyterians. Yet this alliance was
necessary to the Episcopal Church in order to give it
greater breadth and knowledge, and a greater feeling of
confidence. An interval was therefore needed for such
growth and for similar parallel growth in the Presbyterian
Establishment after which it became possible to take up
the question once more.
The year 1867, in which the Bishops of the Scottish
Episcopal Church took their places side by side with their
English brethren, therefore marked an epoch in history,
which cannot be overlooked, and may fitly serve as a term
to our survey of public events in this period. The same
year saw another important movement in the Presbyterian
Church taking shape, viz. the foundation of the ' Church
Service Society.' From this year, then, there were new
beginnings in both these bodies which had necessarily to
develop and still have to develop internally before they
could, or can, draw much nearer to one another. To put
N 2
180 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. v
it plainly, it was necessary that the Episcopal Church should
move more with the times and become a body more worthy
of national confidence and of proved ability to lead, and that
the Presbyterian should become more Catholic in its usages,
habits, and feelings. It will take a long time to produce the
necessary changes ; yet something was done by the subject
of this memoir, as we shall record in a later chapter.
But before Concluding this chapter, some details of a
more personal nature must be mentioned belonging to this
time.
The domestic events which touched the Bishop most
deeply were doubtless the deaths of his old friend and col
league, Warden Barter, which took place on 8 February,
1861, and that of his then youngest son, 1 Kenneth, a bright
and beautiful boy, who died the next year at Glenalmond,
where he had only just been sent (16 May, 1862).
He was the youngest boy in the school, and entered
eagerly into the games. At the annual school sports he
overheated himself in a race and took a cold which attacked
his throat, and proved fatal in a few days. His grave is
under the east window of the College Chapel. The occa
sion of his death is referred to in the concluding lines of
his much-sorrowing father's epitaph, which we may
render :
Sport, boys : but sporting know Death lies in wait.
To search for serious thoughts may be too late.
The whole inscription, of which this is a part, is as
follows :
H(ic) s(itum) e(st) | quod mortale habuit | Kenneth Andreas
Wordsworth | [puer ix annorum et ii dierum] | vix prius ad
1 Another son was born to him a few years later (1866), and then a
daughter (1868), the thirteenth and youngest of the family.
CH. v RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867 181
scholam missus | quam ad domum, uti spes est, | coelestem
avocatus ; | Quatuor filiorum nasci ultimus, | Primus decessisse ; |
Parentum nuper deliciae | nunc, si Deus misereatur, | pro brevi
tempore desiderium. Natus MaiaB xiv, 1853. Obiit Maiae
xvi, 1862. ||
Lude, puer, si vis ; memor at tu lude propinquse
Mortis : post mortem seria sera nimis.
The death of Warden Barter was an event in which I also
had a very real concern, as it occurred a few months before
I left Winchester School, where his house was (through
his affection for my uncle) always open to me. He was to
us boys a sort of hero, and a worthy one, especially to those
of us (and they were not a few) who were constantly enter
tained by him on * leave-out days.' Even in his old age he
was a man of noble presence and most attractive genial
aspect. He was known to us as having given his name to
a glorious forward drive at cricket, as an untiring walker,
and a man of unflinching courage, and a thorough Christian
without cant or pretence. He knew how to talk charmingly
to boys without any appearance of being bored or making
conversation, yet without losing dignity. No wonder that
every one loved him.
The following admirable sketch was written by the
Bishop of St. Andrews for Mr. Adams's ' Wykehamica,' l but
only a sentence or two was printed by the latter from it.
The reader will be glad to have more of it.
In asking me to contribute to your volume upon Winchester
a few sentences about Warden Barter, you are so good as to say
that no one could speak of him with more weight than myself.
It is very true, so far as intimacy goes ; to which he admitted
me so unreservedly, that I looked upon him almost as a second
father, or elder brother. But the consciousness of this weight
1 Published in 1878 ; see note to p. 324. The book contains some other
interesting matter, both on the Warden and his brother.
182 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
presses me down, just in proportion to my knowledge of him and
my attachment to you. It is indeed a constant reflection with
me, now that I have passed my threescore years and ten, that to
have known him and one other friend not unlike him in many
points of character the late Bishop Hamilton of Salisbury so
intimately as I did, has been among the greatest blessings of my
life blessings for which I must give account. If ever there was
a man in whom there was not a grain of selfishness it was
Robert Speckott Barter. And to this perfect absence of all con
sideration for self was added in equal perfection the finest, nicest
discernment and regard for the feelings and circumstances of
others; so that the difficult Christian precept to 'honour all
men ' from the beggar to the prince, seemed to come to him as
part of his natural disposition. And what is perhaps a still
rarer gift, he had the happiness of being able to give expression
to this discernment if called upon to do so on any public occasion,
either of business or festivity, with an ease and felicity of speech
such as the greatest orator might have envied, but could not have
surpassed. Intellectually, it must be confessed he never did
himself justice. He lacked the ambition to excel others which
so often gives the spur which is necessary to overcome consti
tutional indolence; and while he had no inclination for self-
display, the natural talent which he possessed enabled him to
meet the calls made for the exercise of his literary powers either
in the pulpit or elsewhere with only too great facility. In short,
it may be said with truth that he had within him all materials
for making not only one of the best (for that he was), but also
one of the most distinguished men of the time in which he lived :
while his personal appearance, his noble form and features, the
amiable disposition shining out so clearly through the sweet
expression of his countenance, would have contributed to render
him an object of universal admiration on a much wider sphere,
had he made it any object of his life to be so admired.
Among the athletic exercises in which he excelled in early
life, he became eventually most famous as a tennis player.
Indeed, during his latter Oxford days he had the reputation of
being one of the best gentleman players in England. It was
this which first led to my acquaintance with him. . . . Soon
after Mr. Barter, having been elected Warden of Winchester,
left Oxford to settle in his new office, 1832, and both the Master-
CH. v RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867 183
ships of the College fell vacant. ... As I was myself a Harrow
man, and as there had been, I believe, no instance since the
foundation of the College of the appointment [of second Master]
having been bestowed upon any but a Wykehamist, it is not
probable that I should have ventured to come forward, and still
less that I should have been elected, if my tennis acquaintance
with the Warden had not tended to smoothen the ground and
induced him to regard my candidature not only without pre
judice, but (I believe I may say) with some prepossession in my
favour.
He then goes on to describe the Warden's sympathy
with, and genial encouragement of, every effort for the good
of the boys, instancing especially the experiment made by
Mr. Hullah of teaching them all to sing as the College
boys, at any rate, were bound by the Statutes to profess
themselves able to do before their election.
In this happy sketch the Bishop connects Warden
Barter's name with that of another kind friend and admirable
man my honoured and much-loved predecessor, Walter
Kerr Hamilton, whose premature death in 1869 was a
cause of wide-spread sorrow. Of the two he wrote at the
close of his life :-
Walter Hamilton and Warden Barter. The two men whom
I have known in the course of my long life most full of the
milk of human kindness most free from any taint of selfish
ness most ready to prefer others to themselves, were Walter
Hamilton [and Robert Speckott Barter]. 1
Of the generosity of Bishop Hamilton he has left the
following delightful account, which I venture to think is
most creditable to both parties concerned. 2 It belongs, I
believe, to the year 1864 3 and, if so, to 28 or 29 May.
1 MS. Note-book, in. 36. 2 MS. Note-book, iv. 45, 46.
3 I find a letter from Bishop Hamilton asking where I may pay to your
account 200J.' It is dated 20 December, and is filed among the letters of
1866.
184 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. v
I have now to record and I do it with the deepest gratitude
to the Giver of all good and to His noble-hearted instrument
an instance of sympathy and generosity in a friend such as I
suppose that few in this uncertain life have had the happiness to
experience. I was staying with Walter Hamilton, the Bishop at
Salisbury, and we were walking together one day in the Palace
garden, when quite unexpectedly he said to me : ' I have been
thinking over your circumstances in Scotland, and I am sure
with your small income and so large a family you must find it
difficult to get on, so I propose to raise for you a sum of 200Z. a
year from among your friends in England, which I can do with
perfect ease.' The proposal took me quite by surprise. I had
never given him reason to suppose that I was in pecuniary
difficulties, and now, though I admitted I might sometimes be
rather straitened, I assured him such was not the case. I
thanked him for his great kindness ; but I urged that my
independence as a Bishop might be compromised by such
assistance, and therefore I could not accept it. He was not, how
ever, to be diverted from his purpose. He promised that I should
never know from whence the money came, and that I need be
under no apprehension of the least curtailment of my freedom in
any quarter. I did not give my consent, and the matter was left
apparently undecided. Nevertheless the money came, came
regularly year by year through a banker's hands never less,
sometimes considerably more, than 200/., till Hamilton's death
(1869), and after his death, at his request the subsidy was carried
on by Claughton [Bishop of Rochester], and only ceased when I
was elected Fellow of Winchester [May 1871]. My income was
largely increased through that appointment. When it is con
sidered how many and various are the claims which an English
Bishop has upon his time, his thoughts and sympathies, I think
it will be felt that such an example of genuine disinterested
beneficence and simple goodness of heart ought not to be allowed
to pass unrecorded. Up to this day I have never learned who
my other benefactors were, with the single exception of Lord
Robartes, because he left an order under his will that his
donation should be continued till my death (see 'Annals of
Early Life,' p. 96).
Some other incidental notices of Bishop Hamilton which
CH. v RESIDENCE AT PERTH. 1860-1867 185
appear in my uncle's correspondence are worth mentioning.
My father writes to his brother (February 1867) : ' Thank
you very much indeed for your kind words of encourage
ment on the notes to Joshua. English Bishops, alas ! have
no leisure to obey St. Paul's precept to give attendance to
reading ; and I cannot expect any such cheering language
from them. One exception there is your excellent friend
and brother of Sarum.' Bishop Hamilton himself writes
most characteristically (23 May, 1867) : ' I know not when
I have shed so many tears of joy as I did on hearing that
dear Claughton was called to the Episcopate.'
186
CHAPTER VI
LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876
' Through evil report, and through good report.'
Proposal to consecrate Bishop Macrorie in Scotland Proposal to revive
Archiepiscopal titles -Irish disestablishment Bishop Claughton
Biography in ' Scotichronicon' Important Conference of Clergy and
Laity at Perth, 1868 Laymen in Synods Letter to Koundell Palmer on
the principle of Establishment and his reply Christopher Wordsworth
made Bishop of Lincoln (1868-9) Hamilton's death (1869) Depressing
period Troubles among the Bishops Kenewed troubles at St. Ninian's
Mr. Burton Provost (1871-1885) Perth Nunnery Eitual Charge of
1872 Letter from Bishop Williams of Connecticut Precentor Humble's
presentment : dismissed by the Bishops Special Synod of 1873 Pro
posed Committee Address by Dean and other clergy Various circulars
The Bishop's intended resignation (1874) Resignation suspended
Attempts at a modus vivendi with Provost Burton Its partial success
(1874-5) Precentor Humble's death (February 1876) Bishop moves to
St. Andrews (October 1876).
Deaths of Bishops Ewing (1873) and Forbes (1875) Of Kev. W. G.
Shaw, of Forfar (1874) Sermons &c. in England, especially in English
Cathedrals Visit to Gladstone (1876) Work of New Testament
Bevision (1870-1881) Final Considerations Dr. Field Dean Blakesley
Secondary advantages of the Revision Charge of 1881 Letter of
Archdeacon Palmer The writer's judgment Removal of Divinity Stu
dents from Glenalmond and consecration of Cumbrae Cathedral (1876).
Important book on ' Outlines of Christian Ministry ' (1872) Its value
Supplemented by ' Remarks on Dr. Lightfoot's Essay ' (1879) Letter
from Bishop Williams Note on ' Sacerdotalism.'
ONE issue of the Lambeth Conference of 1867 was to draw
attention to the Episcopal Church in Scotland as a body
which might fulfil an important function for the benefit of
the Colonial Church, as it had done in the preceding cen
tury for that of the United States. During the month of
January 1868 negotiations were in progress between the
Bishop of Capetown and the Scottish Bishops, with the
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 187
cognisance of Archbishop Longley, in which Bishop Hamil
ton also had a share, with a view to the use of a church in
Scotland for the consecration of a Bishop for the Diocese
of Natal. Legal difficulties were interposed in England,
otherwise Bishop Wilberforce would have permitted the use
of a church in his Diocese, and Mr. Burgon would have
been glad if it could have taken place at St. Mary's, Oxford.
A majority of the Scottish Bishops were quite inclined to
lend a church for the purpose, and passed a resolution
to that effect at a conference held at the Bishop of St.
Andrews' house, Wednesday, 29 January, the Primus and
the Bishops of Brechin (Forbes), St. Andrews, Aberdeen
(Suther), and the Coadjutor of Edinburgh (Morrell) being
present. At the same time they were strongly and unani
mously of opinion that it would be most desirable that the
consecration should rather take place in the Province of
South Africa. The minutes (which are in the hand of the
Primus) further state that the Bishop of Argyll protested
against the proposal to take action in the matter, and the
Bishop of Glasgow was decidedly opposed to it. It was a
relief to them when, on the last day of January, the Primus
announced that Bishop Gray had withdrawn his request.
The following letter, addressed to Dean Kamsay, who in
this matter was the mouthpiece of Bishop Tait and Dean
Stanley, puts my uncle's own position in a very clear light.
It is dated 12 February, 1868 :
I return the letters with which you favoured me, having
read them with much interest.
You are quite right in supposing that I never in my heart
desired a Consecration in Scotland. I was also, and still am,
scarcely less opposed to a Consecration in England. In the
discussion at the Lambeth Conference, and afterwards privately
to the Bishop of Capetown at the Wolverhampton Congress, I
ventured to offer my strong opinion that, having the moral
weight which he already possessed, any further clinging to
188 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
England would be a mistake, and would only tend to injure his
own cause. Claiming to be a Provincial Church (now free from
State control) they must act as such (as we in Scotland do), and
take the responsibility of their action to themselves. I saw
several objections (some connected with the election of a new
Bishop) which could only be solved, as I thought, by action in
the Province, and partly also in Natal itself. In short, I feared
that, by pressing for more than he had already got, out of the
Province, he would at once increase his difficulties, and put
himself and his Province into a false position. And all this so
far, I am afraid, has come to pass.
On the other hand, with regard to our own action, my
opinions if you care to know them have been these :
1. I consider Dr. Colenso to have been canonically deposed,
and the two links which Mr. Dodd speaks of worth nothing ' in
foro Ecclesise.'
2. When the matter first came to us (and before I knew the
Archbishop's opinion) I strongly recommended caution to the
Primus, because
(1) We Bishops are not the Church.
(2) I think the Bishop of C[ape] T[own] a little impulsive.
3. When it seemed necessary to form a practical judgment,
having ascertained how some Churchmen of weight in this
Diocese felt about the matter, I saw no sufficient grounds upon
which I could take to myself the responsibility of refusing, still
less of urging upon others the refusal of compliance with the
Bishop of C[ape] Town's request, backed as it was with the
virtual approbation of the Archbishop of Canterbury. That
responsibility in the sight of God was, I think, a very awful one.
The Bishop of C[ape] Town (not, indeed, without the im
perfections incident to humanity under such difficult and un
paralleled circumstances) has acted most nobly the part of a
Confessor for God's Truth against one whom five years ago
(February 1863) the English and Irish Archbishops and Bishops,
as one man, pronounced unfit for his sacred office by suggesting
to him to resign it. Since then substantial justice all the
justice that case admitted of for the maintenance of the Truth
has been done upon the offender. How he is yet to be dealt
with, or how the place which he has forfeited in the sight of
God and man is to be supplied being still impenitent and
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 189
contumacious is a matter which, for various reasons, as Mr.
Dodd justly observes, requires the deepest and most far-sighted
prudence on the part of the Church Authorities of the Province
itself, subject (so far as they are subject) to the Archbishop of
Canterbury, but to no other person, power, prince or potentate
upon earth. In such a case I may venture to give private
advice (as an Anglican Bishop), asked or unasked but I cannot
do more ; I cannot refuse assistance, which I may give (in my
opinion) not uncanonically, not unlawfully, when applied to by
those who are alone responsible, who ought to be able to judge
best, and who consider (rightly or wrongly) the assistance asked
for necessary or advisable pro bono Ecclesice.
Dean Ramsay acknowledged this letter as ' most satis
factory.'
The Bishop was concerned with two other public matters
in the spring of 1868, viz. the question as to a revival of
Archiepiscopal titles in Scotland, raised in connection with
the Roman Catholic movement towards the establishment
of a titular hierarchy, and the disestablishment of the Irish
Church. The first of these questions did not, I think, come
before the public ; but, from the letters which the Bishop
has preserved, it seems probable that more would have been
heard of it if either the Primus had been Bishop of St.
Andrews or the Bishop of St. Andrews had been Primus.
But even had it been so, the practical difficulties at that
time were so great that it is unlikely that the movement
recently taken by the Canadian Church, and followed in
1897 by the Cape, West Indies, and Australia, would have
been anticipated nearly thirty years before in Scotland. It
was no fault of Bishop Eden's, however, that it was not
done, for he writes on 11 July :
Do you see that the Romanists have got the start of us by
making Dr. Errington Archbishop of Glasgow ? The sooner you
are Archbishop of St. Andrews the better. We must sound the
Church at once as to the revival of Metropolitical Jurisdiction.
190 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
As to the Irish Church, the Bishop was asked by the
Primus to draft and promote a petition, to be headed by the
Scottish Bishops, in opposition to Mr. Gladstone's Bill ; and
he went some way towards doing so. He tried, however, in
vain to bring in prominent men of the different Presby
terian bodies, and did not even succeed eventually in gain
ing a clear vote of the Scottish Bishops for it the two
* Alexanders,' for different reasons, and Bishop Wilson, of
Glasgow, being opposed to it. A form of petition, couched
in the names of the Bishops alone, was, however, circulated
in print. A copy lies before me which was evidently sent
to Bishop Hamilton. It has no signatures attached, and
bears evident traces of its authorship. It states that, ' at
present the entire realm of Great Britain and Ireland is
consecrated by the national profession of the Christian
religion.' ... ' At present the forms of Christianity pro
fessed by the State throughout these kingdoms recognise
no foreign or extra-national jurisdiction. This we believe
to be in strict accordance with the doctrine of Kevelation,
and, at the same time, a necessary safeguard of our
national liberties.' The proposed legislation would give
increased ascendancy in Ireland to Borne. It would weaken
the testimony given by the Legislature against Roman
error. Mention was made further of the weakness arising
from the establishment of a different form of Protestantism
in Scotland. Sympathy was also expressed with Boman
Catholic political disabilities. Finally, the petition refers to
the sufferings of the Episcopal Church from disestablish
ment in Scotland, and draws a conclusion unfavourable to
the prospects of such a measure in its effect on the sister
Church of Ireland.
The following is a specimen of Bishop Claugh ton's
hasty, amusing, and very intimate notes (24 April, 1808).
It refers to the debate in the House of Lords on the Irish
Church :
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 191
My dearest Andrew, If you had heard Lord Derby speak
last night you would have exclaimed * There's Life in the old
Dog yet ' (you remember the Picture at the Manchester Exhibi
tion bearing that title an old Shepherd's Dog found at the
bottom of a rock nearly dead ; next to which there was a
Picture of Lear in his last moments. An old Lady with a
Catalogue in her hand applied that title to King Lear).
Abiit Renn Dickson Heref. Succedet Edwardus Inf. Dom.
Convoc. Prolocutor. Ita dicit T. L. Roff. 1 Dear old Sarum
revivificatus est. How you must be elated and yet depressed
by the fulfilment of your vaticinations irtpl rAaoVroi/iov ! !
When do you come to Danbury ?
I think there is a reaction beginning about the Irish Church.
The Bishop of London's [Tait's] words were well received in the
House of Lords last night. He spoke so well. Brother Samuel
not so well. Now, my dear Andrew, you never write to me.
I do so wish I were a good speaker. There is such an infidel
coterie just opposite me in the H. of Lords. . . . We had a
delightful day at Maplestead. Old Barter of Sarsden was so
genial. 2
In May of the same year the Bishop was forced, by Dr.
Gordon's insisting upon publishing Lives of living Bishops
in his * Scotichronicon,' to direct two friends in revising or
re-writing his own. It was this, perhaps, that first gave
him the idea of writing his Autobiography. (See above,
p. 108 n.)
The ordinary Synod of this year was held in May, at
Lord Hollo's hospitable house, Duncrub ; but it was much
surpassed in importance by a conference of clergy and
1 'Renn Dickson [Hampden], Bishop of Hereford, is gone. Edward
[Bicker steth], Prolocutor of the Lower House of Convocation, will succeed
him. So thinks T. L. [Claughton] of Kochester.' Hampden's successor
was, however, Bishop Atlay. Bishop Hamilton was taken ill the Wednesday
before Easter (8 April, 1868), but rallied enough to take his ordinations and
to confirm in the autumn in Dorset. After a painful illness in London, he
returned home 29 July, and died at Salisbury 1 August, 1869.
2 Mr. Charles Barter died a short time after, 24 June.
192 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
laity held later in the year at Perth. The school chapel
(St. Andrews) was opened on 23 August, and in it, a month
later, was held this conference (24 September), which was
intended to be annual, after the fashion of our Diocesan
conferences now familiar in England. I have already
quoted from the Bishop's interesting opening address,
which gave a sketch of the history of the Diocese, in
Chap. II. I will add here some particulars of the condition
of the Diocese at this time, which will serve to mark the
steady growth that had taken place during his Episcopate.
Of the thirty-seven churches and chapels of all kinds now in
the Diocese, all except two (Blairatholl and Kirriemuir) have
been built, or otherwise acquired, since the beginning of the
present century. Or if the view be confined to the period of my
own Episcopate, which began when the first half of the century
had expired viz. in 1853 of these thirty- seven churches and
chapels, twenty-one have been built or otherwise added since
that time ; that is within the last fifteen years. In these fifteen
years new churches (to place them in chronological order) have
been erected at Meigle, Bridge of Allan, Callander, Alyth,
Pitlochry, Birnam, Kinloch-Rannoch, Crieff, Cupar-Fife, and
lastly at St. Andrews. Mission Chapels have been opened at
Weem (where a new church is now in course of erection), at
Leven, Dollar, Doune, Dunning, Elie, Croiscraig, Perth ; besides
the private chapels open to neighbours, poor as well as rich, so
far as they can afford accommodation, at Duncrub Park, Dupplin
Castle, and Glamis Castle. Of course this increase of con
gregations implies a similar increase of clergy; the seventeen
clergy of fifteen years ago being now twenty-nine. And, I am
thankful to add, the increase in the provision for their permanent
accommodation is still more remarkable. In 1853 there were
only two parsonages in the Diocese viz. at Dunblane and
Kirriemuir. Since then, in addition to those two, there have
been built, or otherwise acquired, fifteen, so that there are now
seventeen.
He mentions further that in the school chapel, where they
were assembled, 100 scholars had been gathered in a month.
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 193
Besides encouraging details, he had, however, to note that
thirty years before there had been larger congregations at
Blairatholl, Strath-Tay, and Tummel Bridge; and that
extinct congregations, noticed in the last century, at Auch-
terarder, Balgowan, Kinclaven, Glamis, Cortachy, Memus,
&c., ought to be revived. Indeed, the Episcopal Church
ought to be represented in every one of the 159 parishes of
the united Diocese. He spoke in something like despair of
the failure of his attempts to co-operate with Presbyterians,
referring specially to the promise taken by ministers at
their ordination to do nothing to subvert Presbyterian
government and discipline. But he hoped the truth would
in time make its way.
The subjects discussed were Church progress in town
and country districts, and good speeches were made both
by leading clergy and laity; but no resolutions were
passed. The Conference was considered to have been very
satisfactory. The Primus writes about 'the marvellous
success of your first Conference. I was glad to see Methven
[i.e. Mr. Smythe, a leading layman and great friend of the
Bishop's] was there, and should much have liked to have
watched his countenance.' Bishop Forbes writes : ' I never
have had the opportunity of expressing to you my admira
tion of your able address at the Conference, which seems to
have been on the whole a great success.' The results of
this Conference were seen in a resolution of the Episcopal
Synod held next year at Edinburgh (16 and 17 November,
1869), when the question of the powers and functions of
laymen in Synods was remitted to the consideration of
Special Diocesan Synods, to be held before Whitsunside
1870, and the resolutions to the following effect were agreed
to by the Bishops : (1) that in future notices of the annual
Synods should be read in church two Sundays previous to
the Synod; (2) that all Lay Communicants should be
o
194 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
invited to attend ; (3) that such laymen should have free
leave to speak. The subject, and others connected with it,
was discussed at the Special Synod of 1870, but no definite
action was taken. It was reopened at the Episcopal Synod
of 1873, but without any immediate result. Finally, in
1876, the General 'Synod established the Eepresentative
Church Council, which dealt with matters of finance and
external administration, a point beyond which the Episcopal
Church has not yet gone. Those who are interested in the
question, as many now are in England, will find useful
material in Bishop Wordsworth's ' Charge ' of 1870, and
its Postscript in reply to arguments. He dwells much
upon the proper qualification of Laymen to be admitted
they must not only be confirmed and be communicants,
but 'accept the canons and make some form of subscription.
He would not elect the lay members, but have their names
as Synodsmen put in by the clergy. This is to apply to
Diocesan Synods. As regards General Synods, laymen
are to be chosen from Diocesan Synodsmen, and be fully
thirty years of age, and be obliged to attend. The safeguards
he contemplated were : voting by orders if demanded ; a
right of veto in each order ; and a power in any of the
three orders to claim reconsideration of a resolution by
another General Synod. He considered that such General
Synods should meet triennially , and their functions not be
confined to legislation only. He would not, however,
abolish the Episcopal Synods.
In November 1868 interesting letters passed between
the Bishop and his old friend, Koundell Palmer, on the
latter's candidature for Parliament and his ' Richmond
Address.' The Bishop, in his zeal for the principle of
Establishment (notwith standing difficulties which he felt as
to applying it to the case of Ireland), went so far as to
say that his friend had neglected the teaching of revelation
CH. YI LAST YEAKS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 195
on the subject. His language was startling, as he after
wards felt himself :
' The notion that the ruled are to be judges of what is right and
best for them in matters of Eeligion, and that Eulers are to
accept their judgment and not God's, appears to me an unscrip-
tural, an infidel, notion excluding God from the government of
His own world ; or at least supposing Him to prefer such mere
human justice (so to call it) to the maintenance of His own
Truth,' &c.
The letter is of course that of an intimate friend,
speaking his mind, and must not be judged as in any way
harsh or rough. The reply acknowledges its kindness, and
is written in a very open and affectionate style. ' I shall say
to you some things which at the present time I could not
be induced to say to (almost) any one else, and which I have
not said to any one else in fact.' The writer comments on
the strength of the Bishop's language as calculated to
search his own conscience, especially as coming from one
' who though of an impetuous natural temperament is not
usually rhetorical or unreal in his way of handling great
subjects.' The substance of the reply is practically that
he differed from the Bishop on the question of the revelation
of the duty of Establishment. I will quote a few sentences
which exhibit the noble character of the author a character
afterwards proved in action, as all his contemporaries knew.
When I gave my reasons for not holding the opinion that a
political Establishment of Eeligion was always required by the
duty of a Christian State, I said (in effect if not in words) that
the best way of promoting or advancing the interests of religion
appeared to me to be not at all times and in all places one and
the same ; but to be liable to variation, according to circum
stances : and that State Establishments of Eeligion, when most
certainly right, had not been created upon any abstract or prior
theory of the duty, in that respect, of a Christian State, but
had arisen spontaneously, as the natural fruit of the religious
o 2
196 EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
anxieties of the people. By ' the interests of religion ' I certainly
meant the interests of Truth, and the advancement of the
Knowledge and Service of the God of Truth. Had I believed
that this cause (to which, by God's grace, I desire to devote my
whole life, and for which my mind is wholly made up to renounce
everything else which I believe, or even suspect, to have a
tendency to tempt me to be unfaithful to it) would be endangered
or compromised by one course, rather than another, of those
which I was called upon to consider, I should, without hesitation,
have stated thisas a reason for rejecting that course.
After discussing Scottish and Irish Establishment the
letter concludes as follows :
My doctrine is, that every act of a Christian man, public or
private, political or individual, should be done with a view to the
promotion of God's glory, and should be consistent with faith in
His revealed Truth : but (if I may, without irreverence, allude to
words not Christian) that in the government of nations there
are TroXXal ^op^ai not of Truth, but of the means of serving the
GOD of Truth.
Ever yours affectionately,
R. PALMEE.
A few days later my father, then Canon of Westminster,
received a note from Mr. Disraeli (dated 13 November,
1868), in which he expressed his intention, if it met my
father's views, of recommending the Queen to raise him to
the Episcopal Bench. No See was named, and it was
doubtful what was meant. He was first desirous to decline,
but it was rumoured that it was Ely, which attracted him
from its relation to Cambridge. On the day he received
the letter he went down to Wellington College, where he
was the guest of Dr. Benson (afterwards Archbishop) ; and
consideration in company with that kind friend led him to
accept what he then supposed would be, as it turned out to
be, nomination to the See of Lincoln.
The Bishop of St. Andrews was naturally called to assist
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 197
in the consecration, which took place on St. Matthias' Day
(24 February, 1869), at Westminster. Immediately after
it he went down with his wife, who was in very poor health,
to Seaton, in South Devon, where he remained nearly two
months, and then paid his brother a visit at his new home,
Riseholme, a few miles from Lincoln. The Bishop from
time to time felt his isolation in Scotland very deeply, and
his friends at this period were anxious to find him some
Cathedral preferment in England ; but nothing came of
their applications. There was also some talk of his going
to Edinburgh, on the vacancy of the place of coadjutor-
Bishop Terrot still living on, a wreck of his former self, till
2 April, 1872. The expenses of a large family pressed
heavily upon him, and it was not till May 1871 that he had
the relief of a Fellowship at Winchester College. Bishop
Hamilton's death on 1 August, 1869, was also a great
sorrow. The next few years were, in fact, years of con
siderable depression and disappointment, chiefly connected
with the renewed disturbances in the Chapter of St.
Ninian's, which were at their height in 1872-3. But
there was also considerable discomfort in the College of
Bishops. One question concerned the propriety of Bishops
and others preaching in Presbyterian Chapels. Certain
English dignitaries did this, and sides were taken in con
sequence. Then Bishop Ewing accepted an invitation to
preach in the University Church at Glasgow, and Bishop
Wilson interfered to prevent him a dispute in which
Bishop Wordsworth openly took the part of Ewing. Then
there was considerable heart-searching (in 1871) as to
Bishop E wing's theology which in its way was. as broad
as the Bishop of Brechin's was high. The latter had
published his book on the Articles in 1867, and it reached
a second edition in 1871. His further publication of a
service containing prayers for the departed, in a way
198 EPTSCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
which seemed to implicate his brother Bishops, gave
renewed alarm, though no public action followed.
But the St. Ninian's disputes were so near home
that they were a perpetual source of distress. I will not
enter much into detail about them, but something must be
said as to the principal events.
The fact of Provost Fortescue's resignation in July
1871 has been already referred to (Chapter III. p. 48). The
Provostship was then offered to Mr. Shute, Incumbent of
Callander, who, as the Bishop had reason to suppose, was
likely to be acceptable to the congregation. He declined,
apparently because of the insecurity of the endowment.
At length (October) the Bishop determined to offer the
place to Mr. Burton, who had been in the Diocese upwards
of twenty years at Blairgowrie, Alyth, and Meigle.
He possessed many recommendations. He had the qualities
of a Christian gentleman and a competent scholar. He had long
experience of the Diocese, and hitherto he had shown no tendency
to extreme doctrines or extreme practices ; and I hoped that he
would work with me. But in this I was disappointed. He had
been brought into the Diocese originally by Mr. Forbes, of
Medwyn, and he had not strength nor, perhaps, inclination
to resist the closer and sturdier influence of Mr. Humble, who
knew Lord Glasgow's mind, and this, for serious reasons, must
remain paramount. The consequence was there followed no
permanent improvement in my relations with St. Ninian's. I
made once more the attempt to attend the services, but I soon
discovered that they were still not conducted in a manner for
which I could make myself responsible (which, the Cathedral
being regarded as the Bishop's Church, my attendance would
seem to imply) without serious damage to my general influence
throughout the Diocese.
We have already described (in Chapter IV.) the main
circumstances of the earlier conflict. They were to a
certain extent repeated in this period. As in 1859, so in
1872, the Bishop's Charge at the ordinary Synod was a
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 199
detailed censure of the proceedings at St. Ninian's. The
special subject then was the Collegiate School ; now it was
the 'Perth Nunnery,' an institution not definitely con
nected with the Cathedral, but supported by the same
interests. There was also the question of ritual, on which
Mr. Burton had accepted a pledge that it was to be * in
conformity with ' or ' not in excess Of ' that usual in
English cathedrals. The Bishop took pains to inquire
what English usage was, and found that it was exceeded
by that of St. Ninian's in some more or less important
respects. In particular, he found fault with the East
ward Position throughout the Communion service, and the
use of the chasuble. It was not as if the Cathedral had
laid hold on the public mind through its services. On
the contrary, the Bishop had good reason to think that it
had not been a success during the time of his withdrawal
from it. Mr. Burton informed him that when he came
into office the average congregation on Sunday morning
was under twenty. The Bishop, knowing his own powers
as a preacher and a teacher, could not doubt that if he
were practically Incumbent, and the Provost and Precentor
his curates, he could have made the Cathedral a power in
the city. But the statutes, while defining the Provost's
position to be ' under the Bishop,' were so drawn as to
make the Provost and the Precentor acting together almost
as independent of him as the Dean and Canons of an English
Cathedral. The Bishop's disappointment found vent in
his Charge, delivered at the Ordinary Synod 26 September,
1872, in which he reviewed the various painful circum
stances of his relation to the Cathedral, sometimes men
tioning names, but more often not doing so, and in general
terms displaying his suspicion of the loyalty of the Cathe
dral party. It was on this Charge that Bishop Williams,
of Connecticut, wrote (5 December, 1872) :
200 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
It is a real comfort, in these days, to read such words as it
contains. We have all had, I suppose, our share of trouble from
these men, who have, as I told one of them the other day, ' taken
up everything in Romanism except its principle of obedience, and
abandoned everything in Protestantism except its self-will.' I
am particularly gratified to find that you have taken up the same
ground on which I have all along placed myself, i.e. that you
will not move judicially till a formal and proper presentation is
made. It is very easy for Presbyters and Laity to say that the
Bishop ought te move, and so to shift off upon his shoulders
responsibilities which fairly belong to them. I have held, and
shall continue to hold, just that very position, and I rejoice to
find it endorsed by an opinion which I rate as highly as I do
yours. The great trouble with these people is their awful
insincerity
Men were hard hitters in those days !
All those passages in the Charge that touched persons
named or unnamed were swept together by Mr. Humble,
and represented as an indictment of himself; and the
Bishop was thereupon presented to the Episcopal Synod as
having publicly censured a clergyman subject to his Epi
scopal jurisdiction ' without previous trial or consultation
with the members of the Synod in terms of Canon No.
44, and without his having any opportunity of being
heard in his own defence,' and accused ' of perversion of
justice and of oppression of the said Eev. Henry Humble,
and also of violating the provisions of the said 44th Canon
above mentioned, and also of behaviour unbecoming the
character and office of a Bishop.' This presentment was
signed by Mr. Humble, Lord Charles Lennox Kerr, and
Kev. Hardwicke Shute, 'late of Callander, now of 28
Netting Hill Square, London,' and the articles were served
upon the Bishop 30 January, 1873.
The presentment was heard by the Episcopal Synod,
and the charge unanimously dismissed on 27 March. At
CH. vi LAST YEAES AT PERTH. 1868-1876 201
a special meeting of the Chapter on 17 April it was
attempted to give effect to the words ' under the Bishop '
as meaning that ' all the ministrations of Divine service
shall be subject to the Bishop's approval and control,' but
the motion was lost by three to five. A Special Synod
was then held on 8 May, in which the history of the
Cathedral was recounted at some length by the Bishop,
and special stress was laid (inter alia) on the custom which
had grown up of celebrating with only one Communicant,
and the consequent exaltation of the sacrificial element in
the Lord's Supper so as to obscure the Communion element.
There was some controversy as to whether the Bishop had
at one time sanctioned this practice, which was apparently
permissible in Scotland in cases of necessity, such as had
frequently occurred in the past history of the Church. He
felt convinced that he had not sanctioned it ; but, if he
had, he fell back upon the result of his bitter experience,
which had taught him * to distrust where he had formerly
placed confidence,' and 'slowly and even reluctantly to
mislike some practices which formerly he had deemed
innocent.' This Charge contains near the end a forcible
passage on the work which the Cathedral ought to do and
might do, and it is remarkable as containing no reference
to the presentment out of which he had come victorious.
The Bishop subsequently offered to endeavour to treat St.
Ninian's as the Cathedral if he were allowed a veto on the
arrangements of the Church and the future order of the
ritual, but this was declined. The Synod wound up by a
resolution for the appointment of a committee to confer
with the Chapter as to the nature of the necessary amend
ments in its constitution. But, after some hesitation, the
Bishop declined (on 12 May, 1873) to have anything to do
with the appointment of such a committee, and there was
apparently no other constitutional way in which the Synod
202 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
could give effect to its resolution. He was bitterly dis
appointed, and for the time abandoned St. Ninian's (as he
wrote in 1885) ' in despair,' determining to treat it as any
other * ritualistic church ' to which he might have duties
as Diocesan, but which he could not be expected to do
more than tolerate. He felt that he must decline re
sponsibility for its management and the conduct of its
services.
The majority, however, of the clergy were not willing
that the Cathedral should sink to such a position, and
about the beginning of the next year l the Dean of the
Diocese and about eighteen others addressed him on the
subject, asking him either to resume his place at St.
Ninian's or to sanction the action of the Cathedral Chapter,
apart from its Bishop, ad interim till the holding of the
next General Synod. To this he replied, in a circular
dated 12 January, 1874, declining either course, and at
the same time speaking of himself as * being pained and
injured ... by breaches of faith in more than one quarter.'
Provost Burton replied to this, in a circular sent to the
Dean and all the clergy, showing considerable irritation,
dated 28 January. The Bishop replied, in another circular
to ' Mr. Burton ' (he did not call him ' Provost '), dated
29 January, also sent to all the clergy, in which he justifies
in detail the charge of breach of faith. Mr. Johnston, of
Kirkcaldy, and Mr. Tuttiett, of St. Andrews, also printed
circulars in defence of the Bishop. Mr. Burton naturally
replied in two other circulars, one addressed to the Dean
and one to the Bishop, and so the matter in dispute became
unhappily only too notorious.
1 The address is undated, but the Bishop docketed it as received
12 January. It had been drawn up some weeks previously, and neither by
the Dean (Torry) nor by the Provost and resident Canons. I do not, in
fact, know by whom it was composed.
CH. TI LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 203
It is not surprising that the Bishop should have thought
this an opportunity for seeking to discharge himself of a
troublesome post, and in the month of April he wrote to
my father enclosing the draft of a letter announcing his
resignation to take place at Whitsuntide. My father
accepted the resolution as having been well weighed,
adding, * You have a right to a discharge.' Others, how
ever, like Bishop Claughton and Archdeacon Grant, feared
that it might be precipitate. The former ends his letter :
L. sends you her best love, and is in amazement what is to
become of Mrs. Wordsworth, and at the loss of the Feu. So
am I. It was the most delightful house in Scotland. I hope
you have not been too precipitate.
The letter was, however, issued, dated 15 April, and
addressed to the Dean. It refers to his wish to live and
work in England, where he had a locus standi as Fellow of
Winchester College. He mentions the eclipse of his hopes
in regard to closer relations with the ' Established Church,'
the most material cause of which was the disestablishment
of the Church of Ireland. With regard to the Diocese,
though progress had been made, there was * at the heart
. . * a cause of anxiety, of difficulty, and trouble, which no
other Diocese of our Church has experienced in the same
degree.' He refers to the sympathy which had been
shown him in his stand against ultra -ritualism and
Eomanising practices, which sympathy, however, had been
recently much neutralised (of course by the Address of the
Dean and eighteen clergy and what had followed it). He
touches on other influences with which he had to contend.
Leighton's retirement is naturally cited as a precedent,
and the letter ends by thanks to his brethren in the Epi
scopate and to the great body of clergy and laity of the
Diocese. It was clearly intended to be a farewell.
204 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
Many remonstrances, however, followed and, further, it
was difficult to find a fitting successor to take such an
office. The income was only 5001. a year even now ; and,
much as he desired to retire, he could not with equanimity
think of being succeeded by one who might take a party
line in opposition to his own.
He spent most of the next month in England, in
London (for |he Eevision of the New Testament), at
Salisbury (where he was actually thinking of taking a
house in the Close), Winchester (on College business), and
Kidderminster (where his eldest son Charles was now
curate). On his return to Scotland he issued a short note
addressed to the Dean (dated 26 May), saying that he had
received so many urgent solicitations praying him to re
consider his intention, that he felt it his duty to postpone
his resignation for the present. The matter seems gradu
ally to have dropped.
The very day on which he came to this decision he
determined and I venture to think he could hardly have
done otherwise to reopen negotiations with the Provost
for a better understanding at St. Ninian's, the details of
which negotiations were prolonged till the end of the year.
But peace was so far secured at once that he preached in
the church rather frequently in the month of June and
later. The Provost, who was naturally desirous of peace,
was ready to accept a compromise when the Bishop was
present, i.e. at the midday service. The chief points were
that the vestments were to be given up, and the Eastward
Position not taken except at the consecration prayers and
the prayer ' for the whole state of Christ's Church,' which
follows them in the Scottish Office. In making this latter
concession the Bishop was clearly moved by my father's
' Plea for Toleration by Law in certain Kitual Matters,'
added to a pamphlet called ' Senates and Synods : in
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 205
reference to the Public Worship Regulation Bill ' which then
agitated the Church of England, which pamphlet was pub
lished in June 1874. l The Bishop of St. Andrews wrote a
good deal at this time and later in reference to the Position of
the celebrant, especially in letters to Mr. Beresford Hope and
to the * Times,' which he republished in 1876 with an essay
under the title, ' Three Conclusive Proofs that the use of the
Eastward Position is contrary to the mind and intention
of our reformed Church,' dedicated to his friend Claughton.
His explanation of the words ' before the Table ' was that
they referred to the ordering of the bread and wine, and
that the Priest was expected to return to the ' north side '
after he had so ordered them. The * north side ' he
understood to refer to the long side of a table placed
east and west along the gangway of the church. Like all
similar writings of his, this tract contains much informa
tion. It is still worth reading, though since the Lambeth
judgment of 1890 the matter is on a different footing. The
Bishop's views on that judgment are given in the Appendix.
He was, however, in 1874, prepared to accept the E.P. in
others under certain circumstances and to a certain extent.
Unfortunately Precentor Humble did not lend his aid
to a peaceful compromise. And the Bishop, on his part,
thought it his duty to call attention by circular to the Pre
centor's paper on ' Reservation of the Blessed Sacrament '
in Mr. Orby Shipley's volume of * Studies in Modern Pro
blems ' a paper containing much that was open to criti
cism, and extremely disrespectful to the Scottish Bishops
generally, and to his own in particular. Canon Humble
did not reply in detail, but protested that the Chapter,
to whom the circular was addressed, was not the proper
tribunal to sit in judgment upon him.
Notwithstanding this interruption the Bishop continued
1 See, also, his Miscellanies, ii. 135 foil.
206 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
to officiate at St. Ninian's and printed a sermon ' preached
in the Cathedral ' on 1 January, 1875, called * Spiritual
Edification in reference to the Public Worship of God '-
a short and simple discourse in which he laid down two
good principles adopted from a ' distinguished layman '-
probably Beresford Hope as to any changes in public
worship :
1. That the change should be in its own nature favourable to
a devout and intelligent adoration of God in the sanctuary.
2. That it should not limit, but increase, the active partici
pation of the flock in the service.
Finally he urged that all should unite in making the
subordination of the external element of worship to the
spiritual a mark of the Cathedral services.
For some time he continued to preach in St. Ninian's
when he was at home, and his family returned to worship
there ; but, though certain practices were altered, the tone
and temper of the worship was distasteful to him, and the
reconciliation did not really last till the close of his resi
dence at Perth and removal to St. Andrews in the autumn
of 1876. The chief actor in the dispute was, however,
himself removed by another cause. Canon Humble, who
had long been in failing health, was persuaded to go for a
six months' holiday to the south of France, and he died at
San Kemo at the early age of 57 on Monday, 7 February, 1
1876.
On his deathbed he desired a clergyman who was with
him to express regret to the Bishop for any ' harsh or un
fitting words' he might have used in the heat of those
controversies in which he had felt it his duty to engage with
him. He was buried at San Kemo. My uncle calls him,
1 Some accounts say Sunday, 6 February, but he survived to the
Monday morning. I have before me a note in Provost Burton's hand:
' Copy of telegram received this morning from San Eemo " Canon Humble
died six o'clock 7 February." ' This was stated more at length by the
Provost in his funeral sermon.
CH. vi LAST YEAHS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 207
like Mr. Mackonochie, a man of adamantine mould in regard
to what he considered to be right ; but his range of vision was a
narrow one. He had good abilities, and was well informed on a
certain class of Ecclesiastical subjects. Faithful and kind,
especially to the poor, in the discharge of pastoral duty, his
chief interest lay in the maintenance of ritual, which not only
prevented progress, but went far to empty the church in which
he ministered.
It was not, therefore, without a feeling of relief from
painful associations and responsibilities unsatisfied, that
the Bishop's thoughts turned towards the opportunity for
making himself another home in the ancient City of St.
Andrews itself. The landlord of the Feu House refused
to renew his lease except on terms that he thought un
reasonable, and he determined, not without some regret, to
leave the centre of his Diocese for the circumference. He
left Perth 26 October, 1876, and entered upon his large new
house ' The Hall ' (called by him * Bishop's Hall ' or ' Bishops-
hall'), formerly a boarding-house for students at the Uni
versity (of which my friend Mr. Andrew Lang was once an
inmate), on 20 November. This move was a turning point
in his life, and naturally opens another chapter of his
biography. He was seventy years of age, but he had
sixteen years of vigorous life and work before him, an
episcopate, that is to say, as long as that of my father, or any
of my three immediate predecessors in the See of Salisbury.
It will be convenient, however, before we close this
chapter, to record some of the more prominent events of
the period affecting the Bishop's position.
Bishop Ewing, of Argyll, died on Ascension Day 1873,
and Bishop Forbes, of Brechin, 8 October, 1875. The
former was succeeded by Eev. G. E. Mackarness, brother
of the Bishop of Oxford, the latter by Bishop Jermyn, of
Colombo, the present Primus. Both the deceased Bishops
'208 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
were considerably younger than himself, and both were
friends as well as neighbours, Bishop Ewing especially so,
as his many frank and affectionate letters testify. But
perhaps the most important loss sustained by the Bishop
of St. Andrews was that of his old pupil, and attached
supporter and fellow-worker, the Eev. W. G. Shaw, who
had been for twenty years Incumbent of Forfar, which took
place 25 October, 1874. I do not find any letters in his
correspondence which are more thoroughly sympathetic
than those of Mr. Shaw. He was apparently a man quite
after the Bishop's own heart, unaffectedly simple, generous,
and conscientious, and worthy of the fullest confidence. 1
Of the Bishop's public work for the Church in Scotland
generally, the most important was a long speech in the
Episcopal Synod of 1875, which led to the meeting of the
General Synod in 1876. 2 His object was to urge that
the General Synod should (1) give canonical recognition
to the Scottish Cathedrals ; (2) restore Trinity College,
Glenalmond, to its original status, and (3) provide for the
meeting of the General Synod at fixed intervals. With
the first and third of these objects I should imagine that
few of those who wish well to the Episcopal Church can
fail to sympathise, nor can the second be a subject of much
difference of opinion as far as the duty of supporting the
school, as the principal school for Churchmen in Scotland,
is concerned. The retention or removal of the Divinity
students is a question of a different character, as in most
cases it would seem to be the teaching of experience that
young men of university age and schoolboys cannot pru
dently and effectively be educated within the walls of the
same college. But the Bishop was very keen for Glen-
almond as originally planned and as successfully worked
1 See the Funeral Sermon preached at Forfar, All Saints' Day 1874, The
Gospel a Defence against Evil Tidings. 2 See Public Appeals, ii. 595.
OH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 209
by himself, not realising, perhaps, how few Wardens were
capable of the combination which he had achieved. The
removal of the students to Edinburgh took place in 1875
on account first of a fire at Glenalmond. He desired their
return, but there they remained, and there they are now
conveniently located close to St. Mary's Cathedral. Of
this matter he wrote at the end of his life as follows :
The removal being now a fait accompli, and accomplished, I
hope, with every prospect of success, I have no wish to revive
the controversy concerning it. Only I think it due to the
founders of the College to place on record the opinion which I
held, and still hold, in opposition to my Episcopal brethren and
others. I have no doubt the main promoters sincerely believed
the change would be for the advantage of the students ; neither
can I doubt that other motives were allowed to give the convic
tion an undue bias. It was an important object to the Bishop
of Edinburgh [then Bishop Cotterill] to supply the want of
endowment for his Cathedral. To be able to place the Pantonian
Professor and Bell Lecturer upon his staff would be a material
help in that direction. But this, of course, must involve the
withdrawal of so much strength and support from the Staff of
the College. The Professor himself would naturally feel the
attraction of Edinburgh society as a decided gain in comparison
with the solitude of Glenalmond.
His wish for legislation in the General Synod about
Cathedrals was not only due to his desire to see St. Ninian's
put on a better footing, but was concerned with the move
ment for making the little College Chapel on the island of
Cumbrae into a ' Cathedral of the Isles,' and developing
the College in a manner which he imagined might be inju
rious to the divinity training at Glenalmond. He naturally
regretted the diversion of money and interest towards what
he could not but regard as rather a fanciful project, but any
rivalry of a serious kind never existed. The consecra
tion, however, of the Chapel as a Cathedral took place on
Wednesday, 3 May, 1876.
210 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
Unfortunately nothing was done at the General Synod
of much importance except the establishment of the
* Representative Church Council.'
Of other public work in which he was engaged outside
Scotland in the period embraced in this chapter, I may
mention his assisting at the first consecration of a ' suffragan '
Bishop in our own times, that of Mackenzie Sub-dean of
Lincoln, who was made Bishop of Nottingham, 2 February,
1870. This was one of the occasions when Archbishop
Alexander Lycurgus, of Syra and Tenos, who was then my
father's guest, attended a solemn function of our church.
The "Bishop of St. Andrews also preached frequently in
English Cathedrals, as at Norwich and Peterborough in
1870, Rochester and Salisbury (1872), Durham (1873),
Norwich (1875), and Chester (1876). On the latter occasion
he visited Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden, an incident of which
he gives the following account in a letter to Miss M. Barter,
written (29 August, 1876), just before he left the Feu
House.
You have heard, I dare say, of my visit to Mr. Gladstone ; a
busy, restless-minded man, if ever there was one. I looked
upon him with a sort of melancholy interest, and all the more,
when, through the vista of the past, I remember Lincoln (New
castle), Canning, Herbert, Bruce (Elgin), Hope (Hope-Scott),
Hamilton (your dear Bishop), Twisleton all more or less my
juniors, like himself, and all gone ! and Manning and W. Palmer
gone also, in another sense. We talked over Glenalmond, of
course, and, after sundry other topics, came at last to Homer ;
and he kindly gave me, at parting, two of his Homeric articles
which have appeared in the ' Contemporary.'
He preached again at Salisbury the Sunday (5
November, 1876) after the reopening of our choir the
other preachers at the festival being Bishop Moberly,
Bishop Woodford of Ely, and Bishop Mackarness of Oxford.
In his sermon, 'The Worship of God to be maintained
CH. VI
LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876
211
under all Circumstances,' he paid, as might be expected, a
warm and affectionate tribute to Bishop Hamilton, in whose
memory the restoration was carried out. 1 His sermon at
the Norwich Choral Association meeting in 1875 was also
printed, and contains some interesting material. It was
published at the expense of the Committee. He quotes in
it an anecdote related by Bishop Home of two Portuguese
noblemen attending the anniversary of the National Schools
in St. Paul's (when 6,000 children sang together), who
exclaimed, ' This is life indeed ; we have never lived until
now.' In printing he added a remarkable and beautiful
passage from the heathen philosopher Epictetus, on' songs
of gratitude due to the Deity, by those who can sing them,
which I have never seen quoted elsewhere. His historical
knowledge was shown in a sermon on a similar occasion at
St. Albans (preached some years earlier, 27 July, 1871),
entitled ' Preservation of St. Albans Abbey a National
Duty.'
But the most important external occupation of these
years was the Bishop's share in the Eevision of the New
Testament, on which Committee he was elected, on the
proposal of Bishop Moberly, of Salisbury, 5 July, 1870.
He attended 109 times out of a total of 407 as many as
could be expecied considering the distance which he had to
travel. Although the New Testament was not published
till 1881 it may be convenient to treat the subject here
rather than in a later chapter. The journeys to England,
the visits to friends, the association with other learned men,
were secondary results, which to a man of his tempera
ment and circumstances were extremely valuable. Of the
primary results it is not easy to speak. He did not,
indeed, find himself in harmony with the methods and
1 The subject of the sermon is Daniel's continuance in prayer (vi. 10) ;
see below, p. 279.
p 2
212 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
actions of the majority of his colleagues, and his elaborate
' Final Suggestions on New Testament Eevision : the Four
Gospels,' printed in 1879, disclose the fact that he con
sidered many of the alterations unnecessary and pedantic,
especially those made in regard to the use of the definite
article and the tenses of verbs. 1 He feared rightly that
the revisers ran the risk of preventing the popular accept
ance of their work by the amount of changes they intro
duced, and this particularly because the first part of that
work was the Gospels, in which needless alteration would be
most generally felt and most keenly resented. He agreed,
in fact, with Dr. Frederick Field, whose ' Otium Norvi-
cense, Pars Tertia,' was probably the most important
criticism of the many to which the Eevised Version was
subjected. Unfortunately both the ' Considerations ' arid
Field's ' Otium Norvicense ' were only privately printed,
though as many as 1,000 copies of the latter were struck
off. 2
The following paragraphs were prepared for the
' Annals.' I have had to fill them out here and there.
One of our New Testament company [Dr. Roberts] has
written to me quite recently [(September 1881) : * Since I wrote
my " Companion," my judgment as to the Revised Version has
become much more unfavourable. Indeed I cannot but look
upon it, in its present state, as being a deplorable failure.'] I do
1 These suggestions were intended for the use of his colleagues, and
were made under a resolution which forbade the re-opening of the most
serious questions : they are, therefore, not a complete representation of his
opinions.
2 In a letter to my uncle, Dr. Field says (20 December, 1881) : ' I printed
1,000 copies, and have up to this time distributed nearly half that num
ber to such persons, dignitaries (as Bishops, Deans, and a few others),
libraries (of colleges, schools, &c.), and private scholars, as I thought most
likely to be interested in the subject. I have received many letters of
thanks, and I find a general consensus of opinion in regard to the revision,
expressed in very similar terms to those which you have pronounced in your
Charge and myself in my prefatory remarks.'
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 213
not quite go so far as that, but [I was seriously dissatisfied with
the result].
Our Chairman had many excellent qualities for his post, 1 but
he was much to blame for not reminding us that by introducing
so many minute and unexpected alterations we were exceeding
the terms of our commission, 2 and not only for not reminding us
of the fact, but for not preventing it, as I think he might and
ought to have done. It was not enough that he felt (as doubt
less he did) that he was only carrying out what appeared to be
the wishes of the majority of the Company. [But he had a duty
to those who felt as I did :] Non haec in foedera veni.
I joined the Company on the understanding [that our instruc
tions would be exactly followed]. And when I found, at the
completion of the Gospels, that we had far exceeded those
instructions I was anxious to withdraw; but Dr. Scrivener
persuaded me to remain on to the end. He himself shared my
dissatisfaction, at least to some extent ; and he assured me that
when the end came I should have an opportunity of joining with
others against the proceedings of which we disapproved ; but
this was never done. No such opportunity was ever found.
He goes on to remark on the occasional jests which
some members of the company allowed themselves, observ
ing, however, that the Nonconformist members of the body
always set an example of gravity, and then proceeds :
This suggests to me the remark that the Revision gave
occasion to other important results besides those immediately
connected with the work itself. The perfect level upon which
we met, and the brotherly cordiality which prevailed throughout
our meetings, rendered it impossible that the barrier which had
previously existed to social equality between Conformists and
1 Out of 407 meetings Bishop Ellicott attended 405, and Dr. Troutbeck,
the secretary, 406. Dr. Scrivener came near them with 399 attendances.
2 Beference is made to resolutions passed 25 May, 1870, viz. : 1. ' To
introduce as few alterations as possible into the Text of the Authorised
Version consistently with faithfulness.' 2. ' To limit, as far as possible,
the expression of such alterations to the language of the Authorised and
other English Versions.' These resolutions reproduce the sense of the
Keport accepted by the Convocation of Canterbury in 1870.
214 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
Nonconformists, at least to some extent, should any longer be
maintained. And for my own part I rejoiced in this. I looked
upon it as a step taken, not only towards bringing about more
intimate relations, but, if it please God, ultimate reconciliation.
The attitude of Dean Blakesley, of Lincoln, was similar,
but not quite so critical. He writes (9 January, 1881) :
I hardly know whether to rejoice or grieve at the termination
of our task of^Revision. It is certainly an improvement on the
old Version ; but then it might have been made much better
still if executed by fewer hands. I certainly think it has proved
useful in allowing common occupation to Churchmen and Dis
senters: (some of whom) were so mild and so diligent and
accurate, that one felt tempted to say, ' Talis cum sis, utinam
noster esses.' Moulton, the Methodist professor, struck me as
being one of the most valuable members of the whole Company.
The ' Final Considerations ' were never published ; but
in his Charge for 1881 the Bishop took occasion to discuss
the subject of Revision in a manner which must have
influenced those who were present. It was in one sense a
misfortune that this valuable paper was not published in a
more permanent form, but only in the newspapers, such as
the ' Scotsman/ the ' Glasgow Herald,' and the ' Glasgow
News' (all of Friday, 23 September).
On the other hand, the Bishop seems to have felt that
in making his protest public he had done as much as his
conscience required him to do ; while he might have
seemed to be disloyal to his colleagues l if he had circu
lated it with all the advantages of a well-printed pamphlet,
which would go down to posterity as an indictment of
their immense and self-denying labours. 2
1 See Public Appeals, ii. 597. He reprinted a small part of the Charge
there that dealing with the nomenclature of the orders of the Christian
ministry.
2 Mr. John Henry Parker, of Oxford, actually offered to publish it for
him gratis, to be sold for a penny.
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 215
Edwin Palmer, then Archdeacon of Oxford, a brother
reviser, who went generally with the majority, and did
good service to their cause by his excellent edition of the
' Greek Testament with the Kevisers' Headings, ' wrote thus
(on 26 January, 1882) in acknowledging a copy of the
' Glasgow Herald.' He regretted the Bishop's dissent, but
on the whole thought that it might not injure the cause in
the end :
I do not hold it likely to add to the credit of our work that
you should appear as a frequent dissentient, and indeed as
adverse to the general methods adopted by the Company. But
I never understood that individual Revisers were under any bond
to hold their tongues after the publication of the work, and I am
not sure that there is not some advantage in the liberty of
criticism on the results of the majority in which you and others
have indulged yourselves. No outside critic can suppose now
that ' the Revisers ' hear for the first time from his mouth
such objections as Sir E. Beckett and Dean Burgon, in the
January ' Quarterly ' (the October article stands on different
ground), showered upon us so bountifully. Nor can such an
objector reasonably doubt that, when his view was advocated in
our conclave by such men as yourself, it received the fullest con
sideration. So I am not sorry, upon the whole, that you have
given your protest to the world.
If the reader cares to know my opinion, after
sufficient time for reflection, it is that the pedantry and
awkwardness of the Eevised Version would not strike us
as much as the early critics contended, if we heard it
read often enough to become thoroughly familiar with it.
Rhythm depends very much on accent, and right and
seemly accent is a matter of habit quite as much as of
rule. The distinction between pedantry and faithfulness
is not a very easy one to draw, and I am personally
grateful to the revisers for their determination to give a
faithful rendering, even at the risk of seeming pedantic.
I have seen too much of the mischief caused by the care-
216 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
less and superficial revision of the Latin New Testament
by St. Jerome, to have any sympathy with the idea that a
mere patchwork emendation would have availed to bear the
judgment of posterity.
On the other hand I think it was distinctly a misfortune
that the Gospels were the first portion of the Bible revised.
The Epistles were much more in need of emended transla
tion than the Gospels, and certainly the revisers have made
them muchrmore accessible to English readers than they
were before. If they could have been circulated in a
limited number of copies and exposed to criticism, the
revisers would have tested public feeling better, and have
been more cautious in regard to the more sacred pages of
the Gospels. As it is, we have to take the work as a whole,
and to test it by reading it aloud in order to give it a fair
trial. In some twenty years' time I hope a further revision
will be possible, which will remove some obvious blots from
the revision, like ' men in whom he is well pleased ' (Luke
ii. 14) * in the angels' song, but leave the general body of the
work to be used concurrently with the Authorised Version.
The most important independent publication of the
Bishop in this period was undoubtedly his volume on the
Christian Ministry. Its full title is * Outlines of the
Christian Ministry delineated and brought to the test of
Beason, Holy Scripture, History, and Experience : with
a view to the Keconciliation of Existing Differences con
cerning it, especially between Presbyterians and Episco
palians ' (London : Longmans, Green & Co. 1872). It was
dedicated to his Felloiv- Labourers from Scotland 2 in the
1 Dr. Field has shown that &vQpu>iros is not used in Biblical Greek with a
qualifying genitive, but that this construction would require tv avSpda-iv
(uSoKtas. The construction cuSoKeti/ lv avdptivois is also the usual one.
2 These were Principal D. Brown, of the Free Church College, Aberdeen ;
Dr. J. Eadie, of the U. P. College, Glasgow ; Dr. Milligan, of Aberdeen ;
Dr. Roberts, of St. Andrews
H. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 217
ivork of revising the Authorised Version of the New Testa
ment in token of sincere esteem and affection, recognising
their common desire to ' Love the truth and peace.' The
book consists in substance of three lectures delivered by
the author in the principal cities and towns of Scotland,
especially in the four University cities of Edinburgh,
Glasgow, Aberdeen, and St. Andrews. The manuscript
had been laid aside, but was taken up after a perusal of
Dr. Lightfoot's essay on the same subject attached to his
commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians, first
published in 1868. It is occupied with three main
arguments (1) that a priori, from the general character of
the Church and the analogies of nature, and of the consti
tution of the Jewish Church, and similar considerations ;
(2) from Holy Scripture and from history with answers
to objections against the threefold ministry ; (3) ex conse-
quente, from the consideration of the evil consequences
that have followed from the abandonment of the threefold
ministry, especially among Presbyterians. The tendency
of the book is, therefore, wholly ' apologetic,' to use a
technical term, viz. to defend the threefold ministry,
particularly the Episcopate, against attacks. There is
little or no attempt to treat the duties of the ministry,
pastoral and sacerdotal, from a practical point of view.
Nevertheless, even in this matter the third head of argu
ment is very interesting and helpful, and it is perhaps the
most original portion of the book.
I do not know any treatise in which the student of
theology can more conveniently or .profitably begin the
study of this subject. If he then goes on to read Bishop
Lightfoot's 'Essay,' with the Bishop of St. Andrews'
' Remarks ' upon it, published (by Parker & Co.) in 1879,
and then turns to Canon Gore's 'The Church and the
Ministry,' published in 1889, and Professor E. C. Moberly's
218 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vi
' Ministerial Priesthood,' published in 1897, and Professor
Sanday's ' Conception of the Priesthood,' published in 1898,
he will have as full a statement of the case from learned and
balanced theologians of the Church of England, and from
different points of view, as his heart can desire.
The 'Remarks' above mentioned were called forth
principally by a sermon entitled ' The Burning Bush,'
preached by Dean Stanley, at Glasgow, before a large
Presbyterian audience, 27 March, 1879, ' in which he put
an interpretation on Bishop Lightfoot's views as favourable
to Presbyterian ism to an extent certainly not warranted by
his arguments taken as a whole. A second edition of the
* Remarks ' was published in 1884 ' (' Public Appeals,'
ii. 616). Stanley's sermon may be found at the end of
the second edition of his characteristic volume of ' Lectures
on the History of the Church of Scotland, delivered in
Edinburgh in 1872,' published in 1879.
The following letter (4 July, 1879) from Bishop Wil
liams, of Connecticut, is a remarkable testimony to the
value set on the Bishop's work by an excellent judge in the
sister Church of U.S.A.
Professor Hart brought me yesterday the copy of your ' Out
lines of the Christian Ministry ' which you were kind enough to
give him for me. ... I shall especially prize this copy as your
gift ; and, besides, it will enable me to have a clean copy for
myself. For it may interest you to know that your excellent
book the copy, that is, which I have long had has done yeo
man's service in these regions. I have found it so useful for
candidates for Holy Orders, and especially to persons coming to
us from Congregational or Presbyterian bodies, that it has been
kept in constant circulation. Indeed, I hardly see it from one
year to another. It or what is left of it, for it has been
dilapidated in its manifold travels is now in the hands of a
Methodist minister who is seeking Orders in the Church.
You will not wonder that I am particularly grateful, not only
CH. vi LAST YEARS AT PERTH. 1868-1876 219
for your remembrance, but for enabling me to keep by me a work
the value of which I so thoroughly know and appreciate. I wish
I could send you something in return ; but my work in theology
is not to write, but to teach candidates. This year has completed
the quarter century of my own Divinity School, from which nearly
250 clergy have gone out into the Church.
I will add here in conclusion the Bishop of St. Andrews'
own note on * Sacerdotalism ' prepared for this volume :
All Christians are Priests, as all Israel was a Priestly Nation ;
but, as under the law, so now under the Gospel there is an
unction a special element of xap to 7* a (this Principal Tulloch
allowed) given to rightly ordained ministers of Christ, by which
they are separated from the Laity, to enable them to discharge
in a more effectual manner the functions of their sacred office
and for the benefit of those to whom they minister and that
there may be no confusion in the Body, but order and good
government.
This Dean Stanley denied, and Bishop Lightfoot does not
seem to admit ('MS. Note-book,' ii. 36).
220 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
CHAPTER VII
RESIDENCE AT ST. ANDREWS AND LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION.
tf
1876-1892
' He who would win the name of truly great
Must understand his own age and the next,
And make the present read} to fulfil
Its prophecy, and with the future merge
Gently and peacefully, as wave with wave.'
From J. R. LOWELL, A Glance behind the Curtain.
Reasons for the Bishop's removal to St. Andrews Influence on him of the
learned Society there Retrospect The ' Church Service Society ' founded
in 1867 Its influence on Presbyterian worship The Bishop renews his
efforts Lambeth Conference of 1878 Lord Bute's Breviary Sermon at
the Consecration of Edinburgh Cathedral (1879) Correspondence with Dr.
Milligan (1880) Duke of Argyll The ' St. Giles's Lectures ' (1880-1) His
criticism in ' Discourse on Scottish Church History ' Its character
Letter from 'A Son of Toil' Summary of the Bishop's views on Church
polity ' Prospects of Reconciliation ' (1882) drawn out by Milligan's
conduct as Moderator Dr. Sprott's theory of ' two orders ' How far
supported Presentation of portrait Invitations to preach in College
Church and Parish Church, St. Andrews, accepted (1884) Letter to
Dean Johnston Archbishop Benson's general sympathy with his efforts
Description of a University Sermon at St. Andrews by the poet Robert
F. Murray Important article on ' Union or Separation ' (May 1884) Its
influence on the position of the Bishop at the Seabury Commemoration
Address prepared for that event Article on 'Archbishop Hamilton's
Catechism ' (January 1885) Death of Bishop Christopher Wordsworth
(March 1885) Relation of the Brothers' The Case of non-Episcopal
Ordination Fairly Considered ' (3 September, 1885) ' Public Appeals '
(two vols.), published 1886 Suggestion that Presbyterian Orders, though
irregular, may be valid Address at Aberdeen University (February
1886) Invitation to lecture at St. Cuthbert's, Edinburgh Changes in
the Episcopate Bishop Dowden consecrated and Bishop Jermyn elected
Primus (21 September, 1886) Charge on ' Book of Common Prayer '
Jenny Geddes Bishop Dowden, with his Chapter, objects to St. Cuth
bert's Lecture' The Yoke of Christ to be Borne in Youth ' published
(1887) Letters from Presbyterians and others Dr. Cunningham's ' Lee
CH. vii RESIDENCE AT ST. ANDREWS. 1876-1892 221
Lecture ' discouraging Other publications ' Jubilee Tract ' Question
of a Metropolitan 'Letter to Archbishop Benson Ecclesiastical Union
between England and Scotland ' Case of the Donatists Wide proposals
of Committee of Lambeth Conference (July 1888) Charge of August
1888 ' On Lambeth Conference ' Invitation to preach before University
of Edinburgh : 'A Three-fold Eule of Christian Duty 'The author's own
judgment: discussion of principle, precedent, and expediency These
indicate weak points in the Bishop of St. Andrews' scheme Further
opinion reserved Obvious points emphasized Duty of co-operation in
practical work.
Happy alteration in the Bishop's relation to St. Ninian's Healthy
influence of ' Supernumeraries,' Kevs. S. B. Hodson and G. T. Farquhar
Bishop uses Cathedral again 1882 onwards Death of Provost Burton
and appointment of Provost V. L. Eorison Lord Glasgow's failure : a
blessing in disguise New life of Cathedral (1886-1890) Consecration
of Nave (7 August, 1890) Verses to G. T. Farquhar The Provost made
Dean and Kev. A. S. Aglen Archdeacon Charge describing work of
General Synod (1890) Charge ' On Old Testament Criticism ' (1891)
Analogy from reaction against Wolfian theory of Homeric poems
Present of a chair and 'pastoral staff (April 1892) Continued literary
activity Last Charge read by Dean (October 1892) Untoward incident
Final words on Keunion Foundation of ' Scottish Church Society '
Last illness and death (5 December, 1892) Burial in Cathedral yard.
Summary of the Bishop's public services by Dr. Danson and Canon
Farquhar His supposed egotism His belief in the reality of the move
ment among leading Presbyterians Testimony of Dr. James Cooper.
THE following is the Bishop's own account of the reasons
which actuated him in his removal to St. Andrews :
The lease of the house which I had occupied [at Perth] for
nearly nineteen years was now expiring, and as my landlord
insisted upon raising the rent, which I thought unreasonable
(as I had done much and spent large sums in improving both
the house and grounds), I determined not to renew it. Had
my relations with St. Ninian's been such as I could have wished,
I should have been very unwilling to remove from Perth ; but
as this was not so, and as no other suitable house was to be
had in the town or immediate neighbourhood, I was obliged to
look out for a residence elsewhere ; and the offer of Bishop's
Hall, then for sale at a price greatly below the original cost,
tempted me to St. Andrews. The situation of St. Andrews at
an extreme corner of the Diocese, while Perth was at the very
centre, was a serious drawback ; but, in other respects, its recom
mendations as a residence for the Bishop in comparison with
222 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
Perth, were great and obvious. The building of Bishop's Hall
was larger than I required, though I had then seven daughters
at home. But I had means of turning its accommodation to
account for the benefit of my clergy, and in other ways. Perth,
for so large a town, was deficient in literary society, and, when
the trouble of the removal was over, I felt at once a pride and
a pleasure in finding myself among men such as Principals
Tulloch and Shairp, Dr. Boyd, Professors Baynes, Campbell,
Mitchell, Roberts, Crombie, Dr. Rodger and, later on, Professor
Knight, to saymothing of the society of occasional visitors
during the summer months; while in the other parts of the
year the presence of the young men at the university afforded
objects of interest of a different and a higher kind.
In another note he mentions also Principal Cunningham
(who succeeded Tulloch) as one of those whose acquaintance
he made during the later part of his life at St. Andrews,
and calls it ' a literary and clerical society nowhere to be
surpassed.'
There can be no doubt that this period of the Bishop's
life was in most respects far happier than that which had
preceded it. It also clearly deepened his conviction of the
necessity of making some practical concessions to Presby
terians, in respect to their orders, if reconciliation was to be
attained. I attribute this conviction not a little to the
personal society of the good and able Presbyterian teachers
into which he was thrown, whom he found to be, or thought
to be, ready to accept Episcopacy if the manner of its
acceptance could be tempered so as to avoid subjecting
them to humiliation. He saw what an immense blessing
a national Episcopal Church of Scotland would be if it
embraced such men, and he saw also that the existing
Episcopal Church was unable to claim anything like
equality with the Establishment in the number of its
learned sons, while in its general hold upon the people it
was miserably inferior.
CH. vii RESIDENCE AT ST. ANDREWS. 1876-1892 223
We have seen that at the time when the Bishop inter
mitted his Keunion work in 1867 the Established Church
began to move internally in the organisation of its own
forces. In that year the ' Church Service Society ' was
founded for the study of the Ancient Liturgies and the
preparation of suitable offices for public worship l thus
using the liberty which Dr. Kobert Lee had vindicated for
the Clergy of his Communion. The formation of the
Society was suggested by Dr. Sprott, an independent
inquirer in this field. The Society took its origin among
the Glasgow clergy, on the invitation of Mr. George
Campbell, Minister of Eastwood. Naturally its leaders
were what could be called * High Churchmen,' viz. Prin
cipal P. C. Campbell, of Aberdeen, Mr. Campbell, and Dr.
Sprott; but though Dr. Lee did not favour it, younger
men of his school, ' Broad Churchmen of the older
type,' such as Principal Tulloch and Dr. Story, joined it,
and the latter especially took a prominent share in its
formation.
Its chief work was the remarkable ' Euchologion ' or
' Book of Common Order,' which has passed through many
editions and is extensively used. It provides forms for the
two great Sacraments, and for the sacramental acts of Mar
riage and Ordination, and also for Burial. It has provided
for the orderly reading of Holy Scripture, and revived the
celebration of Marriage in church, and the use of a Burial
Service at the graveside. It has helped to restore the observ
ance of the chief Festivals of the Church by the provision of
Lessons and Collects. Principal Tulloch was instrumental
in procuring the insertion in it of the Nicene Creed.
This movement went on side by side with such Litur
gical developments and enrichments as we have been
1 In the following sentences I have followed Dr. James Cooper, The
Revival of Church Principles in the Church of Scotland (Oxford, 1895).
224 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
familiar with in England in the form of Children's Ser
vices, improved Hymnals, restored Churches, and the like.
The Holy Table came, in some (now perhaps in many)
churches, to have its proper place of honour; organs,
painted windows, and the like were introduced ; the cross
is frequent in monuments and on the outside of churches.
Communion every quarter (instead of once or twice a year)
is now common, and a monthly, or sometimes more than
monthly, celebration is not unknown.
A knowledge of this movement, and the healing influ
ence of time in regard to his own troubles, gradually
enabled the Bishop to recover from the ' great despond
ency ' which was noticed in his Charge of 1875. It will
be seen from the Suggestions as to the Catechism printed in
Appendix III at the end of this volume, that the Bishop
took very little direct part in the Lambeth Conference of
1878, being only present at the first day's session. He
presented to it, however, the draft of his important ' Sug
gested Addition to Church Catechism,' which afterwards
received the approval of the Episcopal Synod in Scotland.
The first fresh effort on his part, in the direction of his old
Keunion enterprise, may perhaps be found in the sermon
which he preached at the Consecration of St. Mary's
Cathedral, Edinburgh (30 October, 1879) a noble building,
especially in its interior, given to the Episcopal Church by
the piety of two sisters, Barbara and Mary Walker, and
probably the most important material instrument which it
has received in this century next to Trinity College, Glen-
almond. The sermon, entitled ' More than Solomon is
here,' was evidently intended to conciliate the Scottish
mind by showing the general advantages which such an
institution possesses, rather than to sound a note of
triumph. Of it he writes to his sister-in-law, Miss M.
Barter :
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 225
If it had any merit it lies in its abstinence from anything
very demonstrative. I have learnt that the Scotch mind is not
to be carried by storm, as the English mind may be ; and there
fore I believe it was not unsuccessful here, though in England
perhaps more would be expected on such an occasion.
Another timely publication at this date was an article
on the Marquess of Bute's * Translation of the Koman
Breviary ' (a book in 2 vols. 8vo.), which appeared in the
' Edinburgh Courant ' of 16 December, 1879. The publi
cation of which the article was a critique was not likely, in
its original form and it is now very scarce to pass into
many hands. The Bishop did a service to the Church by
pointing out publicly some of the salient features of the
Breviary, as compared with the Prayer Book, its cumbrous-
ness and complexity, its addresses to saints of prayers that
ought to be addressed to God, its retention of ridiculous
legends and apocryphal matter, its large use of human
words as ' Lessons,' and its comparatively small and very
inconvenient use of Scripture. The reviewer also does not
fail to indicate a certain bold and independent treatment of
his material on which the Marquess had ventured.
This, however, was rather an excursus of a congenial
sort than a definite step in the Eeunion movement except
so far as it rright show the anti-Eoman, but fair and
courteous, controversial spirit of the reviewer. Next to
the Edinburgh sermon I should count among such steps
(and it was a much more decided one) a correspondence
with the late Professor Milligan, of Aberdeen, whose friend
ship the Bishop had made over New Testament Ke vision.
The latter wrote to me that the Bishop did not write much
to him, and, as he (Milligan) went to St. Andrews once a
year or so, he contented himself with the hope of seeing
him personally there.
But from time to time letters passed between them, and
Q
226 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
the following is important enough to be inserted here. It
is dated Bishopshall, 19 April, 1880.
No truer words were ever spoken than some which I see you
are reported to have used in your last Croall lecture. * To speak
of making the world believe in a Risen Lord by mere Bible
circulation or missionary exertion was to waste time and strength,
unless it were attended by the spectacle of Unity,' &c.
I have often said the same ; but, as coming from one in your
position, I rejoice to think it is infinitely more likely to carry
weight. I also quite agree with you that there has been ' too
much speaking about unity and too little action.' I have not
only spoken much perhaps too much but have also done some
little though perhaps too little (though the best I could see my
way to) and now I shall look to you to help me to do more,
or at least to invite me to march under your standard, with its
admirable motto, ' Visible Unity and (Mutual) Helpfulness.' For
some twenty years I have used daily the enclosed prayer, 1 and
would gladly do anything more you may recommend.
The following was the answer, dated Aberdeen,
24 April :
1 Visible Unity and Mutual Helpfulness.'
Let the excellent motto stand. I think that I should have it
printed at the top of the note paper I am to use, that it may
be constantly before my own eyes and those of my corre
spondents.
I am greatly pleased that you should have found anything to
give you satisfaction in the newspaper report of my last lecture.
... By and by I shall have to publish the lectures and shall then
have to try and speak out. What am I to do now ? I really do
not well know. I fear that I am not fit for much action, and
thinking that we have had plenty at least of general speech, I
too often sit moping in my own den here and let things go their
way. There can be no doubt, however, I imagine, as to the great
necessity which exists for a thorough reviewing on the part of
all our Christian bodies of the whole situation. The solution
1 Probably the prayer for Unity from the Accession Service, with a
clause specially applying it to Scotland. See Appendix III. p. 358.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 227
offered by the mere fact of Disestablishment seems to me so
short-sighted and so imperfect, that I can hardly think that even
those most eager about it can thoroughly believe in their own
panacea. I can hardly resist the conviction that there must be
widespread beneath the surface the feeling that something more
is necessary. You have lived long enough among us to know
the hollowness of our Church cries.
Other letters followed on both sides, and the outcome,
though not immediate, was doubtless a drawing together
of two single-minded and wise-hearted men who between
them laid the foundations of separate pillars that must
some day grow together into an arch in the Church of God.
The Bishop, notwithstanding his kindly feeling to
Presbyterians of a certain class, was nevertheless at all
times on the alert to criticise and demolish inaccuracy in
argument on their side, and in his Charge of 1880
(' Public Appeals,' ii. 616) he had occasion to notice a slip
of the Duke of Argyll's, when he laid down, in a speech at
Ballachulish, that Episcopacy grew out of Presbytery just
as the Papacy grew out of Episcopacy, and urged his
countrymen not to sacrifice any part of their ancient
traditions, viz. of antagonism to this development. The
Bishop's answer naturally was that the Papacy was no
natural outgrowth of Episcopacy, but was due to the
historical fact of the Pope's being Bishop of Rome, the capital
of the civilised West. The Papacy was really the enemy
of Diocesan Episcopacy. In the East Episcopacy had all
along been universal, without giving birth to a Papacy, or
acknowledging it in its Western form. The Duke's argu
ment, therefore, though specious, was devoid of real cogency.
A more important opportunity of gaining the public
ear was, however, given him from another side a few months
later.
In the winter of 1880-81 twelve of the Presbyterian
Q 2
228 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
clergy were selected to deliver what were called the 'St.
Giles's Lectures,' first in Edinburgh and afterwards in
Glasgow, on the subject of Scottish Church History. These
lectures were in many respects commendable, but some of
them deserved comment and criticism, not only those deal
ing with the period of the Reformation, but more particu
larly the eighth lecture, by Dr. Story, dealing with the
reign of William III., which had much of the ' keen east
wind ' abouHt. The Bishop of St. Andrews, whose ' Dis
course on the Scottish Reformation,' published in 1861,
showed his large command of historical material, was
naturally asked to provide some counterbalancing con
siderations. He delivered two lectures in St. Mary's
Cathedral, Edinburgh, on two successive Sundays, 8 and
15 May, 1881, which were afterwards published under the
title, ' A Discourse on Scottish Church History from the
Reformation to the present time, with Prefatory Remarks
on the St. Giles's Lectures and Appendix of Notes and
References' (Wm. Blackwood & Sons). The Prefatory
Remarks are an elaborate review of the St. Giles's Lectures,
which much enhance the value of the ' Discourse.' They
show clearly enough the difference of opinion that existed
among the lecturers, and add largely to our knowledge of
the topics treated by them. The ' Discourse ' itself is full
of much matter for thought. It is based on four words
Reformation, Restoration, Revolution, Disruption. It
must be confessed that the tone is rather sad, and has
more in it of the lamentation of Hebrew prophecy than of
the exulting hopefulness of Scottish patriotism. While
Bishop Wordsworth was conscious of the strong points of
the Scottish character, he was, I think, constantly repelled
by its want of intelligent orderliness as understood by an
Englishman. And his subject, in almost every aspect of
it, suggested reasonable grounds for criticism. He had,
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION, 1876-1892 229
of course, no affection for the spiritual revolution which
ruthlessly separated the Church of the [Reformation, in
Scotland far more than in England, from the Church of the
past, though he strove to do justice both to Knox and to
Melville. He had little or no sympathy for nonjuring
Jacobitisrn in his own communion, which he called ' infatu
ation ' and ' attempting to live on a Eomance.' He was
equally out of harmony with the claim of Presbyterianism
to be established ' by the will of the people ' ; and, while he
admitted the noble and magnanimous character of the Free
Church disruption movement of 1843, he thought it, like
the nonjuring attitude of the Episcopal Church, a kind of
' martyrdom by mistake.' There was, therefore, little to
please him in the general movement of Ecclesiastical affairs
in Scotland, though of course it was possible to look with
satisfaction on many actions of individuals, and to discern
in it as a whole the signs of God's Providential care in
overruling the wills of men.
The Bishop had the satisfaction of receiving from his
publishers, Messrs. Blackwoods, a note, dated 9 June, 1891,
stating that a generous friend of the Church, who desired
to remain anonymous, had ordered 1,000 copies of this
lecture, 500 to be sent to Ministers of the Church of Scot
land and 500 to Free Church Ministers.
He also valued the following from an anonymous
correspondent, a Presbyterian working man :
Right Rev. Sir, Emboldened by your letter in the ' Scotsman '
of the 20th, I beg to offer you my sincere congratulations on the
noble sentiments expressed by you in your animadversions on
the St. Giles's Lectures ; believing as I do you will not under
rate the same, though they come from the pen of a humble
working man, who is also a Presbyterian.
In the first place those lectures were open to challenge from
the fact that several of those men who were singled out as
worthy of the high honour were not men whom we look upon
230 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. TII
as champions of our faith ; nay as true, genuine representatives
of Presbyterianism at all. What is worse, some of them are
men who have occasionally given expression to sentiments calcu
lated to strike at the very roots of our common faith. No doubt
some of them are men of distinguished talents and keen dis
crimination, of whom we may justly be proud ; but through many
of the lectures there exhibited itself a spirit of exultation and
foolish bravado which (at this time especially) it ill becomes any
branch of the Christian Church to manifest. What, however,
I liked worst, and what you by example corrected, was the
tendency to overlook and ignore the overruling of Divine Provi
dence. This is one of the more decided forms which Infidelity
assumes in the present day ; and that it is gradually creeping
into our Churches we are not without proof. I rejoice in the
honest Christian integrity of men who like you are valiant in the
open rebuke of such a spirit, and in the open avowal of a
constant belief in God the Father, as well as in His Blessed
Son. I congratulate you on the testimony of a good conscience
which must undoubtedly be yours, and envying those who enjoy
your personal friendship, I am, with sincere respect,
Your obedient servant,
A SON OF TOIL.
A Country Parish, 21 June, 1881.
This may perhaps be a fitting place in this Memoir to
sum up the Bishop's views on the whole question of Church
polity. As far as I can analyse his belief it consisted
mainly of three articles :
First that the Bible, as well as reason and experience,
taught that Episcopacy was right ;
Secondly, that an Establishment of religion, according
to the Bible, was part of God's will ;
Thirdly, that the Synodal system, in which the laity
were to have their proper place, was necessary to the
Church of the future, and in accordance both with primi
tive Church principles and present conditions of Church
life.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 231
It is difficult to say which of these three articles he
held with greater tenacity than the others : I have
been struck with his strong attachment to the second.
For though he would have granted free toleration to
all who stood outside an Established Church, he clung
ever to the duty of having a national representation of
religion. He was, however, no Erastian, and he spoke in
the strongest terms of the injury done to the position of
his own Communion by its acceptance of the * Assertory
Act ' of 1669, which put the disposal of the external
government and polity of the Church at the mercy of the
Crown. As regards the Episcopal Church he was much
opposed to the importation of Englishmen to fill important
charges in it, and he felt that everything possible must be
done to prepare the way for a union between it and the
Established Church, while the main principle of Episcopacy
was preserved.
He had dropped any direct action tending towards Re
union, as we have said, in the year 1867 (see Chapter V.).
The proceedings of the General Assembly of 1882 encour
aged him to renew his efforts. The closing Address of
Dr. Milligan, of Aberdeen, was, as might be expected from
the letters printed above, a remarkable utterance for the
Moderator of such an assembly. The Bishop naturally took
it for the text of his Charge delivered in the Autumn,
entitled ' Prospects of Reconciliation between Presbytery and
Episcopacy.' ' It may be said (he asserts) I believe with
truth, that a nobler or more memorable manifesto, if I ma} r
so call it, has never proceeded from the occupant of that
chair.' He notices also the kindly motion of Dr. Tulloch,
whose friendship he made about this period as Principal of
St. Mary's College. Incidentally he praises the institution
of the General Assembly as the backbone of the Presby
terian Church and as giving it a great and paramount
232 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vii
advantage over the Episcopalian. He quotes, too, with
approval, my predecessor Bishop Moberly's last Charge of
1882, in which he spoke of the necessity of * building up a
central body, not a Synod of the clergy, but the Synod of
the Church framed upon true Church principles,' evidently
a body of clergy and laity working together, as in the
United States and the Colonial Churches generally. The
remainder of the Bishop of St. Andrews' Charge is taken
up with a discussion of the theory of the ' twofold ministry '
chiefly in answer to Dr. Sprott, who argued in favour of
' two orders,' Presbyters and Deacons. This latter theory (as
the Bishop noticed) has some arguments in its favour from
the Apostolic Constitutions, and the teaching of medieval
schoolmen, and even of Hooker, who drew a distinction, in
one place at least, between ' two orders ' and ' three degrees,'
counting Bishops and Presbyters both to belong to the
order of Presbyters. (See E. P.' v. 78, sec. 2, 5, 9, 12.
He does not, however, make use of this distinction in his
later books.) Field, Mason, Forbes of Corse, and Usher are
also referred to as favouring it, though he did not accept
it himself.
I may remark, in passing, that this method of distin
guishing the clergy has received a certain confirmation,
since the Bishop wrote, from the inquiry into the so-called
Canons of Hippolytus, a document supposed originally to
have belonged to the beginning of the third century and
to the Church of Kome. In this document we find the
same ordination formula prescribed both for Bishops and
Presbyters, to be used only with a difference of name. The
evidence also that the practice of ordination per saltum,
which is thus implied, was primitive and long continued in
the Church of Borne, though not new, has received greater
currency. That is to say, it is now understood that a man
might be ordained to either of the three degrees without
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 233
passing through the lower ranks, and especially might be
made Bishop without first becoming Presbyter. 1
Immediately after the delivery of the Charge of 1882,
just referred to, it was arranged that the Bishop should
be presented with his portrait painted by Mr. H. T. Munns
of London. 2 It was hung in the room, and represented the
Bishop delivering his last year's Charge on the Kevised
Version. The presentation was made by Captain Oswald of
Dunnikier, who spoke of the unanimity and readiness with
which the proposal to present the portrait had been received,
and stated that it was intended to be an heirloom in the
family. The Bishop expressed his thanks, as might be
expected, in a short review of his relations to the Diocese
and of the progress made in it, adding :
The two features in our progress which I regard with most
satisfaction are, on the one hand, the general softening, and to a
great extent entire disappearance, of prejudices against us on the
part of our Presbyterian brethren ; and, on the other hand, the
increased interest now taken by our own laity in the affairs of
our Church, and the zeal and energy which many of them show
in their earnest desire to promote its welfare and advance
ment.
The next few years saw the Bishop's advance to the
furthest point of reconciliation with the Established Church
to which he felt it prudent to go. In January 1884 the
' Senatus Academicus ' of St. Andrews offered him, through
Principal Tulloch, an honorary degree, giving him a choice
between the LL.D. and the D.D. He chose the latter ; and
it was conferred on 17 February. This gave him a position
in the University in close proximity to which he lived, and
he felt it a sort of duty to do something in return in the
1 The evidence on both these points is referred to in our Archbishops'
Answer to the Apostolic Letter of Pope Leo XIII. on English Ordinations,
chaps, xii. 1 and xiii. 2
2 Exhibited in the Koyal Academy, 1883. See frontispiece.
234 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. vn
way of a theological thesis. 1 Hence when he was addressed
by the students generally asking him to give them a sermon,
and also by the members of a Students' Missionary Associa
tion, including young men of different denominations, with
a like request, he was ready to listen to both invitations.
This led to his preaching in the College Church on Sunday,
9 March, with the full approval of Mr. M. Rodger, the
Incumbent, and on the Sunday after in the Parish Church,
of which his friend Dr. A. K. H. Boyd was Incumbent, at
the special service held once a year for the Students'
Missionary Association.
His reasons for taking these steps, and the limitations
which he wished to be put upon them as precedents both for
himself and others, were explained to the Diocese in a printed
letter, dated Bishopshall, 17 March, 1884, and addressed
to the Very Rev. N. Johnston, then Dean of the Diocese. 2
He explained the peculiar circumstances of both cases ; and
pointed out that it could not be inferred that he was there
fore willing to preach in any Presbyterian Church on any
occasion, or that his example might be pretended by the
clergy to justify them in so doing. At the same time he
implied that such further advances were rather a question
of opportuneness and expediency, than forbidden by law or
principle. He took the opportunity of reiterating some
1 He received the same degree from the University of Edinburgh in the
same year, two months later, at their Tercentenary (17 April, 1884). This
naturally weighed with him in accepting invitations to St. Cuthbert's and
St. Giles's. He habitually wore both hoods, one in Lent and one in Advent :
see below, p. 337.
2 Dean Torry had died in 1879, and the Bishop attended his funeral
(Friday, 19 December). He writes of his successor (23 January), 1880 : ' I
have appointed Mr. Johnston, of Kirkcaldy, to succeed Dean Torry. He is
the senior Presbyter of the Diocese, being as old as I am, and that is a
disadvantage ; but, all things considered (and there are some that required
very careful and anxious consideration), I could not see my way to do better.
He is a man of sound judgment, and I feel that I can depend upon him.'
Dean Johnston died, quite painlessly, in his sleep in September 1890.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 235
of the general considerations on reconciliation which were
familiar to him, and quotes the following from a Charge
of the then newly-created Archbishop, delivered as Bishop
of Truro in 1883 to his Diocesan Conference :
I would not spoil by an indistinct word the practical views of
such papers as we heard last year. I would only enforce them
by reminding you of the near approaches (formerly incredible)
to each other of the Scottish Episcopal and Established Presby
terian Churches. When we think of their history so ennobled
and so stained, so inveterate on both sides and so heroic, and
mark their attitude to-day, the hardest man may believe that it
is no will of God that any devotion and faith should war for ever
against faith and devotion ; or the folds of the flocks stand * like
cliffs that have been rent asunder ' and ' dreary seas flow between '
them hopelessly and unalterably. Let me commend to any who
have not read them as voices of promise for the whole Church
the closing address of Dr. Milligan, Moderator of the General
Assembly of 1882 ; the Speech of Principal Tulloch in the same
Assembly ; and the first part of Bishop Charles Wordsworth's
Charge in the Synod of the United Diocese.
The Diocese practically approved of his action by
passing unanimously, at the next Synod, a resolution thank
ing him for what he had done in the cause of Union.
The impression made by a similar sermon at St.
Andrews (for he continued to preach once a year in the
College Church l ) has been recorded in the following frank
and pleasant letter from a young St. Andrews' poet,
Kobert F. Murray, author of ' The Scarlet Gown ' and
other poems. The letter is dated (Sunday) 17 April, 1887,
1 See Public Appeals, ii. 614 and 669 foil. note. The last entry in his
Diary of such a sermon is Second Sunday in Lent (26 February) 1888.
Similar sermons were preached, with his approval, in the same Chapel by
the Bishop of Eipon (W. B. Carpenter) and Dr. Danson, of Aberdeen. At
the same time, it is to be noticed that he did not approve of English
Bishops or clergy preaching, without consulting him, in such churches, much
less making a practice of going to Presbyterian places of worship in
preference to those of the Episcopal Church.
236 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
and was evidently written just after the sermon, and
without any idea of its going beyond the person who
received it. Its writer died, aged thirty, in 1893. !
There was a University sermon, and I thought I would go
and hear it. So I donned my old cap and gown and felt quite
proud of them. The preacher was Bishop Wordsworth. He
goes in for the union of the Presbyterian and Episcopalian
Churches, and is glad to preach in a Presbyterian Church as he
did this morning. How the aforesaid union is to be brought
about I'm sure I don't know, for I am pretty certain that the
Episcopalians won't give up their Bishops, and the Presbyterians
won't have them on any account. However, that's neither here
nor there at least it does not affect the fact that Wordsworth
is a first-rate man and a fine preacher. I dare say you know he
is a nephew, or grandnephew, of the poet. He is a most vener
able old man, and worth looking at merely for his exterior.
He is so feeble with age that he can with difficulty climb the
three short steps that lead into the pulpit, but once in the pulpit
it is another thing. There is no feebleness when he begins to
preach. He is one of the last voices of the old orthodox school,
and I wish there were hundreds like him. If ever man believed
in his message Wordsworth does. And though I cannot follow
him in his veneration for the thirty-nine Articles, the way in
which he does makes me half wish I could. ... It was full of
wisdom and the beauty of holiness, which even I, poor sceptic
and outcast, could recognise and appreciate. After all, he didn't
get it from the Articles, but from his own human heart, which
he told us was deceitful and desperately wicked. Confound it,
how stupid we all are ! Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Unitarians,
Agnostics ; the whole lot of us. We all believe the same things,
to a great extent ; but we must keep wrangling as to the data
from which we infer these beliefs. ... I believe a great deal
that he does, but I certainly don't act up to my belief as he does
to his.
1 It may be found at p. xxv of Mr. Andrew Lang's Introduction to the
volume of Murray's Poems published in London in 1894. The ' scarlet
gown ' is, of course, that worn by students at St. Andrews, as at some
other Scottish Universities. (See below, p. 304.)
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 237
Between September 1882, when he returned to the
subject of Keunion, and September 1885, when he delivered
his most important Charge dealing with it as a matter of
practical policy, there were signs both of encouragement
and discouragement to the movement. Individual Presby
terians of distinction spoke and wrote strongly and affec
tionately, amongst whom the foremost were probably Dr.
Cunningham, in his Lecture on Dr. Kobert Lee; Dr.
Cameron Lees, writing on Bishop Ewing among * Scottish
Divines ' ; Dr. Milligan, in the ' Catholic Presbyterian,'
September 1883 ; Mr. John Parker, Minister of Cleland,
in the preface to a Sermon entitled ' The Body of Christ,'
and Dr. James Cooper (now, I am glad to think, Professor
of Ecclesiastical History at Glasgow), in a Sermon on the
' Eeconstruction of the Scottish Church.' l On the other
hand, later meetings of the General Assembly had been
much less favourable than that of 1882 ; nor had Presby
terians as a body recognised the help given to them by
Episcopalians in their opposition to Disestablishment.
The germ of the Bishop's own deliverance of 1885, and
of his final policy, is to be found in an article entitled
' Union or Separation,' published in the ' Scottish Church
Keview' for May 1884, and afterwards as a pamphlet,
which was largely circulated, and therefore was not re
printed in his ' Public Appeals.' It is to be found in this
sentence there printed in italics (p. 11) :
Can a reconciliation between Presbyterians and ourselves be
effected upon the understanding that the adoption of the three
fold ministry is eventually to be accepted as the basis of our
agreement the existing generation of Presbyterian clergy being
left free to receive Episcopal ordination or not, at their own
1 All these are mentioned in more detail in Public Appeals, ii. 669,
together with the invitation he received from the Principal and Professors
of the University of Aberdeen to address the students.
238 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. m
option ; l and that in the meantime we are to work together with
mutual respect, and ivith no unkind or unbrotherly disparage
ment of each other's position.
The Article ' Union or Separation,' appearing in May
1884, undoubtedly alarmed some of his brethren, and this
alarm led to the very regrettable incident of his being
denied his proper position as Senior Bishop (in the absence
of the Primus) at the Seabury Commemoration.
The following is his own account of it :
The principal event of this year in our Scottish Church was
the Seabury Commemoration held at Aberdeen, Wednesday,
8 October, which passed off in a way which gave, I believe, a
general satisfaction and evoked, as it justly might, considerable
enthusiasm. To me personally, who, as senior Bishop, in the
absence of the Primus, had the right to preside, certain circum
stances connected with the arrangements (especially after I had
good reason to expect a different result, which led me to prepare
an opening address) were disappointing and vexatious, and upon
them it will be better to maintain silence. But I record with no
little pleasure and gratitude the kind hospitality I received in
the house of Dr. and Mrs. Ogilvie Will, and the opportunity I
enjoyed of making the personal acquaintance of the Senior
Bishop of the American Church, Bishop Williams of Connecticut,
with whom I bad held sympathetic correspondence many years
before respecting the novel teaching which was springing up in
the Church of England on the subject of the Eucharist. The
gathering included representative men from every portion of the
Anglican Church, English, Irish, American, and Colonial ; and
the Secretary of State for Scotland, the Marquess of Lothian, an
1 Original Note. There can, I suppose, be no doubt whatever that at the
Restoration of the Monarchy and Episcopacy in 1660-61, a very large propor
tion of the clergy who had not received Episcopal Ordination were allowed to
remain in their parochial charges upon no other condition than that of
acknowledging the office and authority of the Bishop of the Diocese. Dr.
Grub writes : ' None of the Bishops, except Bishop Mitchell [of Aberdeen,
who died early in 1663], insisted on re-ordaining ministers who had received
only Presbyterian ordination, though they did not refuse to do so when
asked ' (iii. 215) ; and see Burnet's Own Time, i. 252 and note. [The last
words are added in pencil in the Bishop's private copy.]
CH. vir LAST EFFOKTS AT KEUNION. 1876-1892 239
old pupil of mine at Glenalmond, presided at the banquet given
on the principal day.
One who was present at the latter records the ' great
enthusiasm ' with which the Bishop was received on pro
posing the toast of ' the Episcopal Church of Scotland.'
He prepared, as above noted, a valuable historical
address, which contained nothing but what might have
been heard with attention and admiration, for the meeting
in the Albert Hall in that city of October 8. It would be
easy to give an account of this incident, putting his action
in a favourable light, but he evidently wished it to be
treated with reserve, and I shall make no further reference
to it. The address itself is valuable as vindicating the
Archbishops and Bishops of England from any charge of
complicity with the delays of conferring the Episcopate on
the American colonies, and for pointing out some reasons
for the policy of the Government in denying that boon.
Here, as elsewhere, his historical facts are marshalled in
succinct and telling order, and no one writing on this
subject would be wise to neglect this address. He also
took occasion to speak of the ' Scottish Office,' and to
praise the manner in which the American Church had
dealt with it, and to express a hope that his own would
follow its example at any rate in the wording of the Conse
cration prayer. Keunion is only just glanced at in the
warnings as to the necessity of remaining in sympathy
with Scottish national life with which the address closes.
This address was warmly approved by the Bishop
(H. Browne) of Winchester, who wrote (15 October, 1884) :
* I wish it had been delivered. Every portion of it has my
fullest sympathy and assent. ... I cordially agree in
all that you have written about the Communion Office.'
He also republished as ' A Contribution to the Seabury
Commemoration ' his Oxford Ramsden Sermon of 1857 on
240 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vii
' The Mending of the Nets,' a sermon on ' Confirmation as
an Ordinance Scriptural and Apostolic,' and * Eucharistical
Offices, English, Scotch, American,' in one pamphlet, which
he dedicated * To my Rev. Brethren the ex-Moderators of
the Presbyterian Churches in Scotland.'
In January 1885 he was led to express himself on the
subject of two reprints of 'Archbishop Hamilton's Cate
chism ' of 1552, l one of them issued by the ' University
Press,' at Ox&rd, with a Preface by Mr. Gladstone. The
Catechism was undoubtedly a cautious and moderately
worded document, and Mr. Gladstone adopted the opinion
that it represented a policy on the part of the Scottish
Bishops to follow in the lines of the Reformation in Eng
land under Henry VIII., where for instance Bishop Tunstal
of Durham wrote against Papal Supremacy, but without
cutting himself off from the traditional teaching on many
subjects. The Bishop of St. Andrews did not deny that
there were Churchmen of the type of Bishop Tunstal in
Scotland, of whom he specially named John Mair or Major,
Provost of St. Salvator's College, St. Andrews, but he did
not believe in the breadth of any such movement among
the Bishops. His essay was of practical importance to his
Reunion scheme ; for, if there had been such a tendency, it
would have made the work of Knox and his fellows much less
necessary or justifiable, and have rendered it less possible to
consider them as representatives of a true national uprising
against priestly tyranny. His discussion of this topic is well
worth reading, and, in my opinion, he proves his point.
The spring of 1885 was saddened by the death of my
father, who had just resigned the See of Lincoln, on
21 March. This was the end of a constant loving inter
course, especially by letter, between two men who were
1 In an article of 21 pp. in the Scottish Church Review (No. I. of
vol. ii.).
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 241
closely allied in sentiments and interests, and who consulted
one another in regard to almost every important literary
enterprise. Few Churchmen of their age used the printing
press more freely, and each valued the other's judgment,
though both were independent in their attitude towards
public questions. It would be easy to draw a parallel and
a contrast between them, but the latter, certainly, would
be to some extent unreal, because of the very different
circumstances of their lives. I at any rate prefer to think
of them both with deep and almost equal reverence, which
increases as I grow older, and as experience teaches me to see
the superior force of character and public spirit with which
God endowed them both, and, I would add, some others of
their generation, even in comparison with many of the fore
most men of our own day. I sometimes ask myself how
my father would have regarded his brother's action of 1885
and 1888. I have no direct evidence except my knowledge
of his greater cautiousness of temper and stronger reverence
for tradition. He would, of course, in any case have recol
lected and tried to enter into the special circumstances of
Scotland, of which he knew that his brother had a far deeper
knowledge than himself. A few years before his death he
wrote as follows to an intimate friend :
The Bishop cf St. Andrews may not perhaps be allowed to
see the good effects of his sayings, writings, and doings ; but,
like other good and wise men, he has planted trees under the
shade of which future generations will sit, and from which they
will gather fruit.
These various writings and incidents prepared the way
for his remarkable if somewhat indefinite Charge of 3 Sep
tember, 1885, 1 * The Case of Non-Episcopal Ordination
1 In August 1885 I was unexpectedly offered a nomination to the See of
Salisbury on the part of the Crown, and, after accepting it, was glad to take
counsel with my uncle. He was kind enough to meet me a Edinburgh for
B
242 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
fairly considered.' After some preliminary statements about
the threefold ministry being ' the historical backbone of the
Church,' and showing how the Papacy has engrossed the
functions and reduced the status of the Episcopate, he
sketched lightly the condition of things in Scotland, and
emphasised the point, which had long impressed him very
strongly, that, after the Kestoration, Scottish Episcopacy
was Erastian, and Presbyterianism the contrary. He then
proceeds (' Public Appeals,' ii. 695) :
If this were so, may it not of itself form a ground for believing
that the grace of valid ordinances, and consequently of a valid
ministry, would not be withheld from a body of professing
Christians, who, with the Bible held firmly in their hands and
clasped devoutly to their inmost hearts, had succeeded in
extricating themselves and their country from a degrading
bondage ? And in that respect, at least, might they not even
seem to claim with greater reason the name of Church, inasmuch
as they had vindicated more strenuously the rights of its Divine
Founder, which their more legitimate rivals had too often
pusillanimously and faithlessly surrendered ?
He then goes on to affirm that the question of the
validity or invalidity of Presbyterian ordination has never
been treated from our side with the breadth of argument of
which it is capable. It is easy to draw up, as he had done
thirty-four years before, a catena of Anglican Divines in
favour of the exclusive validity of Episcopal ordination, but
none of these authorities refer to our Lord's test, ' By their
fruits ye shall know them ' (Matt. vii. 15-20). And most
of these passages refer to regularity and good order rather
than absolute validity. No Anglican would deny that ordi
nation properly belongs to Bishops ; but those who say so
need not always be held to pronounce an opinion in regard
several happy days (7-10 September), just after his Charge was delivered.
I saw him again, this time in weakness, at St. Andrews in October 1888.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 243
to the effects of ordination performed otherwise. Bishop
Andrewes, in his answer to Peter Moulin, a French Pro
testant, had used the same word as Carpzov did in describ
ing the Anglican position, 'Potestas ordinandi Episcopis
solum competit,' but further on he (Andrewes) adds :
' It does not, therefore, follow that a Church cannot stand
without Episcopacy ; for a man must be blind who does not see
Churches standing without it ; ' only (he argues) looking to the
example of all antiquity, every Church that has lost ought to
endeavour to recover it, ' ubi Deus dederit, et res ferent ' i.e.
when God shall grant the opportunity and circumstances shall
permit (' Opusc. Posth.' p. 191; see also p. 211); a passage
quoted with approval by Archbishop Bramhall (iii. 518).
He points out that our Divines not only recognised
Presbyterianism, when adopted as a necessity, in preference
to Komanism as Hooker, Dean Field, Bishop Cosin, and
Archbishop Wake did but even when that necessity had
been removed they contemplated the continuance of the
Divine favour in the case of Churches which, to use the
words of Archbishop Bramhall, not only ' through new
necessity,' but ' through ignorance, or new-fangleness, or
covetousness, or practice of some persons, have swerved
from the Apostolic rule and primitive institution.' In
another place Bramhall notices the distinction between a
valid and a regular ordination (Bramhall's ' Works,' iii.
475, cp. 517). Bishop Wordsworth also cites (as he did
several times) Bishop Gray's remark addressed, in his own
name and that of the other Bishops of South Africa, to the
Dutch Eeformed ministers at the Cape : ' We do not doubt
that the Holy Ghost works in the conversion of souls to
God in and through your ministry. It would, in our judg
ment, be sinful to doubt this. Wherever there is godliness
there must be grace and the author of it.'
There is no definite proposal made in this Charge, but
i>44 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
it was evidently intended to be read in the light of the
article * Union or Separation.'
This Charge was the last of his collected ' Public
Appeals on Behalf of Christian Unity,' of which he pub
lished twelve parts, with valuable connecting Introductions,
ranging over more than thirty years (1854-1885). The
first Introduction is dated 25 January, the last 31 July,
1886. In the latter he refers thus to the Charge in ques
tion (' Public Appeals,' ii. 680 foil.) :
I was fully aware that the main argument of that Address
was not likely to prove acceptable to some at least of the straiter
and more rigid members of our own body. And perhaps I was
less careful than I ought to have been in stating the precise point
which I undertook to maintain. In the first place I do not
maintain that all non-Episcopal Ordination is valid. It may be
not only schismatical but heretical. In the next place I am
only concerned with Presbyterianism which is not heretical but
orthodox ; and with Presbyterianism which has a history to
show of struggles against despotism, of hardships and perse
cution, which provoke our repugnance against those who inflicted
rather than against those who suffered them. Fitted to that
History my argument is only an extension of the ground taken
up by the great English divines when they held that the non-
Episcopal Ordination of the foreign Protestants was justifiable
and valid under the treatment which they received from the
Church of Rome and from their own Bishops who adhered to
that Church ; or rather (considering the deep and mysterious
character of the whole subject) the view which I wished to take
was not so much to assert the positive side of the argument
except as probable, and under all the circumstances, fully
admissible, but to repudiate the negative viz. that our Presby
terian ministers as regards their Ordination are no better than
laymen.
He then goes on to say that, on the whole, he considers
the testimony of our Church to be that such orders are valid,
though irregular, where there is no conscious departure
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION, 1876-1892 245
from the Catholic Faith. He instances St. Augustine's
rule that, where a Schismatic or Heretic comes over, Catho
lics, while curing his schism or heresy, do not repeat any
Sacraments he may have received, ' lest while we aim at
curing defects we condemn divine remedies ' (' De unico
Bapt. adv. Petil.' c. 3).
The friendly intercourse with Dr. Milligan and his
colleagues naturally led to an invitation from the neigh
bouring University of Aberdeen, where the Bishop delivered
a lecture to the students, in February 1886, in the Hall of
Marischal College, ' On the True Perspective of Christian
Duty,' with the motto Donee perveniamus omnes. He
speaks first of Unity of the Faith in reference to the
Apostles' and Nicene Creeds ; then of Unity in the imita
tion of Christ touching on imperfect ideals like those of
the Freemasons, Good Templars, and other societies ;
lastly, of Unity in the Ministry, touching on the much-
needed reform in the formula of subscription imposed on
Scottish ministers, and the necessity of an unprejudiced
study of the seventeenth century. There is, perhaps,
rather an air of constraint and some want of definite aim
in this address, though, as usual, it contains much that is
excellent.
In May of the same year he received a similar, but
even more liberal, invitation from Dr. Macgregor, of St.
Cuthbert's, Edinburgh, asking him to address the members
of his Young Men's Christian Association some Sunday
evening in church during their usual winter course, and, if
he chose, to urge upon them the claims of his own system.
He accepted the invitation generally, though preferring,
and, I think, wisely and rightly, to speak on another sub
ject. The See of Edinburgh was then vacant by the death
of Bishop Cotterill on 16 April. It was first offered, by a
very large majority of votes, to Canon H. P. Liddon, who
i>46 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
was then travelling in the East. Among his reasons for
declining was one which must have pleased my uncle the
absence on his part of any Scotch blood, and his dislike to
hear the Church in Scotland described as the English
Church, and his fear that his acceptance would further
that misdescription. It was not till 6 August that Dr.
Dowden, the Pantonian Professor, was elected. He was
consecrated on 21 September, all the Scottish Bishops and
Bishop Lightfoot, of Durham, taking part. The Bishop of
St. Andrews, as senior Bishop, was the principal con-
seer ator.
Another change took place at the same time, which must
here be chronicled, the election of a new Primus. Bishop
Eden had for some years been in bad health, and since
July 1885 had had the help of a coadjutor, Bishop Kelly,
late of Newfoundland, who had recently given valuable aid
to my predecessor, Bishop Moberly, in his declining years. 1
The Primus died in August 1886, and my uncle (though in
his eightieth year) was prepared to accept the office if it
had been offered to him ; but, as the ' Glasgow Herald ' put
it, he was passed over as * too friendly to Presbyterians.'
He was, however, almost at the same moment exposed to a
rather severe- experience of ' odium theologicum ' on their
side.
His Charge of 2 September, 1886, had been on * The
Study, Use, and Value of the Book of Common Prayer.' This
Charge is remarkable as containing a very striking catena
of testimonies to its value from Churchmen, lay as well as
clerical, Nonconformists, Presbyterians, Americans, and
foreigners. In the concluding part of this address he men
tioned with approval the restoration of daily service in St.
Giles's, Edinburgh, but could hardly omit disapproval of
1 Bishop Moberly died 6 July, 1885. I was consecrated Bishop of
Salisbury 28 October.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 247
the inscription recently put up in honour of the rough
brawler who interrupted the Dean when he was reading
one of the most beautiful of our Collects, that for the
Seventh Sunday after Trinity. This was met by a violent
article in the Established Church organ, called ' The Scottish
Church,' which was privately resented by his Presbyterian
friends, though they did not think it necessary to make
any public remonstrance.
When the See of Edinburgh was filled my uncle
thought it right to inform the new Bishop of his promise
to Dr. Macgregor, and to ask whether he would give his
approval, or at least tacit consent, to its fulfilment, promis
ing to accept his decision. Bishop Dowden consulted his
Chapter, which, on the whole, was unfavourable. I have
before me my uncle's letters to the Bishop (18 October,
1886) accepting this decision, and to Dr. Macgregor
(20 October) announcing and giving his own explanation
and defence of it.
His letter to the Bishop of Edinburgh contains the
following interesting reminiscence :
I remember just thirty years ago, three years after I became
Bishop, I was requested by a Young Men's Christian Association
in Perth to give the concluding lecture of their winter course
(which was held in the St. John's East Church on a Sunday
evening) with the full concurrence of the minister of that
Church, Mr. Murdoch (long since dead) ; so much so that he
called upon me and begged me also to give the introductory
lecture of the same course which had been assigned to him !
I acceded to the former request, but when the matter got wind
the young men were threatened with the interference of the
Presbytery, some of whom were shocked at the notion of a Bishop
being allowed to preach in one of their churches ; and so my
lecture was given up. I mention this to show that 110 change
has taken place in my own views upon such a case.
And now I can sing : * Solve senescentem,' &c. &c. Only
the participle ought to be in the passive voice.
248 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
This last little hit may be forgiven in an old man writ
ing to a young one.
Unfortunately the matter was not allowed to drop.
Dr. Macgregor did not forget, and did not allow others to
forget, that Dean Montgomery had given such a lecture at
St. Cuthbert's without interference on the part of Bishop
Cotterill ; and it was also stated untruly in one or more of
the newspapers that Bishop Dowden had inhibited his col
league. The position was difficult for them both ; but,
though some friction was for a time generated, it did not
cause any lasting soreness. The Bishop of St. Andrews
set a high value on his colleague's learning, as well as his
personal kindness. The principal result was that the lecture
was printed and given to all the members of the Association
by the author, and was probably more read than it would
otherwise have been. It was entitled ' The Yoke of Christ
to be Borne in Youth,' and was one of the most successful
and characteristic of such productions of the Bishop's pen.
The Bishop received many appreciative letters concern
ing it, as well as appreciative printed notices. Amongst
others may be named a reference to his long labours in
' Two Sermons ' preached by Professor Ince before the
University of Oxford, and letters from Mr. Shorthouse, the
Bishop of Aberdeen, Dean Boyle, and Dean Montgomery.
Amongst communications from Presbyterian friends the
following words from a letter of Dr. Eoberts of St. Andrews
are interesting, and probably represent a large section of
feeling among pious and enlightened men of his com
munion.
You cannot possibly exaggerate the evil of present disunion
among the Churches especially of Scotland. But what can be
done ? So far as I see nothing, until the Westminster Con
fession is got rid of ; and to attempt to meddle with that would
at once lead to disestablishment. ' All seek their own 'the
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 249
various sects aim only at their own aggrandisement and union
on any basis seems hopeless, until the national conscience
awakes to the sin of Sixoo-rao-i'ai (Gal. v. 20). I do not myself
believe that any form of Church government can claim a jus
divinum in the strict sense of the words. But, of course,
episcopacy has the prestige of antiquity, and seems to me, in
some important respects, the most expedient. At the same time,
I think that there are very valuable elements to be found both in
Presbyterianism and in Independency.
Another from Dr. Cameron Lees expresses his great
sorrow at the non-delivery of the lecture, and adds * Among
the mass of people who do not understand Ecclesiastical
punctilio I find a deep feeling of indignation.'
Another from Dr. Campbell Fraser, of the University of
Edinburgh, contains the following :
In this perplexed and divided state of the Church it is
refreshing to breathe the air with which you surround us. Surely
it cannot fail in the end to improve the health of Scotland
ecclesiastically, though unity of the visible Ecclesiastical organi
sations may be far away.
The Anglican branch of the Church has seemed to me the
most likely centre for this unity if it should ever come about
with the strong presumption of history and of most of Christendom
in favour of its Episcopal constitution.
To bring all the sects to see this is the difficulty which
writings like yours should, if any can, help to overcome.
The year 1887 saw Bishops everywhere preparing for
the Lambeth Conference, and my uncle looked out for
encouraging omens. Unfortunately (as was too often the
case in his life) the most prominent omen was discouraging.
Dr. John Cunningham, who had succeeded his friend
Tulloch as Principal of St. Mary's College, and who also
was personally friendly to himself and had indeed recently
asked him to his official dinner as Moderator of the General
Assembly and wished him to propose the toast of the
evening, ' the Health of the Church of Scotland 'delivered
250 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
the Lee Lecture for that year on the question, ' Is a Union
of the Episcopal and Presbyterian Churches possible ? If
not, is Federation ? ' He did not conceal the facts that there
were ' many circumstances highly favourable to the possi
bilities of Union,' and that ' there is now much more
uniformity of worship in the Churches of England and
Scotland than there was twenty years ago,' and * a common
danger which is drawing the two Churches together ; ' but
his statement.- of the objections was stronger than of the
possibilities, and he answered both questions in the
negative. My uncle took this Lecture for the basis of his
Charge (delivered on 1 September, as usual, in the Cathedral,
Perth), and certainly showed that the conclusions were not
so inevitable as the lecturer had made out citing many
testimonies of Presbyterians in favour of the conclusion
that Scotsmen were not so attached to Presbyterianism as
they had been. Principal Cunningham spoke strongly of
the necessity of the repeal of the English Act of Uniformity.
Why should he think that the repeal of Scottish Acts which
were antagonistic to Episcopacy should be out of the
question ? He spoke, too, of the proposed ' absorption ' of
Presbyterians in the Episcopal Church : the Bishop did not
intend this, but wished to see ' the Presbyterian National
Church made such that Episcopalians, without dereliction
of principle, can seek admission into it ; or in other words,
such that a good Catholic Christian can properly belong to
it ; by which (in this relation) I mean one who cannot be
content to live without Episcopacy, and consequently with
out the ordinance of Confirmation.' Precentor Farquhar
speaks of this Charge as lasting an hour and a half, and as
exhibiting ' magnificent pertinacity and wonderful power.'
Other publications of this year were ' A Jubilee Tract
for the People of Scotland,' containing a summary of the
arguments in favour of Episcopacy, with some pages from a
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 251
Jubilee Sermon on ' The Evangelisation of the Heathen,'
and a letter reprinted from the ' Scottish Guardian ' of
5 August, 'On the Question of a Metropolitan.' The
former contains a characteristic anecdote of Dean Stanley,
with whom he had made friends in his later years, especially
in the matter of their joint congratulation to Lord Beacons-
field (in English and Latin verse) upon his return from the
Berlin Congress in July 1878. l Stanley in bidding good
bye to him at Megginch Castle in 1879, said : 'I have been
reading with pleasure your Kemarks on Lightfoot ' ; you
are the kindest of controversialists,' and, taking him cordially
by both hands, whispered loudly in his ear, 'We have not
been quite fair to James ! ' 2 They never met again.
Stanley died in 1881.
The letter ' On the Question of a Metropolitan ' is dis
tinctly against the proposal, which was being mooted again
after ten years. Besides the arguments which would
naturally occur to any one who considers the subject such
as those that concern the difficulties connected with election
in conciliating the rights of the Diocese and the rights of
the whole Church, which have proved so troublesome in
Ireland there are others which specially concerned the
statements of the memorial, and the particular case of
Scotland. The recent determination of Canada, and of the
Cape, Australia, and the West Indies (1897), to have Arch
bishops has, however, made it more natural that Scotland
should have its Metropolitan, if not its Archbishop. It
may perhaps be asked why the present system should not
go on, only changing the ' Primus ' into a ' Primate.' 3 But
1 This will be spoken of in the next chapter, with other fugitive
compositions.
2 Of course the Bishop of Jerusalem, whose position is one of the
recognised arguments for the early institution of Episcopacy.
3 The Bishop of St. Andrews, in his Charge of 1890, p. 7, wrote : ' I was
inclined to prefer the name of" Primate " (for which there is good authority
252 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. VH
the prior necessity is surely to have a regulation for the
periodical meeting of the General Synod, and to make
provision, that, at any rate in matters of this kind concern
ing external order, the laity should be properly consulted.
The autumn of this year (4 October, 1887) saw another
and a last change of residence, the move from Bishopshall
to a smaller but very pleasant house upon ' the Scores,' in
full view of the bay, its rocks and countless seagulls, which
the Bishop called Kilrymont, after the old name of the city
of St. Andrews said to mean ' Cell on the King's Mount '
and to refer to the retirement of Constantine III. to
Kirkheugh in 943. The following is his own account of it :
After my brood of twelve children had been more than
fledged, and most of them had left the nest, I felt that I was
incurring unnecessary expense in continuing to occupy a residence
so spacious as Bishopshall, and I was glad to be able to get rid
of it upon reasonable terms and to remove into a smaller house,
just then built, on the Scores, in a delightful situation overlooking
the sea. Unhappily the removal involved the breaking up of my
large and valuable library, a laborious and a melancholy opera
tion ; because, from want of accommodation in my new abode,
it became absolutely necessary to get rid of a portion of the
books, and the proceeds of the sale, partly in Edinburgh and
partly in London, of many which I was loath to part with, were
sadly disappointing. In all other respects, when the trouble of
tbe change was over I had every reason to be thankful that it
had been accomplished. It did not materially diminish our
domestic comfort, and it enabled us to effect a material reduction
in our annual expenditure.
both ancient and modern) rather than retain " Primus," when parity had
been abandoned I cannot suppose that the change as it now stands
will be of long duration.' The name ' the Scottish Church ' was introduced
into the Code of 1890 as equivalent to ' Episcopal Church in Scotland.'
Why should not the chief Bishop now be called ' Primate of the Scottish
Church ' ? It is more difficult to revive the title Archbishop where St.
Andrews and Glasgow both have the tradition of it, and Edinburgh deserves
it. There is, however, precedent for an ' Archbishop of the Scottish
Church ' in the modern ' Archbishop of the West Indies,' not attached, 1
imagine, to one see.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 253
In this sad business of the books Canon Farquhar
gladly lent his aid to catalogue and divide, and in the
process learnt much both of the books and of the owner's
character. The library, when I knew it, several years
later, was still a very useful one, especially in books bearing
on Scottish Church History, and it will be a great advan
tage to the Chapter of St. Ninian's to possess it. According
to Canon Farquhar's Diary, the books removed to
Kilrymont were 6,000 in number, and it took him a week
to put them in that * exact order ' in which the Bishop
delighted, and which he expected from all who were willing
to be ruled by him.
The Lambeth Conference was summoned to meet under
Archbishop Benson in July 1888. In preparation for it
my uncle printed a letter of some forty pages octavo, dated
24 May, and entitled ' Ecclesiastical Union between Eng
land and Scotland,' and addressed it to him as President
of the Conference, in which he advocated the treatment of
the subject under heading III. of the Agenda, ' The Angli
can Communion in relation to the Scandinavian and other
Keformed Churches.' This is one of the most effective of
his writings, and sums up the experience and hopes of a
lifetime with masterly simplicity, courage, and dignity.
His great precedent for the recognition of Presbyterian
orders is that of the fourth century treatment of the
Donatists. This is the kernel of the whole, and shall be
quoted here, that the reader may keep it firmly in view
in case he has to give a practical judgment on the
question and every reader, male or female, of a
book of this kind is likely to have occasion to influence
opinion on the question at some time or other in his or
her life. It may be found on p. 19 foil, of the * Letter.'
He had been speaking of the case of the Novatians, about
which there is, I think, something more than uncertainty
254 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
(see Chap. III. p. 62 on Presbyterian Baptism). The words
in square brackets are his own corrections. I have omitted
the references to authorities contained in footnotes.
Next we have the case of the Donatists. About this there
can be no uncertainty. The thirty-seventh canon of the ' plenary
Council of the whole of Africa,' held at Hippo, at the instance of
St. Augustin, in A.D. 393, not only leaves no room for doubt as
to the concessions actually made upon the point in question, but
lays down the everlasting principle which determined it, and which
is closely applicable to the case we are now considering. The
canon itself is to be found in Bruns, i. 139. I quote the follow
ing from the translation of Fleury, edited by Newman (p. 226) :
* A decree also was made with reference to the reunion of
Donatists in these words : " Former Councils have forbidden the
admission of Donatist clergy to the same rank in the Church,
allowing them only lay Communion. . . . But whereas the lack
of clergy in the African Church is such that some places are
totally destitute, it is decreed that those shall be excepted of
whom it can be ascertained that they have not rebaptised, as
well as those ivho shall desire to be admitted with their flocks
to the Communion of the Church Catholic. For we ought not
to doubt that the good of peace and the sacrifice of charity
effaces the evil which these last, misled by the authority of their
forefathers, have committed by rebaptising. This decree, how
ever, shall not be confirmed until the Church across the sea
transmarina has been consulted." That the decree was con
firmed, and consequently, we may conclude, with the approval
of Rome and other transmarine Churches, is manifest from
numerous letters of St. Augustin of subsequent date, which
speak of the matter as so determined and so acted on. It adds
not a little to the force of this decree that former Councils had
taken, as it admits, a different and a stricter line. And the
ground which it alleges, " the lack of clergy," as compared with
the number of the [Donatist] clergy, is precisely that of our own
case in Scotland ; and, humanly speaking, as we are going on at
present if not in the great towns, in rural districts it must
take centuries to recover our lost ground. Now it is difficult to
perceive any principle upon which the whole African Church
could accept Donatist Ordination as valid, and not accept Presby-
CH. vii LAST EFF01ITS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 255
terian Ordination conferred under the circumstances in which
this country was placed through the action of the unreforming
Bishops at the time of the Reformation, and again, through the
action of the reformed Bishops at the time of the Revolution.
That the Donatist Bishops [clergy?] were not required to be
reordained when they joined the Catholics, any more than they
were required to be rebaptised, has been clearly proved. And
yet the Donatist separation had much less to say in its excuse
than the Presbyterian separation had, at least in Scotland ; and
it can scarcely be argued that greater validity attaches to a
ministry when in schism, merely because it happens to be
Episcopal, as was that of the L>onatists (though Episcopal of a
very questionable kind, for the consecration of Majorinus, their
first Bishop, was, according to Optatus, " unlawful "), than to a
ministry which is bona fide Presbyterian and which was believed
by its first founders to be Scriptural and Apostolical ; rather the
reverse might be inferred, according to the maxim, " corruptio
optimi pessima." '
He then speaks of the difficulty arising from the
acknowledgment of Roman Orders by the Church of
England, while it does not acknowledge Presbyterian
Orders ; but he observes that this may be explained by the
facts (1) that our succession was ' through the Romanised
channel,' and (2) Presbyterians had shown themselves very
hostile to Episcopacy, denouncing it as contrary to Scrip
ture, and even anti- Christian and diabolical, and in some
cases favourable to Anarchy.
He then cites Keble on Hooker, ' E. P.' vii. 14, 11
(Preface, p. cxxvi.), and other instances of Presbyterians
employed in the Church of England. And amongst
modern divines he cites Bishop Barry, then Primate of
Australia, and Bishop Gray, of Cape Town, whose words
have been already quoted in these pages (see above, p. 243).
I was staying at Lambeth at the time when this letter
reached the Archbishop, and he asked me to acknowledge
it for him, which I did as follows (6 July, 1888) :
256 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. vii
The Archbishop, who is unable to find time to write himself,
has asked me to acknowledge your printed letter as well as the
private one which accompanied it. He has read the published
letter twice over with great interest and very full and hearty
sympathy. He desires me to say that you have been placed
upon the Committee appointed to consider the question of the
reunion of the different bodies into which English-speaking
Christianity is divided. I forget its exact title. The Bishop of
Carlisle [H. Goodwin] is the convener, and it is a strong body.
I give the names overleaf. I am glad that you feel yourself able
to serve. . . . 'fhe Archbishop thinks that Novatian's consecra
tion was irregular but not invalid. I read your draft resolutions to
the Conference, as I, alone, of those you named, had time to speak.
Committee No. IV. Sydney [Barry], New York [Potter],
Jamaica [Nuttall], Brechin [Jermyn], Rupertsland [Machray],
Ripon [Boyd Carpenter], Manchester [Moorhouse], St. Andrews,
Edinburgh [Dowden], Clogher [Stack], Nelson [Suter], Adelaide
[Kennion], Minnesota [Whipple], Carlisle [Goodwin], Antigua
[Branch, Coadjutor]. 1
I did not understand that the Archbishop committed
himself to all the propositions of the letter written by my
uncle ; nor, I think, did the latter so regard it. But no
one of the Archbishop's character could read such a letter
written by such a man without great sympathy.
My uncle, who was then at Rydal, where he had lately
taken great delight in renewing old memories, came up to
London and attended several meetings of the committee,
especially on the 16th and 17th, and then returned to
Rydal. To the second of these days he puts the note in
his almanack ' Deo Gratias.' His account of it in a con
temporary letter (24 July) is as follows :
1 The names actually attached to the report are 17 : Sydney, Adelaide,
Antigua (Coadjutor), Brechin, Edinburgh, Hereford * (Atlay), Jamaica,
Lichfield* (Maclagan), Manchester, Minnesota, Nelson, New York, Bipon,
Kochester * (Thorold), Bupertsland, St. Andrews, Wakefield * (How). Those
marked with an asterisk (*) must have been added to the Committee after
the Keport was first presented. The Bishops of Carlisle and Clogher must
have been too much occupied with other Committees to serve on this.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 257
Our Committee consisted of fourteen, with the Bishop of
Sydney (Barry) for Chairman, who did his part admirably. This
morning I have received a proof of the Report agreed upon ; and
I enclose a copy of the two most important resolutions, which I
am sure you will be glad to see. They follow closely upon the
lines recommended in my pamphlet. The crucial one (No. 2)
moved by me and seconded by the Bishop of , was carried
with only two dissentients ! The English Bishops (4) were all
in favour of it. This is highly encouraging ; and I came away
from the last meeting thanking God that He had permitted me
to live to see the day, and feeling that I might now sing ' Nunc
dimittis.' For though, of course, one cannot yet tell what may
be the result when our Report is presented to the Conference
(which will be done this week), yet it is certain that such a
resolution, passed by such a Committee- of Anglican Bishops
from all parts of Christendom almost unanimously, cannot fail,
sooner or later, to bring forth the fruit which we desire. The
Bishop of Nelson, who came away with me from the meeting,
remarked that no such important business had been done in the
Church of England since the Savoy Conference.
In order to understand this letter it is necessary to have
before us the words of the Eeport and the Eesolution (which
were published by the Bishop of St. Andrews in his Charge
delivered about a month later (29 August), under the title
' The Lambeth Conference and Church Keunion,' pp. 11-12).
I am therefore breaking no confidence myself in reprinting
them, though otherwise I should have hesitated to do so.
The committee first laid down its ' quadrilateral ' basis,
viz. Holy Scripture, the Apostles' and Nicene Creeds, the
two great Sacraments, and ' the Historic Episcopate, locally
adapted, in the methods of its administration, to the varying
needs of the nations and peoples called of God into the
Unity of His Church.' It then went on to speak of the
duty of holding brotherly conferences with the representa
tives of other chief Christian Communions in the English
speaking races. Afterwards followed a passage referring
s
258 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
to the article about ' the Historic Episcopate,' and con
tinuing :
But they observe that while the Church in her 23rd Article
lays down the necessity of the ministry as a sacred order, com
missioned by those ' who have public authority given unto them
in the congregation,' l and while for herself she has denned the
latter term by insisting in her own communion on Episcopal
ordination, she has nowhere declared that all other constituted
ministry is null and void. They also note that in the troubled
period following the Reformation (up to the year 1662) ministers
not Episcopally ordained were in certain cases recognised as fit
to hold office in the Church of England, and that some chief
authorities, even in the High Church School, defended and acted
upon this recognition in England, Scotland, and Ireland. The
question, therefore, which presents itself to them is this
whether the present circumstances of Christianity among us are
such as to constitute a sufficient reason for such exceptional
action now ? To this question looking to the infinite blessings
which must result from any right approach towards reunion, not
only in Great Britain and Ireland, but in the American and
Colonial communities looking also to the unquestioned fact
that upon some concession upon this matter depends, humanly
speaking, the only hope of such an approach they cannot but
conceive that our present condition, perhaps in a higher degree
than at any former time, justifies an affirmative answer. They
therefore humbly submit the following resolution to the wisdom
of the Conference :
' That in the opinion of this Committee, conferences such as
we have recommended are likely to be fruitful under God's
blessing of practical result only if undertaken with willingness
on behalf of the Anglican Communion, while holding firmly the
threefold order of the ministry as the normal rule of the Church
to be observed in the future to recognise, in spite of what we
must conceive as irregularity, the ministerial character of those
ordained in non-Episcopal Communions, through whom, as
ministers, it has pleased God visibly to work for the salvation of
1 The Committee ought, I think, to have added the words defining the
object of the authority ' to call and send ministers into the Lord's vineyard.'
This is what Presbyters as such have not received, according to the belief
of the Church of England. See below, p. 260.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 259
souls, and the advancement of His kingdom ; and to provide, in
such way as may be agreed upon, for the acceptance of such
ministers as fellow -workers with us in the service of the Lord
Jesus Christ.'
The Eeport was recommitted by the vote of a large
majority, and this passage, in consequence, struck out.
The Charge of August 1888, from which we have
already quoted, is the last of the Bishop's great public
utterances on Keunion. He describes what took place at
the Lambeth Conference, and goes on to say that he was
not surprised at the action of the majority, He would
have preferred to have dealt with the Presbyterianism of
Scotland and Ireland separately, and to distinguish between
those who profess to derive their ministerial character from
above and those who are content to receive it from below.
But the very broad and extensive proposal actually made
naturally alarmed the Conference, especially as it had not
much time to discuss it. As to the proposition which he
advocated, he looked upon it as a suspension or dispensa
tion of a general rule, not an abrogation of it. In addition
to the authorities quoted by him from time to time he
instances the motion of Dr. Korison of Peterhead, already
referred to in these pages, and expresses his opinion that
his motion was in accordance with the opinion of the late
Bishop of Aberdeen J (see above p. 158).
It was no doubt in consequence of these efforts that
the Bishop received a request from a more distinguished
Presbyterian body, perhaps, in Scotland than any that had
as yet asked for his services as a preacher the University
of Edinburgh. This was contained in a letter from Sir Wm.
Muir, dated 25 November, 1888, desiring him to preach the
Commemoration sermon at the Graduation ceremony on
1 Provost Korison, writing on 15 February, 1889, to the Bishop, expressed
some doubt as to Bishop Suther's heartiness in such ideas, although, while
his father lived, Suther was much influenced by him.
s 2
260 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
Thursday, 18 April, 1889. He was not at this time in
very vigorous health, but he determined to do his best for
the University of which, as of St. Andrews, he was an
honorary D.D. ' I must try to gather up all my energies
for that sermon,' he said to Canon Farquhar in the early
spring ; and he was able to do so very effectively. It was
entitled ' A Threefold Eule of Christian Duty specially needed
for these times,' and was based on St. Paul's words,
1 Thess. v. 21$ 22 : ' Prove all things : hold fast that which
is good : abstain from all appearance of evil ' (or, as he
notes, E. V. * every form of evil '). The sermon has a certain
fitting academic flavour, and is remarkable for its wealth of
illustration from history and literature as well as theology.
It is now right, I think, that I should give my own
judgment as far as is possible upon this grave matter. 1
Our determination in regard to it must turn, I suppose, on
three closely allied considerations, those of principle, pre
cedent, and expediency. Consideration of principle is by
itself insufficient, since the form of the ministry is not
directly matter of revelation. But it may seem, and does
seem to myself, to have two lines, first that in which we
all agree with those Presbyterians who have taken up the
matter with any desire of Reunion, viz. that a ministerial
succession was intended by our Lord and His Apostles, and
that it is a note of the true Church to carry on this
succession. The second line of principle is, that this
succession must be carried on by those, who, with the general
consent of the Church, had received the commission to carry it
on, first Apostles, then (in the case of ' Barnabas and Saul ')
1 Besides the well-known larger books on the subject of the Ministry,
I may mention two pamphlets which I have found useful : The Attitude of
the Church of England to Non-Episcopal ' Ordinations,' by Kev. Walter K.
Firminger, B.A., of Merton Coll. Oxford (Parker, 1894), and The Future of
the Church in Scotland, by Rev. Cosmo Gordon Lang, M.A., Fellow of
Magdalen College, Oxford, Edinb. 1805.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 261
the prophets of Antioch, then Apostolic delegates like
Timothy and Titus, then Bishops generally. It is just
possible that a college of Presbyters might have had from
Apostolic times a commission, upon the decease of their
president, to select and consecrate another president, as it
is by some supposed to have been the case in Alexandria.
But this would not be a real precedent : such Presbyters
being really Bishops in posse, as Canon Gore calls them.
The stronger case would be that of the Chorepiscopi and
City Presbyters referred to in the obscure thirteenth canon
of Ancyra, which does, I confess, seem to me to make it
probable that in that abnormal and enthusiastic country
of Phrygia, those who were next in rank to Bishops much
like the Canons of a Cathedral Church or the Cardinals at
Eome had claimed a certain right to ordain Presbyters
and Deacons. The canon (so interpreted) confirms them in
the right, provided the Bishop gives them a written delega
tion. This would harmonise with the claim of Presbyters,
admitted in the East, but not in the West, to act as minis
ters of Confirmation, a privilege to which the condition
has been attached that they must use chrism blessed by a
superior Bishop or Patriarch. But neither of these supposed
and doubtful cases, which I will call (for the sake of argu
ment) Alexandrian and Phrygian, established itself in the
Church at large as a precedent for Presbyterian ordination ;
and it is remarkable that the contrary precedent, the re
jection of the ordination of Ischyras, ordained by a Pres
byter Colluthus, comes to us from the Church of Alexandria
in the fourth century, showing that the principle of Presby
terian ordination was not recognised there.
As to the Donatist case, it differs from the Presbyterian,
to which my uncle sought to ajpply it, in this particular,
that there was no dispute about the proper form of orders
between the Catholics and the Donatists. The latter had
262 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
wished to continue a regular succession. But the Presby
terians broke off from the rest of Christendom very largely
on this point : not only not caring for Episcopacy, or
rather rejecting it, but not even at first caring for the
sacramental sign of laying on of hands. Their succession,
even as a Presbyterian succession, is very doubtful. To
make the cases parallel we should have to show that the
Donatists who conformed were allowed to teach their
schismatic doctrines as long as they lived, provided that
the next generation dropped them. But their conformity
showed, of course, that they had dropped them. This was
all that was really needed. Whereas Presbyterians, con
forming on the conditions suggested, would still be Presby
terians, though, like many now living, they would not
object to their children being different to themselves.
Further the Church was one in those days, and what
could be done by a united Church in the way of a suspen
sion of, or a dispensation from, a general rule, can hardly
be done even by so important a body as the Anglican
Communion in regard to so serious a departure from the
general rule of Christendom.
So much as regards principle and precedent of an
ancient type. As to modern precedents, no doubt there is
a strong case as regards Scotland, after the Eestoration ;
but it is a case which is not satisfactory in respect to its
success. It issued in a more lamentable state of disunion
and hatred than any previous attempt at reconciliation in
Ecclesiastical polity no doubt partly owing to the unwise
Jacobitism of the Bishops. The English precedents are
different. They are partly individual opinions, differing
from one another and from the general stream of Church
policy, like those of Hooker, Bramhall, 1 and Cosin ; partly
1 Bramhall's 'practical judgment must be taken as expressed in the
cautious language of his letters of orders given to Mr. Edward Parkinson, a
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 263
cases of individuals allowed to minister, as far as we can
judge contrary to law, in England ; partly the toleration
of a certain amount of Presbyterianism in the Channel
Islands, 1 and the employment of Lutheran ministers in the
Missions of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel
in India. None of these precedents is strong enough to
commit the Church of England as a body to the position
that a Presbyterian succession is valid. The Scottish
precedent again was under the pressure of royal authority
and does not sufficiently represent Church principles.
Lastly we come to expediency, to which we have already
incidentally referred in the last paragraph, speaking of
Scotland after the Kestoration. Would the union established,
ex hypothesi, on the Bishop of St. Andrews' method, be
likely to be a lasting one ? Would it not be such a mingling
of different parties, uniting without perfect conviction, as
would leave a far from solid teaching body and a weak
disciplinary system to the next generation ? I cannot help
thinking that though the Bishop never changed his opinion,
he was conscious of this serious difficulty.
I have my own opinion as to how the matter might pos
sibly be settled at some future day. with less sacrifice of
principle than was involved in the Bishop's scheme, and yet
without injustice to the natural feelings of the Established
Church of Scotland. I will not, however, encumber this chap
ter with a discussion of it, particularly as I am unwilling to
Presbyterian minister in 1661. See Bramhall's Works in A.-C. L. i. p. xxxvii.
The form was 'Non annihilantes priores ordines (si quos habuit) nee
invaliditatem eorundem determinantes, multo minus omnes ordines sacros
Ecclesiarum forinsecarum condemnantes, quos proprio ludici relinquimus,
sed solummodo supplentes quicquid prius defuit per Canones Ecclesiae
Anglicanae requisitum, et providentes paci Ecclesiae, ut schismatis tollatur
occasio, et conscientiis fidelium satisfiat, nee ulli dubitent de eius ordina-
tione aut actus suos presbyteriales tanquam invalidos aversentur.'
1 The present Bishop of Winchester doubts whether the amount is as
large as has been supposed.
264 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vii
use this opportunity in a way that might hamper my
brethren, the Bishops of the Scottish Church, who have
the main responsibility of representing our communion in
that country. But I may be permitted to emphasise such
obvious points as these, (1) that likeness of aim must come
before alliance, and (2) alliance before inter-communion,
and (3) that both Episcopalians and Presbyterians have
much to learn from one another. The chief practical
lesson of this memoir seems to me to be that common
work, as in New Testament Eevision, and free association,
as in the University of St. Andrews, will instinctively lead
good and wise men to desire closer union ; and, therefore,
that individuals who desire to advance that cause will do
well to seize all fair opportunities of co-operation, which do
not compromise the principles they are bound to uphold.
Without such co-operation aspirations are feeble, and hos
tility and prejudice are readily and almost inevitably
cherished in silence, if not expressed in bitter antagonism.
Leaving now this fascinating subject, we must return
to describe the great change in the relation of the Bishop to
St. Ninian's Cathedral which took place in this period.
In 1878, after the Precentorship had been two years vacant,
Provost Burton agreed to make certain changes in the
ritual and the Bishop permitted him to appoint the Kev.
Donald J. Mackey as his colleague in June of that year.
In the same year the Kev. S. B. Hodson, once a theological
student at Glenalmond, became ' supernumerary ' of the
Diocese, acting as pastor of the Cathedral congregation,
and being at the Bishop's disposal for occasional duty on
the Sundays. This useful office had begun in 1873, but
had lapsed, I presume, during the troubles. Mr. Hodson
was naturally brought into more frequent contact with the
Bishop than the other members of the staff, and succeeded
in restoring something of the old relation between him and
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 265
his Cathedral. In 1882 the Charge on the ' Prospects of
Reconciliation ' was delivered there, and this henceforth
became the rule. In 1883 the Kev. George T. Farquhar
succeeded Mr. Hodson, and continued the same pleasant
relation with an even more filial affection. Provost Burton
died in July 1885, and soon after his death the present Dean,
Kev. V. L. Korison, was chosen to succeed him (21 August).
His excellent work at Forfar, to which sphere he was
advanced by the Bishop's means (to succeed his friend and
pupil, Mr. Shaw), strongly recommended him to the Bishop,
and Lord Glasgow fully concurred in the appointment. The
new beginning seemed most hopeful, when in the course of
the next month (19 September) it was discovered that Lord
Glasgow's endowment, amounting to a capital sum of some
9,OOOL, was in no way secured, and was needed to pay his
debts. Happily Lord Forbes's endowment of the second
stall, amounting to some 200L a year, was intact, and on
Mr. Mackey's resignation this vacancy was opportunely
filled by Mr. Farquhar.
Lord Glasgow's failure called out the sympathy of many
to the Cathedral who had hitherto stood aloof, especially of
the Earl of Strathmore ; and it was really a blessing in
disguise. By the end of February 1886 the new Provost
felt himself justified in resigning Forfar and in entering
upon his new office, into which he threw himself with
immense energy. Since that time the Cathedral has
entered upon quite a new phase of its existence. A new
body of Prebendaries took office, even before the Provost
came into residence, and the Cathedral almost imme
diately took its proper place in the city of Perth as well as
in the Diocese. Nay, in August 1888 the Episcopal Synod
met there. The year 1887 had seen such an increase in the
congregations as to make the building of the nave almost a
necessity. To this was added a project for a more imposing
266 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. TII
single western tower, of which part only, however, has been
built. On the whole something like 8,OOOZ. was spent upon
the building and its adornment in the years 1886 to 1890,
when it was consecrated on Thursday, 7 August, by the
Bishop, the preacher being the present Archbishop (Mac-
lagan) of York, then Bishop of Lichfield ; the Archbishop
(Lord Plunket) of Dublin preaching in the evening. Since
that time much has been done, including the purchase of a
Deanery Hougfe.
Since the Bishop's death 1,10(M. has been collected
towards a memorial to him, which is to go towards the
building of a Chapter House, to which his library has been
presented by his sons. I am rejoiced to learn (September
1898) that this building is likely to be commenced next
spring, and to have reason to thank and congratulate Lord
Eollo who has shown special interest in this worthy com
memoration of his old friend.
It has been necessary to chronicle much that was painful
in the Bishop's relations to St. Ninian's. It is satisfactory
to close our review of them with the following sentence at the
end of a Pastoral Letter, dated St. Andrews, 12 November,
1890, drawing attention to the fact that the Cathedral
had now received its final and complete recognition by the
Church at large, through the new Canon (ix.) of the revised
code of the General Synod, and asking for help to its funds.
After quoting from his sermon on his enthronement in 1853,
the Bishop concludes :
When those words were spoken, nearly forty years ago, the
tone of warning in which they were conveyed was not altogether
unnecessary, and as this will perhaps be remembered by some
among you, it may be well to add that the occasion for it now
is, I am thankful to say, quite gone by. The institution, as at
present conducted, possesses, I gladly assure you, my entire
confidence ; and I feel that I can safely recommend it as worthy
eminently worthy of yours.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 267
The Provost was the chief instrument in collecting
funds, but Canon Farquhar also did his part to conciliate
goodwill, and this, perhaps, may be a fitting place to quote
the Latin verses in the style of Catullus, addressed to him
by my uncle, not only in his Office as Precentor, but as a
poet on the occasion of the publication of his volume of
Sonnets in June 1887. The version is the Bishop's own.
Salvere jubeo te Poeta jam noster !
! si quid olim in conditore Thebano,
Lapides canendo qui movere callebat,
Accidere posset te canente tarn belle !
Turn quam repente surgeret Cathedralis
Perfecta moles ! Tumque cordibus gratis
Quot vota caelo solverentur exultim ;
Et qui Poeta es conditor fores noster.
I bid thee hail, who art become our Bard.
! that Amphion's wonder-working lyre,
Which built the walls of Thebes, might be transferred
To thee who sing'st so sweetly ! All entire
How swiftly then would our Cathedral pile
Rise up ! how full would the exulting strain
Of thanks to Heaven be raised ! And thou, meanwhile,
' Building the lofty rhyme ' wouldst build our Fane.
The early months of 1890 were saddened by two severe
family bereavements, the death of Mr. Macdonald (3 Janu
ary), who had married his daughter Margaret, atKydal, less
than five months previously, and that of his much-loved
youngest son, who had successfully passed ' through the
ranks to a commission,' who was found drowned in the
Severn, 14 April. The latter was Roundell Palmer's godson,
and bore his name, together with that of my eldest uncle
John.
The Bishop was able, however, to confirm in the
Cathedral early in May, and to attend the General Synod,
268 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. YII
at which he preached the opening sermon (3 June) on
' Religious Toleration not to be confounded with Indifference
to Religious Truth.'
The request from his colleagues to preach this sermon
was a mark of that confidence on their part which cheered
and brightened his later years. Dean J. S. Wilson writes
to me as follows, and I believe with great truth :
If I may say so, the Bishop's relations to his brethren were
never so cordial as in the last two or three years of his life.
Bishop Ewing of his earlier contemporaries seems to have been
the only one who thoroughly appreciated him ; and after Bishop
Ewing's death he stood very much alone. Towards the end of
his life from what I have heard both from himself and others
he was more than any other the peace-maker in the not infre
quent conflicts and misunderstandings that occurred, especially
those in connection with the proposed revision of the Scottish
Communion Office in 1889-90.
I should, however, say that his relations with the
Primus (Bishop Eden) were generally those of hearty
cordiality and agreement, though occasionally he came
into conflict with him, e.g. in regard to the commission
touching Pere Hyacinthe (M. Loyson), which he thought
too great an interference with a neighbouring church.
On the death of Dean Johnston (which occurred 18
September), the Bishop appointed the Provost of St.
Ninian's Dean, at the Diocesan Synod (held 3 November),
and requested the Synod to concur in the appointment of
the Rev. A. S. Aglen, Incumbent of Alyth, as Archdeacon
of the Diocese. He had given up the idea of having a
Coadjutor, receiving such Episcopal help as he needed,
particularly from his kind neighbour the new Bishop of
Glasgow (Right Rev. W. T. Harrison, consecrated 29 Sep
tember, 1888), but he required some assistance in the way
of internal oversight. The following were his instructions
given to the new officer. They may be of interest to those
CH. vii LAST EFFOKTS AT REUNION. 1876-189:2 269
inquirers who are occasionally puzzled as to what ' archi-
diaconal functions ' are.
Duties of Archdeacon.
(a) Generally to be the ' eye of the Bishop ' oculus Episcopi.
' Burn,' i. p. 93a, 96a, 966.
To act ' universaliter ' as Episcopi Vicarius in the Diocese
(the Cathedral excepted).
(b) Particularly
(1) To present to the Bishop such as are to be ordained,
having examined them as the Bishop's principal Chaplain
(p. 96o).
(2) To put into possession such as are presented, instituted
and inducted (Ib.).
(3) ' Jurgia ad ejus pertinent curam,' ib. p. 93 (Isidore
Hispalensis at the beginning of seventh century). On his
relations to the Dean, see ib. p. 976.
The Charge of October 1890, though not the last deli
vered by the Bishop, was the last separately published.
Besides dealing with the Cathedral, it enters at length into
the work done by the General Synod. It may be con
venient to the reader to know the principal points of what
was done, drawn chiefly from the Bishop's summary. The
question of the Communion Office was not discussed, nor
that of Metropolitan ; but the Primus was declared to have
the title ' Most Keverend.' The ' General ' Synod became
1 Provincial,' but, unhappily, no rule was passed regulating
its periodical convocation, although the Bishops had pro
posed that it should meet every five years. In Canon i.
reference is made to the joining of Priests in laying on of
hands on other Priests. In Canon ii. the title of the Primus
is to be ' The Most Eeverend the Bishop of , Primus of
the Scottish Church ' an expression said to be equivalent
to 'the Episcopal Church in Scotland.' In Canon viii.
Visitations are ordered, and a Bishop's power to minister
270 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vii
and do everything belonging to the Pastoral Office in every
church within his jurisdiction is made clear. Canon ix.,
as we have seen, recognises * Cathedral Churches,' but pro
vides that they must have a proper endowment. In
Canon xix. the services of laymen as preachers are per
mitted to be used with the Bishop's license. It may be
remarked that in these canons generally ' Incumbent ' is
changed to ' Eector.' In Canon xxx. the presence of adult
communicants of either sex at * Diocesan Synods ' is pro
vided for, males being permitted to speak, and notice of
such Synods is made obligatory ; but nothing was done here,
or in Canon xxxii. (' Provincial Synods '), to give laymen
a right to vote. Canon xxxviii., on 'Holy Baptism,' is not
very clear, but seems more favourable to what may be called
the liberal view of the validity of lay Baptism than the
canon previously in force. Canon xl., 'Of Confirmation,'
sanctions the prefix of the form ' N. I sign thee with the
sign of the Cross and lay my hand upon thee ' wherever
the Bishop, ' with the concurrence of the clergyman,' shall
think fit to introduce it. In Canon xli., ' Of Holy Matri
mony,' it is ordered that all marriages, in ordinary cases,
shall take place in church ; but the clergy may, at their
discretion, omit a part of the prefatory and of the con
cluding address. As regards the interpretation of the
canons, it was declared that ' the canons shall be con
strued in accordance with the principles of the civil law of
Scotland,' with an appeal, if necessary, to any generally
recognised principles of Canon Law.
At the end of the year 1890, on Christmas Day, the
Bishop caught a chill, which was followed by a severe illness
which brought his life into danger. His weakness continued
for the next half-year, during which his Episcopal duties
were taken by his colleagues of Glasgow and Edinburgh, par
ticularly the former. In the autumn he gradually regained
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 i>71
strength, and on Thursday, 1 October, 1891, he took part
with Lord Lothian and Mr. Gladstone and others in the
Jubilee of Trinity College, Glenalmond. A newspaper
account of the proceedings * describes the Bishop's speech
as ' far and away the best, and delivered with an eloquence
that left Mr. Gladstone's far behind. . . . The words came
away in strong and silvery tones, and without much effort.
Every sentence was modulated with the skill of an accom
plished orator ; and when he ceased it was, as Longfellow
says of the passing of Evangeline, the ceasing of beautiful
music.' He had prepared a longer address, which was
printed in the ' Scottish Guardian ' (16 October).
On the same day (1 October) the first volume of his
* Annals ' was published, and on the 21st of the same month
he received a letter from the publishers saying that a second
edition was called for one of the best of ' tonics ' to a
literary man.
The Bishop was permitted to deliver in person one
more Charge, and that one of his best, on ' Modern Teach
ing on the Canon of the Old Testament,' at Perth, a few
days after the Glenalmond Jubilee (on 7 October). Of this
Canon Farquhar wrote in his Journal :
We had our Diocesan Synod at the west end of the Cathe
dral. Since the Dean had installed the Archdeacon as a Canon
[which he had previously scrupled about doing] there was no
business except the Bishop's Charge. He is a wonderful old
man. I never expected to hear him deliver another Charge.
It was on Old Testament criticism, and a very learned
and helpful address he gave. ... Is this the end of his
great series of Charges? He has published his Annals
volume I.
This Charge was printed at the end of the volume
Primary Witness to the Truth of the Gospel,' published
1 Perthshire Advertiser.
272 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. vii
early in the last year of his life (1892). it is remarkably
vigorous, and struck out rather a new line of study on his
part, showing the great freshness of his interest in ques
tions of the day. It is characteristic of the two brothers
that both their last publications were on the Old Testa
ment ; but, while my father's was intended for edification
(* How to Bead the Old Testament,' addressed to his grand
children), my uncle's was controversial, though controversial
with the mellow wisdom of age and the confidence of long
experience of God's Providence over His written Word. The
most original argument is that drawn from the analogy of
the fate of Wolf's theory of Homer, in which I cannot but
think it a happy thing that he returned to sympathy with
his old friend Mr. Gladstone, from whom, as a politician,
he had long been alienated. He quotes largely from him
as to the reaction against the theory of the late date of the
Homeric poems, which Wolf supposed did not exist in their
present form till the time of Pisistratus, four or five cen
turies after the date usually assigned to Homer, and which
he also attributed to a number of unknown writers called
Khapsodists. The Bishop aptly compares Wolf's ' Prole
gomena ad Homer um ' with Wellhausen's ' Prolegomena to
the History of Israel,' and draws an inference that the
speculations of the latter are likely to meet with the same
fate as those of the former. He ends this part of his argu
ment as follows :
Upon the whole this at least may be fairly said : the collapse
of the Wolfian theory in its attempt to dethrone Homer, not
withstanding the energy with which it was prosecuted, and the
triumphant air which it assumed, may well teach us to be doubly
cautious how we meet the advances of the new criticism in its
attempt to dethrone Moses, however we may admire the ability,
or may be staggered by the boldness and assurance it displays.
I say ' to be doubly cautious how we meet.' We must not refuse
to meet them. On the contrary we must welcome every honest
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 273
inquiry which promises to throw light upon subjects of such
deep interest, and at the same time of such great difficulty and
obscurity.
He then goes on to do justice to the general beliefs and
motives of the 'main supporters of the new doctrine,'
particularly Canon Driver, ending as follows :
May we all strive to live, and to induce others to live, in
obedience to the Holy Faith once for all delivered to the Saints ;
and then, though we may fail to attain to the exact truth of
which we are in search upon points such as those to which
your attention has been directed, we may rest assured that our
errors will be pardoned through the merits of the Saviour whom
God has mercifully revealed to us in His inspired Word.
On Easter Eve, 16 April 1892, he received a present
from the members of the Church in St. Andrews, which
gratified him not a little from the manner in which it was
given. The following was the address and the reply which
he made to it :
To the Right Rev. Charles Wordsworth, D.C.L. Oxon., D.D.
St. Andrews and Edinburgh, Bishop of St. Andrews, Dunkeld,
and Dunblane, Right Reverend Sir, The congregation of St.
Andrews Church desire to present you, in the 40th year of
your Episcopate, with the Episcopal chair and pastoral staff which
accompany this address. We offer them as a slight evidence of
the reverence and affection we cherish towards you, not only as
our Bishop, but also as our friend. In doing so we rejoice to
know how much you are esteemed throughout the Diocese over
which you rule, as well as by those in Churches different from
our own who are acquainted with your character, your writings,
and your long career of public usefulness. We pray that your
life may be prolonged in order that by wise and just counsel you
may help to remove misunderstandings which divide the Christian
world and promote the spiritual union of all good men, however
widely they may be separated in other matters. The chair and
staff are made from oak, given for the purpose by the Very Rev.
H. G. Liddell, D.D., the late Dean of Christ Church. Oxford ;
274 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWOIITH CH. vn
and we trust that you will allow them to remain within St.
Andrews Church, in which we have so often listened to your
words and have been cheered by your presence. They will be a
permanent memorial of your honoured name.
The Bishop, in reply, said, My dear friends and brethren in
Christ, I am greatly gratified and cheered under a trial of much
bodily pain and infirmity by the regard and affection which you
have exhibited towards me in this address. I also rejoice to
think that through your kindness and generosity to me my suc
cessors in the,, Episcopate to the end of time will be provided with
an official chair and a pastoral staff, which, through the excel
lence of their workmanship, are not unworthy of the sacred
place and solemn purpose for which they are designed. You
have alluded to the source from which the material they are
composed of has been obtained. The fact you mention cannot
fail to give them an historical interest, and to me especially, as
a Christ Church man and a friend of the late Dean, it enhances
their value. You have also reminded me that this is the 40th
year since I became your Bishop ; and you are so good as to
express a hope that my life, which has been so mercifully pro
longed when so many of my juniors have been called away, may
still be preserved for some time to come. In such circumstances
an occasion like this is one for deep feeling and much serious
reflection on my part rather than for many words. I will, there
fore, only say further that I appreciate these tokens of your
esteem and attachment very highly, and thank you one and all
for them most heartily.
The Te Deum was then sung, and the ceremony closed with
the Benediction.
But even this was not the Bishop's last public utterance.
Though suffering in these last years from severe pain and
bodily weakness, his intellectual vigour was still great, and
to within a few weeks of his death he was making progress
with the second volume of his ' Annals,' and preparing the
material which has been used in this memoir. He also
published a valuable volume of sermons (' Primary Witness
to the Truth of the Gospel') and revised his book on
Shakespeare and the ' Outlines of the Christian Ministry.'
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1676-1892 275
On 12 August, 1892, he wrote from Edinburgh to Miss M.
Barter :
Since I came here I have written my Charge (not long), but
have made as yet very little progress with the * Annals ' proof
sheets are coming in both of * Shakespeare ' and 'Outlines,' so
that I do not expect to be ready for your kindly -offered and
valuable assistance so soon as I had hoped [probably in copying
the 'Annals'], probably not till the end of the year or there
abouts.
The Charge was delivered in the Bishop's absence on
5 October. 1 Canon Farquhar writes in his Diary :
We have to-day what may most likely prove to be Bishop
Wordsworth's last Diocesan Synod. Last night we were awakened
by terrific peals of thunder, and all to-day rain has been descend
ing in torrents. Nevertheless there was a fair attendance of
clergy and laity. The Bishop himself was absent for the first
time during an Episcopate of 40 years ! His Charge was read
by the Dean. The old man's appeal to the Presbyterians (' for
the last time ') was very touching. . . . The Archdeacon, in
happy terms, proposed a motion congratulating the Bishop on
his undiminished intellectual energy, and conveying the affec
tionate thanks of the Synod for some touching words of farewell
with which the Charge concluded. This was carried unani
mously. And is this indeed the end of these forty years of
mighty Charges ?
The following statistics for two years, 1853 and 1892,
giving the figures at the beginning and the end of his
1 It was printed in full in the Scottish Guardian of 7 October, where
it occupies nearly nine closely printed columns. It is therefore of con
siderable length, and is of the author's accustomed ability. Its text is the
address of Dr. Charteris as Moderator of the General Assembly: 'The
Sacred Foundation of the Church of Scotland.' The Bishop restates the
two main features of his scheme, (I) that he did not mean it to apply to Non
conformity in general, but to Scottish Presbyter ianism ; (2) that the
acceptance, where desired, of Presbyterian ordination, was not to be as a
rule for the future, but pro hoc vice. He notices an article in the Church
Times of 23 September supporting a ' precisely similar ' view.
T 2
276 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
Episcopate, will show at a glance something of the pro
gress made in forty years, though they only represent a
few heads of work. I borrow them mainly from Canon
Farquhar's History ' (p. 412) :
Incumbencies Souls Communicants Confirmed Baptised Parsonages
1853 . 16 2,552 1,132 122 91 2 1
1892 . 26 2 6,665 3,283 1,528 3 208 20
Increase 1 4,113 2,151 1,406 117 18
And now the Bishop, having rendered up his accounts
to man, might have hoped that he would be left in peace
to prepare to give account of his stewardship to Him
who gave it. But the end of strife was not yet. Most
untowardly the meeting of the Glasgow Church Conference,
not a week after the delivery of the Charge, gave an open
ing to a trusted officer of the Diocese to criticise the
Bishop's Eeunion policy in a manner which the critic him
self afterwards deeply regretted. This was on 11 October.
It was apparently in consequence of this that the Bishop
once again took pen in hand, and in a very vigorous and
lucid letter addressed to the ' Scotsman ' on the 13th
(which appeared in its issue of the 15th 4 ) made what he
described as an Apologia pro vita sua. There was no
reference to the untoward incident, but after an allusion to
the failure of prophecies about his uncle (like Jeffrey's
famous ' This will never do ' on the ' Excursion '), he went on
to put a series of thirteen questions, the answers to which
must (in his opinion) necessarily be in the affirmative, and
all tend to support his position. Some kind of an apology
1 These were Dunblane and Kirriemuir.
2 Add also 18 Missions, Private Chapels, &c.
3 The number confirmed is very large by comparison. It must imply
that a great many Presbyterians received the rite. The boys of the training
ship ' Mars ' must also be counted.
4 It was reprinted in the Scottish Guardian of the 28th.
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 277
was made by his critic in a letter to the ' Scottish
Guardian,' but it did not quite satisfy his devotion to the
cause for though wounded in person he clearly felt for
that far the most. Yet he fretted much under the un-
looked for charge, made by one whom he loved, that he
had not only been doing no good, but had done positive
harm, and he could not wholly pass it over. The result
was a final and a very remarkable exertion, made within a
fortnight of his death/Tn the form of a letter to the same
Church newspaper, entitled * An Attempt to remove Mis
understanding,' dated 21 November, and appearing in its
issue of the 25th. The arguments are well marshalled
and the points made clear, and, while he lost nothing in
point of dignity, his cause was certainly the gainer. The
critic was gently but firmly answered, and those concerned
reminded of the necessity of historical studies and full con
sideration of circumstances, before expressing an opinion on
the great cause to which he had given the best part of his
life.
In the interval between these two letters he noticed
with thankfulness a hopeful incident in another quarter.
This was the foundation of the Scottish Church Society,
which was constituted at a meeting held in Edinburgh on
19 October, under the presidency of his friend, Dr.
Milligan (see the report in the ' Scottish Guardian/
28 October, p. 576). The following words stand a* the
head of its constitution :
The motto of the Society shall be Ask for the Old Paths
. . . and walk therein.
The general purpose of the Society shall be to defend and
advance Catholic doctrine as set forth in the Ancient Creeds and
embodied in the standards of the Church of Scotland, and gener
ally to assert Scriptural principles in all matters relating to
Church Order and Policy, Christian work and Spiritual life
throughout Scotland.
278 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
Here was clearly the beginning of a * Tractarian move
ment ' inside the Established Church, which might well be
expected to have as important fruits as that which had
coincided with the Bishop's early days, and thus a gleam
of light shone across his last month of life.
The following account of the last days of the Bishop
has been written by a member of the family :
Early in December he was taken ill ; the illness, though
painful, was mercifully short, and it was plain that the long life
was close to its end. Friday, only four days before his death, he
was evidently aware of this ; severe pain coming on, he remarked
that this was certainly to be ' his cross.' He was full of tender
consideration for the daughter who was his chief companion and
nurse during that last week, anxious that she should not be
knocked up, and saying, as he kissed her that Friday evening, ' My
dear, you have been good to me ! ' His mind was vigorous almost
to the last ; and, still intent on the Church and Diocese he loved
so well, on Sunday afternoon he dictated for the post directions
concerning the induction of an Incumbent and other ecclesiasti
cal business. On Monday, the last day, he received with thank
fulness the loving ministry of a young priest then in charge at
St. Andrews. About 10 o'clock in the morning, feeling his
powers failing, he raised himself in bed with a strong and con
centrated effort and, with a clear and vigorous voice, offered his
last prayer and act of humble contrition, in which he earnestly
described himself as ' the chiefest of sinners.' He only spoke
once again, when, seeing another daughter, who had come from
a distance to his death-bed, he said with a loving smile to her,
' Are* you there, my dear? Oh, I am so glad to see you.' His
face brightened again as his children said the * Te Deum ' and,
as the evening drew on, sang hymns round his bed till about 8
p.m. on 5 December his spirit passed painlessly away.
He was buried in the Cathedral cemetery on Friday, the 9th.
His body was taken into the chancel of St. Andrew's Church the
previous evening, and watched through the night by members of
the congregation. Early in the morning, while a golden sun
rise lit up sea and sky with a radiant glow quite remarkable for
that cold, foggy December season, a congregation of loving
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 279
mourners his own family and others gathered for the cele
bration of the Holy Communion. Later on, the church was
filled for the last offices, and, by special permission of the city
authorities, the ancient west doorway of the ruined Cathedral
long since disused was opened to receive the funeral procession
of, in all probability, the first bishop who had been buried there
since the Reformation. 1
The Primus (Brechin) and the Bishops of Edinburgh and
Glasgow attended the service, and the Bishop of Edinburgh
committed the body to the ground.
The following extract from a letter of his son Robert
describes the circumstances of that funeral service :
Nothing could have exceeded the beauty and the brightness of
his funeral. There was a cloudless sky the sun shining in all
its glory, and just a sprinkling of fresh snow. As the long pro
cession composed of all classes and creeds uniting to do honour
to his memory passed under the grand old western doorway of
the Cathedral and wound its way up the roofless nave, following
the surpliced choir, and clergy, bishops, and mourners surely
if there are windows in Paradise (as my father said of Bishop
Hamilton in his sermon on Daniel), he must have been allowed
to gaze on that scene in rapturous joy. Oil, how his soul would
delight in it ! To no one who took part could the thought have
been absent that the work of his life was already bearing fruit,
and in God's good time would surely produce an hundredfold.
On the coffin we placed two lovely crosses of flowers, one at
the head from ' Glenalmond ' (how pleased he would have been
to know that their tribute of affection was on his head), the
other from my sisters, below the plate which bore his name. He
has left, I am thankful to say, the inscription for the marble
slab which is to be placed in the wall over his grave. He lies
just below one of the old walls of the Cathedral churchyard.
The epitaph now in place, almost as he wrote it, is as
follows (see * Scottish Guardian,' 17 November 1893) :
1 As far as can be gathered from the History of St. Andrews, the last
Prelate was a Stewart, cousin of Mary Queen of Scots, who was interred in
front of the High Altar.
280 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
In memory of
The Bight Rev. CHARLES WORDSWORTH, D.D. and D.C.L.,
for forty years
Bishop of the United Diocese
of St. Andrews, Dunkeld and Dunblane.
Born at Lambeth 22nd August, 1806.
Died at St. Andrews 5th December, 1892.
Aged 86.
Remembering the prayer of his Divine Lord and Master
for the unity of His Church on earth,
He prayed continually and laboured earnestly
that a way may be found, in God's good time,
For the reunion of the Episcopalian and Presbyterian bodies
Without the sacrifice of Catholic principle
or Scriptural Truth.
On the curb enclosing the grave are the following words :
' Carolus Wordsworth, 1806-1892 ' at the head ; ' Sci
Andreae Episcopus, 1853-1892 ' at the foot ' ; ' Manus ad
clavum + Oculus ad coelum ' on the right ; * Veritas in
Caritate -f- Unitas in Veritate ' on the left (cp. p. 20 n.)
The following, from an unpublished Lecture by Dr.
Danson, may come in fitly here.
1. He found the Church on his arrival in Scotland obscure in
position and submissively apologetic in demeanour. He could
not materially increase her numbers or add to her wealth. But
he could and did employ his great powers in bringing her from
the shades of obscurity into a position which challenged the
attention of the public mind. Nothing can be more striking
than the contrast between the line of Dr. James Walker's
sermon preached at the consecration of Bishop Sandford and the
bold and aggressive vindication of the Episcopal Church in
Scotland assumed by Charles Wordsworth even in his earliest
days of high office in the Church. The controversy which had
all but slept since the days of the great antagonists Principal
George Campbell and Bishop John Skinner, upon the true nature
of an Apostolic ministry, was re-opened with vigour, courtesy, and
learning. With a laity so deeply interested in Ecclesiastical
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 281
questions as is the population of Scotland, Church leaders and
Professors of Theology in the different Christian communities
could not afford to be silent. His intensified and persistent
appeal could neither be despised nor ignored. Accordingly
answers of varying merit were given, formally in Church courts,
or sporadically in pamphlets or in the press, only to meet with
replies which had (not for their least merit) the marks of unfail
ing courtesy and an honest desire to understand, on the part of
the Bishop, his adversary's position.
2. By his own prowess as a scholar and teacher, by his
personal munificence in the cause of higher education, and by
the labours of the brilliant band of colleagues attracted by his
enthusiasm, he made it possible for the upper classes of Scotland
to obtain in their own country an education for their sons which
before his day could only be had at the historic schools of
England. The gain was manifold.
8. By his personal learning, the pursuit of which was ever
bringing new accessions to his stores, he illustrated the glory of
a learned ministry not, I may say, of a learning which employs
and exhausts itself in curious annotations of old-world com
positions, but of offering upon the altar of God the spoils he had
captured from the great minds of Paganism. His classic muse
even Keble did not disdain to employ upon occasion.
4. By steeping his spirit in the great Anglican divines,
especially of the Caroline period men whose width and depth
of reading and height of mental gifts he was well qualified to
gauge he preserved the robust qualities especially characteristic
of Anglican theology, free from the accretions either of Geneva
or Rome.
And above all, he recalled the Christian thought of Scotland
to the smfulness of schism and to the manifold ill effects of
unnecessary disunion. To patriotism, to motives even of financial
prudence, to social instincts, he directed more subdued appeals.
His trumpet notes, however, proclaimed to every mountain and
glen in the land that as in high heaven so also here on earth the
Kingdom of Christ is one kingdom, that, even for her, union is
strength ; that it is wrong ideally and foolish practically for the
servants of the one King to distract her with factious watchwords
and self-devised modes of government ; that the time had now
come when the most chivalrous, the most patriotic and the
282 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
wisest and best on both sides might concert measures of internal
peace to make her external warfare more effective, and so to
gladden the heart of her King. When unity had been restored
within her walls, then and then only would the poet's words have
any real significance.
1 Blow trumpet ! He will lift us from the dust.
Blow trumpet ! Live the strength and die the lust.
Clang battle-axe and clash brand ! Let the King reign.
Blow ! for our Sun is mighty in His way.
Blow ! for o'ur Sun is mightier day by day ! '
The Bishop of Glasgow spoke eloquently in the same
strain in his Charge of 1893 (' Scottish Guardian,' 17
November), and Canon Farquhar, who published a fine
memorial sermon on his Bishop, writes this deliberate
estimate :
Although strong men and strong theologians, such as Bishop
Rattray, contemplative saints like Bishop Jolly, able admini
strators like Bishop John Skinner, powerful intellects like
Bishop Gleig, hardworking theological saints like Bishop Alex
ander Forbes, have held the Episcopate in Scotland since its
disestablishment in 1689, it may well be doubted whether Bishop
Charles Wordsworth does not stand out pre-eminent amongst
them for a certain largeness of personality ; and it is certain that
he surpassed them all in the way in which his utterances
commanded the ear of the Scottish public (* H. of Perth,' p. 413).
As regards his supposed egotism in reference to the
questions on which he spoke and wrote so much, Mr.
Farquhar has some excellent remarks in his MS. Diary,
which I am glad to have his leave to quote rather than to
attempt a vindication of my uncle in my own words. The
note (which belongs to October 1887) also contains a state
ment as to the attitude of leading Presbyterians, which I be
lieve to be well founded. It exactly represents the Bishop's
mind and belief on the subject, which, as has been said, never
changed.
CM. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-189^ 283
The Bishop impresses me in private, as in public, as being a
most powerful man ; and moreover in private that egotism,
which I have sometimes heard objected to him, disappears.
When you talk to him in the freedom of private conversation,
and so put away your own egotism as to interest yourself in his
ideas and schemes, all his references to ' my movement,' ' the
letters I have received from leading Presbyterian Ministers,'
&c., &c., which to those who are devoid of the power of sympathy
seem rather egotistical, are soon discovered to issue from the old
man's way of losing his own personality in that (so to speak) of
his schemes. Particularly is this the case with his movement for
the reconciliation of Presbyterians with Episcopalians. When he
speaks about himself in this connection he merges his individuality
in that of his great idea, ' My Charge ' is then only the latest
development of the ' Cause,' and ' the flattering terms in which I
was spoken of ' is only a gleam of sunshine which has fallen upon
it. What he said to me this morning about his great scheme
was as follows : ' Every one believes that I ana deceived by the
undoubted encouragements which I receive in private letters from
the leading Presbyterian Ministers in the country. No doubt,
though they write like this to me, they ta,ke up an almost hostile
attitude in public. But then I maintain that they are not
altogether free agents in public. As ministers they were obliged
to take an oath that they would do nothing to forward
Episcopacy either directly or indirectly. And consequently in
their public capacity they feel compelled in common honesty to
do what they can to uphold the requirements of their official
position. And besides, except from myself, they get no en
couragement from us to show their real feelings. But I have
written evidence to prove that the leaders of Presbyterianism in
this country are in their hearts more or less dissatisfied with
Presbyterianism, and more or less prepared to welcome Episco
pacy, if Episcopacy would not take up a non possumus attitude
towards them *
' Therefore my object is (said the Bishop), amidst the evident
unsettlement of mind, which is next to universal among the
leaders of Presbyterianism in this country seeing that they are
all moving away in some manner from their ancient moorings
1 I omit the names here given, some of them those of living men.
284 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH CH. vn
to try and turn the tide in the right direction.' And he con
cluded by regretting that so many leading Churchmen did not
appear awake to the fact that now 'there was a tide in the
affairs of men, which taken at the flood might lead on to fortune.'
I ventured to say that I thought what frightened some of us in
his Lordship's scheme, large and generous as it was, lay in his
apparent assertion of the non -necessity of the re-ordination of
Presbyterian Ministers. * Well,' he said, ' I am aware of it, and no
doubt things would be in an irregular condition for a generation.
But during that^time those who did not recognise the validity of
Presbyterian Ordination would not be forced to recognise it;
they could, as now, resort to the ministrations of the properly
ordained clergy, and as every fresh ordination would be Episcopal,
the abnormal state of things would gradually pass away. In
1662 this was the course formally adopted by the Scottish
Episcopate. The Presbyterian Ministers were left in possession
of their parishes without re-ordination, and if doing this once
has not unchurched us, doing it twice would not.'
I will conclude this chapter with an extract from a
sermon preached in the East Parish Church, Aberdeen, by
Dr. James Cooper, which may serve as a specimen of what
Presbyterians of the most liberal and advanced type of
Churchman ship were not afraid to say about his work.
Dr. Cooper reminded his congregation of the forty-six
years of service to the cause of Christian Unity which the
Bishop gave, and then thus proceeded :
In 1846 he came to Scotland animated with the high aim
to which he dedicated all his after-life of healing the breach
which since 1661 had separated Presbyterians and Episcopalians.
The aim was noble, Christian, and, in the best sense, patriotic.
It was surely not impracticable. Men Scotsmen who preferred
Presbytery managed in the first half of the seventeenth century
to live together in one unbroken Reformed Church. And even
had there never been agreement in the past, is there never to be
any in the future? 'Surely,' to quote a saying of the late
Principal Campbell, to which Bishop Wordsworth very frequently
referred, ' surely the visible Church is not to remain always in
CH. vii LAST EFFORTS AT REUNION. 1876-1892 285
its present divided condition.' The prayer of our Lord will one
day be fulfilled' That they all may be one .... that the world
may believe.' To my thinking, Bishop Wordsworth's aim was the
noblest to which any Churchman in our modern Scotland could
devote himself ; and certainly he pursued it in no unworthy spirit
with no selfish or sectarian ends, with unfailing courtesy, with
rare candour and wonderful perseverance through good report
and bad report ; with unswerving singleness of heart ; with hope
undying because it rested on the word of Christ and trusted in
the power of the Holy Ghost.
286
CHAPTEE VIII
EVENING OF LIFE, PARTICULARLY AT ST. ANDREWS (1876-1892)
' Inveni portum ! Spes et Fortuna, valete !
Sat me lusistis, Indite nunc alios.'
' Immo alii inveniant ego quern, Christo auspice, portum,
Spes ubi non fallax Forsque perennis adest.'
1. Latin verses : partnership with Dean Stanley.
Motto of this chapter : its history Stanley's version Lines addressed to
Dean Ramsay (1872) Lines to Lord Beaconsfield on his return from
Berlin Congress (1878) His acknowledgment ' Beaumont & Fletcher '
Stanley's valediction.
2. Latin verses connected principally with St. Andrews.
Sophocles loquitur Prof. Lewis Campbell's reply Lines on Campbell's
recovery from bronchitis Lines to the 'Country Parson' Elegy on
Principal Tulloch (1886) Intercourse with Principal Shairp and Prof.
Knight St. Leonard's Girls' School Agnata Kamsay's success (1887)
The ' Scarlet Gown ' (1878) Dr. Macgregor's salmon Dean Johnston's
' Wide-awake.'
3. The Wykehamist Dinner of 1880 and Athletics.
Speeches at Wykehamist dinner First game of golf (1890) ' Pindar and
Athletics, Ancient and Modern' (1888) Letter on skating The
' Flying Mercury.'
4. Revival or continuation of old friendships Literary correspondence.
Cardinal Manning Merivale's anecdote Cardinal Newman The Bishop's
judgment of him Opinion on Archbishop Trench Letters to Dean
Boyle On Baxter On Clarendon On Hooker, Plea for Justice, &c.
Extract from Canon Farquhar's Diary : The Bishop's orderliness The
two Skinners Letter to Dean Merivale : lines from Statius The Bishop's
version and the Dean's Mr. Tuckwell's ' Tongues in Trees ' Mr.
Gladstone : note to Sir J. E. Eardley-Wilmot Intercourse with Bishop
Claughton Bishop Moberly's golden wedding Interest in his nephews'
writings.
OH. viii EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 287
5. Last, publications in verse and prose executed and projected.
Latin poem on ' Night-mare ' ' Series Collectarum,' &c. Other Hymns
'Lead, kindly Light' Sonnet by Bishop of Kipon after visit to St.
Andrews Volumes of Sermons, Lectures, and Reviews, projected.
6. Manner of Preaching and Confirming.
Impressiveness of his sermons Dr. Danson's criticism Always uses manu
script Manner of confirming Order of service Cards.
1. Lord Selborne's Character of Bishop Wordsworth.
The Bishop's remarks upon the book and the character.
8. Conclusion.
1. Latin verses: partnership ivith Dean Stanley
The lines which form the motto of this chapter were
designed by the Bishop as an inscription to be placed on
the wall of a summer house at Bishopshall, overlooking
the harbour. They consist of a somewhat cynical distich
translated from the Greek Anthology, 1 which has found
much favour as a monumental inscription in various
countries of Europe, including our own, and two lines of a
generous Christian character written by the Bishop to
express his own thankfulness for the blessings of eternal
life, especially in his declining years, and the hope that
others might share them. He repeated the lines, in March
1877, to Dean Stanley, when he came to St. Andrews to
deliver an address to the students, and suggested to him
that he should turn them into English, as he had some
years before felicitously turned some lines addressed to
Dean Eamsay. Stanley two days later enclosed the
following version :
Hail, happy Haven ! By this tranquil shore
From life's long storms I find an easy port ;
False Hope and fickle Fortune, now no more
My course beguile : let others be your sport !
1 See Jacobs' Anthologia, ii. 20, 49 :
'EA.7rls Kal (TV Tux?? ^7 a X a ^P er ' r ^ v At/iteV 5p ov.
Loi % vfjuv Trai^ere roiis fJt.fr' e/t.
288 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
Hail, happier Haven still ! May others, too,
Led by their Lord, find here what I have found ;
With Hope more sure than earth's vain fancies knew,
With brighter Bliss than this world's fortune crowned.
Other friends, including Dean Liddell, Bishop Moberly,
and Professor Lewis Campbell tried their hands at the
rendering of the whole or part of the lines, and the Bishop
preserved a number of notes on the first epigram. From
these I gather that the Latin version is by 'Janus
Pannonius, a Hungarian Bishop, who died in 1474,' and
that its most correct form is :
Inveni portum : Spes et Fortuna valete,
Nil mihi vobiscum : ludite nunc alios.
Lily, the grammarian, and Sir Thomas More amongst our
selves also adopted or adapted it. One correspondent (Arch
deacon Hessey) notices that the epitaph on Archbishop
Laud in St. John's College Chapel, Oxford, is based upon
it:
Qui fui in extremis fortunam expertus utramque,
Nemo magis felix et mage nemo miser,
lam portum inveni. Spes et Fortuna valete,
Ludite nunc alios, pax erit alta mihi.
Le Sage makes his hero ' Gil Bias ' set up the Latin
distich over his home in Valencia, and Lord Brougham is
actually said to have done so over the door of his villa at
Cannes. It occurs as an epitaph at Barsham Church,
Suffolk, and curiously enough on a fine Jacobean tomb
belonging to the Warham family, in Osmington Church,
Dorset, close to which I write this Chapter ; and it probably
would be found in not a few other places. Burton, in his
' Anatomy of Melancholy ' (2, 3, 6), wrongly ascribes the
lines to Prudentius. His version of them is, however,
very good (rendering ' Nil mihi vobiscum ') :
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 289
Mine haven's found, fortune and hope adieu.
Mock others now, for I have done with you.
Of those sent to my uncle, Bishop Moberly's seems to me
the best :
Port won ! to luck and hope I make my bow.
Me you have mocked enough, mock others now.
The friendship with Dean Stanley, of which these
lines are an instance, was one of the many pleasanter
features of the Bishop's later life. Stanley was, it need
scarcely be said, when he was at his ease, one of the most
charming of companions, giving something of himself and
of his best self in a few moments, and compressing the
experiences that he was relating into words that gave you
a subtle flavour of his own feeling. I remember his
describing his night spent in the Kremlin of Moscow in a
way that made me feel for the time that I had been with him ;
and again, his saying about the last volume of his Jewish
history, in a deep tone that made you realise his faith in
another life, ' I have tried to do justice to Judas Maccabeus.
I hope he will thank me for it some day.' The association
between him and my uncle in such compositions may be
illustrated by several other graceful fugitive pieces,
particularly the lines addressed to Dean Eamsay and to
Lord Beaconsfield. The lines to the former belong to an
earlier year (12 August, 1872), and were prefaced by the
following characteristic note for my uncle fled to the
Latin Muses whenever he was incapacitated by headache
for other work : l
My dear Dean, Your kind, welcome, and most elegant present
[the 20th edition of ' Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Cha-
1 In one of his pocket-books he sets down the following pretty lines by
Cyril Jackson, which have, however, one failing that the last, which ought
to give the point, is not exactly right, unless the author meant to insist
290 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. VIIT
acter '] reached me yesterday in bed ; to which and to my sofa I
have been confined for some days by a severe attack of brow
ague. And being thus disabled for more serious employment I
allowed my thoughts to run upon the lines which you will find
overleaf. Please to accept them as being well intended ; though
(like many other good intentions) I am afraid they give only too
true evidence of the source from which they come, viz. a
disordered head.
The linesmay be followed at once by Stanley's transla
tion, though that was not written till later.
Ad virum venerabilem, optimum, dilectissimwn, Eduardum B.
Ramsay, LL.D., Edinburgi Decanum, accepto ejus libro,
cui titulus i Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character*
vicesimum jam lautiusque et amplius edito.
EDITIO accessit vicesima ! plaudite, quicquid
Scotia festivi fert lepidique ferax !
Non vixit frustrti, qui frontem utcunque severam
Noverit innocuis explicuisse jocis :
Non frustra vixit, qui tot monumenta Priorum
Salsa pia vetuit sedulitate mori :
Non frustra vixit, qui, quali nos sit amore
Vivendum, exemplo pnecipiensque docet.
Nee merces te indigna manet : Juvenesque senesque
Gaudebunt nomen concelebrare tuum ;
Condiet appositum dum fercula nostra salinum,
Pr;ebebitque suas mensa secunda nuces ;
Dum stantis rhedje aurigam tua pagina fallet,
Contentum in sella taedia longa pati !
upon the fact that his chief experience in life was a superabundant sense of
his own vitality :
' Si mihi, si liceat producere leniter aevum,
Nee pompam, nee opes, nee mihi regna petam ;
Vellem ut, divini pandens mysteria verbi,
Vitam in secreto rare beatus agam.
Adsint et Graiae comites Latiaeque Camenae,
Et lepida faveat conjuge laetus Hymen.
Turn satis : aeternum spes, cura, dolorque valete
Hoc tantum superest discere : posse mori !
en. TIII EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 291
Quid, quod et ipsa sibi devinctum Scotia nutrix
Te perget gremio grata fovere senem ;
Officiumque pium simili pietate rependens,
Saecula nulla sinet non l meminisse Tui.
A Translation of the foregoing in Verse
BY THE VERY REV. ARTHUR P. STANLEY, D.D., DEAN OF WESTMINSTER.
HAIL twentieth edition ! from Orkney to Tweed
Let the wits of all Scotland come running to read.
Not in vain hath he lived who by innocent mirth
Hath lightened the frowns and the furrows of earth ;
Not in vain hath he lived who will never let die
The humours of good times for ever gone by ;
Not in vain hath he lived who hath laboured to give
In himself the best proof how by LOVE we may live.
Rejoice, my dear Dean, thy reward to behold,
In united rejoicing of young and of old ;
Remembered so long as our board shall not lack
A bright grain of salt or a hard nut to crack ;
So long as the cabman, aloft in his seat,
Broods deep o'er thy page as he waits in the street.
Yea, Scotland herself, with affectionate care,
Shall nurse an old age so beloved and so rare,
And still gratefully seek in her heart to enshrine
One more Beminiscence, and that shall be thine.
The lines to Lord Beaconsfield belong to 1878, when he
returned from the Berlin Congress bringing ' Peace with
Honour.'
Ad Virum Nobilissimum Comitem de Beaconsfield, A. P. Eq. y
dc. t &c.
Post reditum a Berolinensi Congressu, Jul. 16, 1878.
SALVE iterum nobis, Vir praestantissime, salve,
Cujus Pax ' sequitur, ' non sine Honore,' pedes !
Te populus reducem, te Patria grata salutat ;
Te mare, rura, urbes ; Te Thamesisque Pater.
1 Alluditur ad titulum libri Reminiscences, &c.
u 2
292 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH cir.vin
Non capiti galea est ; non ensem extenta coruscat
Dextera ; per plateas non tuba rauca sonat :
Milite pro stipante vias, en ! fcemina jactat
Serta, novisque micat floribus omne solum !
Nam tu progrederis Victor potiore triumpho
Quam quos, effuso sanguine, Bella parant.
Vox tibi pro gladio est ; tibi mens armata vigore,
Injusti impatiens, propositique tenax :
Nee minus ingenium quid possit ad omnia promptum,
Quid p8ssit patriee non cohibendus amor,
EuropaB atque Asiae nuper congressa Potestas,
Consiliis, didicit, pacificata tuis.
Hinc est quod tibi partus honos, plaudente Senatu,
Dum grave certamen lingua diserta refert ;
Hinc est quod, Populi Regina interprete vocum,
Stella, velut caelo, pectore fixa micat ;
Vidimus et laetos plena inter pocula cives
Certatim nomen concelebrare tuum.
Tu vero interea longe ulteriora revolvens,
Concipis indignum nil l humilive modo :
4 Scilicet effugiant alii discrimina 2 rerum,
Si quos, officium quo vocat, ire piget ;
Sit virtus aliis in prassens, et sibi solis
Per tritas tuto consuluisse vias ;
Anglia, majus opus tibi contigit ; area major
Gentibus et potior, te praeeunte, patet :
Laus tua sit petiisse humanum quicquid ubique
Provehat in melius, nobilitetque, genus.
Nee faustum omen abest ; tibi serviet Insula posthac
Sedem ubi dilectam condidit alma Venus,
^Eneadum 3 genetrix, qui legibus, artibus, armis,
Late hominum mores excoluere feros.
At tibi nobilior Romana nata propago
Jamdudum didicit nobiliora sequi.
Jus tibi, Libertas, tibi Copia rite ministrat,
Et Christi e caelo tradita pura Fides.
1 ' Nil parvum, aut humili modo,
Nil mortale loquar.' Hor. Od.
* Per varies casus, per tot discrimina rerum.' Virg. Mn.
3 ' JEneadum genetrix . . . Alma Venus.' Lucret. sub init.
H. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 293
Aucta igitur Virtute, novo te accinge labori,
Per mare, per terras, quo tua Fata vocant.
Auspice Te, tellus Asiana, excussa veterno,
Incipiat priscum jam renovare decus.
Instar Apostolic! l miseris solatia praebe
(Tu quoque solamen praesidiumque) viri ;
Moeniaque hinc Urbis spectans propiora sacratse,
Inde petas sanctas spes, Animumque 2 Dei ;
Dum Sol Eoas, Luna 3 fugiente, per oras
Nuntiat exoriens Crux tibi summa salus ! *
0. W.
To the Bight- Hon. the Earl of Beacons field, K.G,, (&c., &c., <&c.
HAIL to the Chief who in triumph returns ;
' Peace,' but ' with honour,' his footsteps attends :
Heart of Old England with gratitude burns ;
City with Country its welcoming blends.
Shines here no helmet, here glitters no sword ;
Trumpet sounds none in the long crowded street ;
Citizens only his cavalcade guard ;
Flowers from fair hands this new conqueror greet.
Brighter the hopes that his victories fill
Than trophies won hard on the red battle-field ;
A sword in his voice, and a host in his will
That daunts all aggression, and dares not to yield.
Genius prepared both for faction and fighting ;
Patriot on fire for a land not his own ;
Eastern and Western in Congress uniting,
Swayed by his counsel, their quarrels condone.
Hence rise the cheers of a Senate that listens
To a tale yet more wondrous than that of ' Alroy ; '
Hence on his bosom the Star that outglistens
' Tancred's ' wild vision and ' Coningsby's ' joy.
1 St. Barnabas. 2 Vide ' Tancred,' passim.
3 The Crescent, Standard of Mahomet.
294 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. VIH
Banquet on banquet, and toast upon toast,
Fill up the measure of praise and of glory ;
Tell us, at last, without braggard or boast,
The moral of all this magnificent story.
Let others shun the hazards and the falls,
And shrink to climb the steep when Duty calls ;
Or, safe within the streak of silver sea,
Live for themselves and for the passing day.
England ! for thee a nobler task we find-
To lead the nations, not to lag behind ;
Be thine the praise, in every time and place,
To ennoble, kindle, purify our race !
Henceforth (blest omen !) thine the happy isle
On which the Queen of Love first deigned to smile ;
Mother of those whose laws, whose arms, whose arts
Subdued from clime to clime the wildest hearts.
But nobler than that old imperial Rome
Is to thy sons their own inspiring home ;
Wealth, Freedom, Justice, as thy dower are given,
And Gospel Truth, the last best boon of Heaven.
Then onwards to ' fresh woods and pastures new ; '
O'er earth and sea to thine own self be true ;
The ancient East, through thee with light divine
Once more imbued, shall still ' arise and shine.'
Like that * good man,' the Cypriot saint of yore,
On friendless souls sweet consolations pour ;
Catch from the genius of the neighbouring strand
The holy stirrings of that Sacred Land ;
Whilst the bright Day-star sees the Crescent wane
Be thine this glorious Cross, not borne in vain 1
CH. viii EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 295
Apology of the Translator to the Original.
What English verse can rival such Latinity,
True classic child of Christ Church and of Trinity ? !
Yet still when Whig with Tory thus combines
The glories of a Premier to rehearse,
Mark how the Whig's untrammelled freedom shines
Where'er he quits the Tory's glowing verse ;
And though hard bound within the Bishop's fetter,
The Presbyter prefers the spirit, not the letter.
A. P. STANLEY.
I do not know on which of these versions my uncle wrote
the lines :
Scripsi equidem carmen : tarn belle, tamque facete
Keddidit Interpres desiit esse meum.
[I penned these lines indeed : but taste so fine
Has giv'n them English they're no longer mine.]
Lord Beaconsfield acknowledged the congratulations on
26 August, from Hughenden Manor, in the following
characteristic note.
Dear Bishop of St. Andrews, It is the happiest union since
Beaumont and Fletcher.
I am deeply gratified by such an expression of sympathy
from men so d ; stinguished for their learning and genius.
Your faithful and obliged servant,
BEACONSFIELD.
Henceforth, in their correspondence, my uncle was
' Beaumont,' and Stanley, being a Bishop's son, was
' Fletcher,' though, as my uncle felt, the parallel between
the union of two dramatists in one play was not exactly
akin to their conjunction. The last communication from
Stanley seems to be on a post-card (dated 30 December,
1 Note by Chas. W. I was of Christ Church, Oxford, but my father being
Master of Trinity, my home was at Cambridge.
296 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH.VIII
1880), in which he excuses himself from undertaking some
similar brotherly task. But it breathes a very happy
spirit of joyful friendliness. ' Divus Petrus ' is of course the
Church of St. Peter's, Westminster. The reader will notice
that Stanley calls it his * valediction.'
Senex seni venerando !
Premor, hen ! luctu nefando :
Mihi datur nullus locus
Per, quod vocant, Hocus pocus,
Versus Anglice reddendi
Et ad vulgus descendendi :
Quia nitent sine fine
Aeque Angle et Latine.
In hac valedictione,
Docte, gravis, care, bone !
Divus Petrus (recte putat)
Divum Andre am salutat,
Junctus illi semper grate
Pari confraternitate.
I must at least attempt to do justice to such tender
and pathetic playfulness.
Age to venerated age
Needs must send the sad message :
I've no longer at command
Trick of verse or sleight of hand
English to your lines to give,
And in all men's mouths to live :
For they're infinitely fine,
Whether in English or Latine.
Friend, who art learned, good and strong,
And gentle, take my parting song !
Let St. Peter thankfully
To his Andrew bid goodb'ye,
Ever happy to be joined
With so brotherly a mind.
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 297
2. Latin verses connected principally with St. Andreivs.
The Bishop also employed his Muse to convey his own
kindly appreciation and sympathy to his friends and neigh
bours in the University of St. Andrews. The following lines
to Professor Lewis Campbell, the editor and translator of
Sophocles, were written indeed before he went to reside
there, and enclosed in the letter which explains them from
the Feu House, Perth, 30 December, 1875.
My dear Sir, If I had not been more than commonly
occupied since I received your favour of the 26th inst., it would
have been acknowledged sooner, with due thanks which I now
beg to give for your response to my 'friendly and obliging
challenge,' and for the pleasure you have afforded me by letting
me see the classical elegiacs which accompanied your letter. I
have nothing to offer in return which is at all worthy of your
acceptance : but Sophocles himself is so much gratified by the
two-fold honour you have done him by your eVatVeo-ts, and still
more by your translation, that he has requested me to present
to you the tribute of thanks which you will find on the next
page.
Viro Beverendo Doctissimoque L. Campbell Grc&c. lit. in Acad.
Sanct. Andr. Professori Sophocles olim Athen[iensis] nunc
j Plurimos optans annos continue faustiores S. P. D.
Qui me reddideris Graium sermone Britanno,
Reddo equidem grates, docte poeta, tibi ;
Namque meam, fama est, Musam, te interprete, plausus
Dum servat veteres elicuisse novos.
These lines may be roughly Englished, as a Dean
Stanley is not at hand, in the following manner :
I thank thee, poet, who hast taught my Greek
In learned verse to British ears to speak.
For in thy hands my Muse, so fame has told,
Has gained fresh laurels, while she keeps the old.
298 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vm
I do not know whether my uncle consciously wished to
make out that Sophocles had learnt to write Latin in
Elysium : but, for some reason or other, he himself almost
gave up writing Greek verse (of which he was a master) in
his later years. Professor Campbell, however, replied in
good Greek, expressing his modesty in receiving such a
compliment.
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I must again be interpreter, though rather too tersely :
With awe thy praise I hear, spirit blest !
In silence to receive such grace is best.
Another longer set of verses shows how the friendship
had grown in closer acquaintance at St. Andrews (10 Decem
ber, 1878).
To Professor Campbell on his recovery from bronchitis.
Gratulor optatae morbum cessisse medelae
Qui saeva indiderat gutture tela tuo ;
Gutture quo non est aliud prasstantius ullum
Docta mellifluos edere voce modos.
Non erat indignum Phoebo succurrere vati,
Phoebicolae pubis quern chorus omnis amat.
Ipse salutifero miscens tibi pocula succo
Paeonia curans jam levat arte gulam.
Ergo omnes illi laetum Paeana canamus,
Seu Vir sive Deus suppeditavit opem.
He imagined Phoebus, the healer (Paeonius) as well as
harper, to have a particular tenderness for one who was so
sweet a singer, and to have himself mixed the medicines for
his throat. So all must sing a * Paean ' in his praise.
After he had been a few years at St. Andrews, he
received the nineteenth volume published by Dr. Boyd a
frequent and always kindly correspondent who from being
CH. vni EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 299
a ' Country Parson ' had now come to be Incumbent of the
Parish Church of the ancient city. The reader will I
think acknowledge that the compliment was both pretty
and appropriate.
Rustico Pastori, hodie urbano
Pastor fraternus
Undevicesimo ejus volumine gratissime recepto.
Quot fessos homines, quot tristia corda, quot aegros,
Quot passim indociles otia longa pati,
Te recreans, scriptis recreasti, Rustice Pastor :
Nee tot post annos charta diserta silet !
Non equidem invideo, miror magis : et prece posco,
Haec vita in tantis dum sit agenda malis,
Ut saliens velut in deserto jugis aquae fons,
Ingenii exundans sic tua vena fluat.
In lectulo ante lucem,
Jan. XV. 1879.
The sense may be given somewhat in this fashion :
How many years have sickness, toil and grief,
And blank ennui that cannot kill the time,
Turned to these ' Recreations ' for relief !
Yet still the Country Parson's lively chime
Sounds a fresh note. I grudge not, but admire :
And pray, since life must fare through all these ills,
That, like a moorland spring which cannot tire,
Thy bounteous vein may flow in ceaseless rills.
The wish with which the little poem concludes was
fulfilled ; and the Bishop had an opportunity of gracefully
acknowledging, I think, a twenty-second and even a twenty-
third volume.
A more serious note is struck in the following elegy on
Principal Tulloch, dated 8 April, 1886. There is no doubt
that my uncle felt his death as a real personal loss, and as
a loss to the cause he had so much at heart : for Tulloch
300 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH.VIII
was a strong man and a thorough Scotsman, who might
have carried his countrymen with him farther perhaps
than any man of his generation. The fact, too, that at this
period the Bishop was on less happy terms than usual
with his own colleagues in the Episcopate perhaps sharpened
his sense of loss. At any rate there is a strength of
mournful eloquence about this elegy which goes far beyond
the strain of ^mere compliment, and which I feel sure went
no little way towards revealing the Bishop's sympathy with
Scottish character to the best among his contemporaries.
In Obitum Viri Beverendi Joannis Tulloch, S. T. P.,
Collegii S. Maries Prcesidis, dc., &c., &c.
'In quern illud elogium: Uno ore plurimi consentiunt Populi Primarium
fuisse Virum.' Cic. De Fin. ii. 35 ; De Senect. 17.
OCCIDIT heu ! nimium celeri quern morte peremptum
Pnestantem luget Scotia tota Virum :
Pra?stantem ingenio, quod sursum et ad optima tendens
Provexit studiis excoluitque labor :
Prsestantem eloquio, quod nunquam Ecclesia frustra
Certam in re dubia ferre petebat opem.
Ah ! ubi, quern multos Academia nostra per annos
Fovit dulce decus prsesidiumque sinu ?
Ah ! ubi nunc facies, risusque, et regia formae
Majestas vera simplicitate placens ?
Queerimus incassum ! Sed non evanuit omnis,
Constant! vita quern sibi finxit, honos.
Egregia assidui remanent monumenta laboris,
Nee Tempus poterit perdere mentis opus :
Nee desiderium, fidique insignia luctus
Cessabunt abitum vix numeranda sequi.
Partiri nostrum dignata est ipsa dolorem
Regina, et lacrymas consociare suas.
Quinetiam afflictum post Te superesse recusat
Teque obeunte vetus nunc obit Officium.
c. w.
VIII. Apr. 1886.
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 301
I am glad to have the opportunity of translating these
pathetic lines.
Fallen, alas ! in death, and far too soon,
All Scotland mourns thee for her foremost man.
Foremost in upward mind, whose high -set aims
Were trained by study to yet higher range.
Foremost in eloquent speech, whom ne'er in vain
The Church invoked in doubtful circumstance.
Ah ! where is he, so long the pride and shield
Of all our academic brotherhood ?
Ah ! where the face, the smile, the majesty
Of royal person, with its simple charm 1
In vain we seek it. But the end remains
Honour, the goal of his consistent life,
And those memorials of his patient days,
The mind's brave work, which Time cannot destroy.
Nor lacks there evidence in mournful pomp
Of faithful grief that follows to his grave
In ranks scarce numbered. Our great Sovereign deigns
. Herself to share our grief, and joins her tears.
Nay that old Dignity, which graced thy name,
Falls with thy fall and wills not to survive.
The Bishop was naturally on excellent terms also with
Principal Shairp, whose sympathies with Keble and
Wordsworth as poets, and with literary life and thought at
Oxford and in England generally, were so much akin to his
own. Mrs. Shairp was sister of Bishop Douglas of Bombay ;
and the Principal was a correspondent of Bishop Patteson.
But Shairp was not at all an ecclesiastical statesman,
and had no liking for Wordsworth's Keunion aspirations ;
he thought them indeed unpractical, and of little moment in
comparison with the need of restoration of faith in funda
mentals, the absence of which troubled him much more
than division between Christian bodies. In fact Shairp
was at once a poet and a lover of the poetical side of
Presbyterianism, while Tulloch was probably more aware
302 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vm
of its practical defects, or at any rate felt more bound to
try and rectify them.
In his later years the Bishop saw probably most of
Professor Knight, a member of his own communion, and of
congenial interests and pursuits. Together they founded
the 'Wordsworth Society; ' together they walked, and played
whist or read Shakespeare in the evenings, and in many
ways made each other's lives happier. Those who have the
happiness to know Professor Knight can easily imagine how
his nature and character fitted him for this genial ministry
to an elder friend.
Another interest at St. Andrews besides the professors
and students, was found in the girls' school called * St.
Leonard's,' which succeeded him at Bishopshall. It was,
however, just before the time of his move to Kilrymont,
already recorded, that the school met with its greatest
success in the person of a former pupil, Miss Agnata Eamsay,
now Mrs. Montagu Butler. She appeared at the head of
the Classical Tripos at Cambridge or rather alone in the first
division of the first class and therefore as Senior Classic, on
18 June, 1887, the year of the Queen's first Jubilee. The
Bishop could not let the occasion pass, which brought
honour to a family long known for its scholarship, and
indeed was felt as a remarkable event throughout the whole
country. I print the lines, with his own translation, from
1 St. Leonard's School Gazette ' of November 1887.
Ad Agnatam Eamsay, Cantabrigice in Classico Tripode
facile Principem.
Salve inter doctos Tu doctior unica, salve,
(Si vox quid valeat nostra) puella viros !
Digna novae tellus pariat cui germina frondis,
Qua tua circumdet tempora Granta vetus.
Non prius audito tibi consonat Anglia plausu ;
Te propria jactat Scotia laude suam.
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 303
Optimus exultat Patruus meliore propinqua,
Prseclarus nata nobiliore Pater.
Aureo te gaudens anno Victoria donis,
Successu Agnatse laetior ipsa, beat.
Ante omnes in honore tuo Schola nostra triumphat,
Vix tantum credens se genuisse decus.
Translation
Maid, among learned men more learn'd than all
Hail, doubly hail, if aught my feeble voice
Can speak to greet thee ! Worthy art thou for whom
Earth should bring forth some new-leafed plant, wherewith
Old Granta lovingly might deck thy brow.
England with thy applause, unheard of, rings :
Scotland more fondly claims thee for her own :
Thy Uncle Father each renowned, exults
To find his honoured name eclipsed by thine :
Our Queen, more glad even in her golden year
Thro' thy success, adorns thee with a gift :
But more than all our School thy triumph shares,
Wondering to think she gave such glory birth.
C. W.
St. Andrews, 18 July, 1887.
The St. Andrews verses may be fitly concluded with the
following on the * Scarlet Gown,' which is very striking
there in the old grey streets, and now is worn by female
students as well as male, though I believe it is not peculiar
to that University.
The following mottoes were prefixed to the little Poem.
4 Thy habit rich, not gaudy,
For the apparel doth proclaim the man.' Hamlet, i. 3.
* Amictus corporis . . . nuntiat hominem qualis sit.' ECCLUS. xix. 30.
' Est pudor . . . qui adducit gloriam et gratiam.' Ib. iv. 21.
Qua juxta Eoos urbs antiquissima fluctus
Prseteriti decoris flet monumenta sui,
Rubra spectanda est Academica veste Juventus,
Rubra splendescit veste palasstra ' virum.
1 The Links.
304 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. TIII
Miranti istius quaenam sit causa coloris
Nescio quis ridens talia voce refert :
Non color iste sapit rubicund! pocula Bacchi,
Non fera sanguinea prcelia gesta manu :
Ingenui signum est proprium, mihi crede, pudoris,
Quern vita, ut quisque est optimus, ore gerit.
Quis nescit quantum studiis urbs nostra severis,
Quis nescit quantum floreat arte pilae ?
Adde virum l nostros qui nunc ornatque regitque
JudicSo princeps eloquioque gregis :
Et quum Natura sit tanta modestia nobis,
Quid mirum est ipsas erubuisse togas ?
XXVI. Nov. 1878.
Professor Campbell translated these lines into Greek in
bis a6vpiJ,dTia. I have tried my hand at rendering them
in an easier mode.
The Scarlet Gown
Where by the Eastern waves an old-world town
Mourns the memorials of her vanished fame,
Her Student Youth shines forth in Scarlet Gown,
In scarlet shine the votaries of her game.
1 Why was that colour chosen ? ' should you ask,
A smiling friend may bid you understand,
This vesture doth no Wine-god's worship mask,
Nor tell of foemen slain with blood-red hand.
'Tis the true sign of modest bashfulness,
Whereby each good man's inner life is shown.
Severe our Studies all men must confess :
Who knows not Golf has brought us just renown ?
Then too our Rector whose unrivalled powers,
Wisdom and Eloquence, make fitting head-
Sure, since such natural Modesty is ours,
'Tis only right our gown should blush so red.
1 Lord Selborne, installed Hector on Thursday, 21 November, 1878.
CH. viii EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 305
Two other pleasant little epigrams addressed to clergy,
one of the Established Church, and one of his own, may
fitly close this section. The first is to Dr. Macgregor ' on
the sermon he preached and the salmon he caught at
Pitlochry.'
' Ipse capi voluit : quid apertius ? ' JUVENAL.
Qui captas hominum mentes sermone diserto
Piscator, Pastor, Ehetor Apostolicus,
Quid minim si praeda tuo successerit hamo ?
Credebat mutis te dare posse sonum. 1
[Fisher who catchest men, and Pastor true,
And Orator of Apostolic skill,
To thy charmed book of right the salmon flew,
Who thought tbe gift of speech was at thy will.]
The second is to the Eev. N. Johnston (afterwards
Dean) in acknowledging his gift of a ' wideawake,' 7 October,
1878.
Auspiciuni accipio monitumque fidelis amici,
Donatus hocce pileo.
Prsesulis officium nempe est constanter aypv-n-vclv
Lateque tutari gregem ;
Se praestare babilem cunctis, et in omnibus aequam
Servare mentem casibus !
[A present so proper I thankfully take ;
My friend for the warning I praise.
'Tis a Bishop's first duty to keep ' wide awake,'
And to watch that bis flock never strays ;
His presence to all men convenient to make,
And to keep even temper always.]
3. The Wykehamist Dinner 0/1880 and Athletics.
It is an easy transition from these Academic amenities
the value of which I estimate highly, for good Latin Verse
1 ' mutis quoque piscibus
Donatura cycni, si libeat, sonum.' HORACE.
306 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
is like a royal compliment, and is not given to or by
everyone to the Wykehamist dinner of 1880 at which the
Bishop was chairman. His principal speech on the occasion
contains a lesson against excessive devotion to athletics
which is equally necessary eighteen years later : l
In speaking to this toast upon this occasion, I am naturally
reminded of the excellent address delivered in October last by
our right rey. Visitor, at the re -opening of New College Chapel,
on the 500th anniversary of its foundation. The key-note of
that address was the great benefit which had been derived from
the combination of divine and human elements, or, in other
words, of sacred and secular learning, in our system of school
and college education a, combination originally due to the
practical good sense, the wisdom, and the piety of our illustrious
founder, William of Wykeham. The worthy prelate who now
occupies our founder's Episcopal throne invited us to imagine
what would have been the state of our country, and of the
English nation at the present time, if, instead of that combi
nation, those who had gone before us had been trained in the
opposite system, now recommended by visionaries and sceptics,
wherein secular and sacred learning are to be kept apart, and
tbe latter, perhaps, altogether ignored. And, in illustration of
his remarks, he was able to point to a result which we ourselves
have witnessed namely, the highest lay office in the kingdom
held in succession by two such men and two such Wykehamists
as Lord Hatberley and Lord Selborne men who, to borrow
words from the well-known verses of the latter, bad been trained
alike
' In the nurture of good learning, and in God's most boly fear.'
And the Bishop might have mentioned also a third, as a scarcely
less eminent example of the same kind, and in the same pro
fession of the law, one who has been taken from us since his
address was spoken I mean Sir William Erie a man whom
all men have conspired to praise for the uniform purity and
integrity and benevolence of his character both in public and
1 From the report in the Guardian, of 23 June, reprinted in the Scottish
Guardian of 2 July.
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 307
private life. The combination of which our Visitor spoke
afforded a topic admirably suited to the occasion, the place, and
the audience he was then addressing. There is another com
bination upon which I would wish to offer a few words ; and
which, being of a less solemn nature, and yet, I am persuaded,
of no small importance, will not, I hope, be considered inap
propriate to this festive meeting ; I allude to the relationship
which ought to exist between the erga and the parerga, the
paideia and the paidia, the work and the play, as pursued under
our present system of school and college education. And,
adopting the form of appeal which our Visitor employed, I would
ask you to imagine what would have been the condition of our
country now what would have been its rank in the scale of
nations as a Divine instrument of progress and civilisation
throughout the world if, ever since the days of William of
Wykeham, the same prominence had been given to athletic
sports and exercises which we have seen given to them in recent
years. For myself I need scarcely say that I am a staunch
advocate of such exercises as an indispensable element in all
good education. And it is because I value them so highly that I
would wish to utter a warning against their abuse. Perhaps, too,
as coming from me the warning may carry greater weight, or,
at least, may be more readily excused. For no one, I think, can
have enjoyed a wider or more pleasurable experience of athletic
sports, both at school and college and, I may add, no one can
have derived from them greater or more lasting advantages
than I have done. May I mention some particulars of my
experience ? When the annual cricket match between Harrow
and Eton was first permanently set on foot in 1822, I was in the
eleven of that year, and also of '23, '24, and '25. Also, in 1825
I played in the first match between Harrow and Winchester,
being then captain of the Harrow eleven. Also, in Oxford
against Cambridge, I played as one of the Oxford eleven in the
first two matches viz. in 1827 at Lord's, and in 1829 at Oxford ;
and we won in both. Moreover, I took the principal part in
getting up the first Inter-University Boat-race in 1829 ; and was
one of the Oxford eight, pulling four, with a good Wykehamist
before me pulling six Tom Gamier, son of the late Dean of
Winchester, and himself afterwards Dean of Lincoln. In that
year (1829) the cricket match and the boat-race were both in the
x 2
308 EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
same week the former on Friday at Oxford; and the latter on
Wednesday at Henley and in both we were victorious. This
last experience, I suppose, must be quite unique. But the
advantages I have derived from athletic exercises deserve much
more my grateful commemoration. It was tennis that first made
me acquainted with Warden Barter ; it was cricket that first
made me acquainted with Bishop Moberly ; it was rowing that
first made me acquainted with Bishop Selwyn. It was cricket
that improved my acquaintance with the present Warden of
Winchester.* Again, it was cricket and quoits that made me
acquainted with luxuries Pontificum potiora cmnis I mean
the draught beer, and the mutton chop, hot from the gridiron in
the kitchen of New College ; as preparatory to the annual cricket
match of Christ Church and New College against the University ;
or as introductory to a game of quoits, then sometimes played (I
am ashamed to remember) within the precincts of the college
cloisters. And yet here I am, at the end of a long life, to bear
witness against the altered relationship which, it appears to me,
has arisen of late years between such exercises and the graver
and more substantial studies of which they form at once the
necessary diversion, and the graceful if only the subordinate
accompaniment. Shall I overstate the case if I say that an
agreement would almost seem to have been entered into between
the teacher and the taught of the new generation to commit, if I
may so express it, a huge false quantity, or rather two false
quantities in one viz. to make paidia the play long, and to
make paideia the education short ? And yet it is not so much
the shortness or the length of time spent upon each, of which
I would complain, as of the undue interest which now, by almost
general consent, attaches to the former in comparison with the
latter. It is not long since I read a leading article in the
' Times ' which contained these words : ' At the Universities
every tutor will tell you that athletics rank at least on a level
with the humanities.' But we have more important testimony
even than that of the ' Times ' to the same effect. W T hen one of
the most distinguished gymnasts of the day, while still a young
man, comes forward and that, too, in the interests not so much
of intellectual culture as of simple sobermindedness to protest
against the evil, and to endeavour to provide a remedy as Mr.
Edward Lyttelton has done in a recent number of the ' Nine-
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 309
teenth Century ' we may feel sure that the time has fully
arrived when something ought to be done to bring about a
reform, not so much of athleticism itself (though I venture to
think I could suggest amendments in the present practice both
of rowing and cricket), as of its disproportionate encouragement
and inordinate excess. And as a reformer a Conservative
reformer of this class, I confess I should wish to see the maxim
of the wise Scythian Anacharsis, which Aristotle has preserved,
and which supplies the only true and sound principle for our
guidance in the matter, inserted in the Tabula Legum of every
school and college throughout the kingdom 7rcueu/ OTTCD?
o-7rov8a^5, which, interpreted Wykehamically, is * Play that
you may sap.' You will not, I hope, suppose that because I
have ventured to make these remarks upon this occasion I con
sider that Wykehamists require them more than others ; for
certainly I entertain no such opinion. But I have made them to
the present company because I believe the influence of New
College and of Winchester to be so great, and so well deserved^
under our present rulers, that any reform encouraged or set on
foot by them, so far as it may be needed, could not fail to be
productive of beneficial results far beyond the range of our
own body. At all events, let me trust that what I have said
may be taken in good part, out of consideration of the
motive which alone has prompted me to say it, and which
I shall best express when I utter the sentiment of the toast
I have now to give ' Prosperity to the two St. Mary Winton
Colleges.'
In a subsequent speech at the same dinner, the Bishop of St.
Andrews, in replying to the toast of his health, proposed by the
Hight Hon. Sclater-Booth, M.P. r one of the new Governing
Body of Winchester College after mentioning various par
ticulars relating to his connection with Winchester went on to
say:
But I can also lay claim to a Wykehamical association of
another, and to me, very interesting kind. How it came about
I cannot tell ; and perhaps no one here present has ever heard
of the curious fact to which I allude. One of my Episcopal
predecessors in the See of Dunkeld, Bishop Nicholas, was
employed by William of Wykeham, in the year 1400 four years
310 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vui
before his death to act for him in consecrating the cloisters
and cemetery of New College, and also three of the bells of the
great tower. The petition for the consecration by the then
warden, Richard Malford, and all his scholars, addressed to
Bishop Nicholas, and also the Deed executed by my Scotch
predecessor in testimony of the consecration, are both preserved
among the muniments of New College ; and soon after I became
Bishop twenty-seven years ago, the then Bursar and Librarian
now the honoured Warden of the College was so kind as to
favour me jvith a copy of them, which I still preserve.
The reader will notice how, in the midst of the homily,
the ' natural man ' breaks out ; and there is no doubt that
the youthful, sanguine, athletic temperament, which had
much to do with the success, and sometimes with the failure,
of the subject of this memoir, remained with him to the end
of life. Perhaps as good an evidence of it as can be given
is this short entry in his Diary for 24 October, 1890, in his
eighty-fifth year : ' My first game of golf with K., on
Ladies' Links.' Up to that time I believe he had rather
' vilipended ' that ancient game. A much fuller example
is in the article ' Pindar and Athletics, Ancient and Modern '
in the ' National Eeview ' for April 1888, in which he dis
coursed at length on the subject originally for the benefit of
the students of St. Andrews. There is much good advice
in the address, and much apt classical quotation, for which,
as regards Pindar, he had recourse to Bishop Moberly's
admirable translation. But the striking thing in it is the
broad knowledge of the subject and the evident sympathy
with which it is written.
The following letter on skating addressed to Mr. W. Earl
Hodgson, a young friend of later years, to whom, as to
Canon Farquhar, the Bishop opened out with great freedom,
is worth reading even by those who are not proficient in
that delightful exercise.
CH. vni EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 311
On Skating
Kilrymont : 23 November, 1887.
My dear Mr. Hodgson, Yesterday's article on ' Skating ' is
very good. Whoever wrote it understands his subject well ;
which is not always the case with those who undertake to dis
course upon athletics. I venture to speak with some authority,
as I was one of the best if not the best of the skaters at
Oxford in my day. As a boy and young man I never missed a
day's, or a night's, skating, when it was to be had, even at some
risk of life ; and consequently I had a narrow escape of drowning
on more than one occasion once at Harrow, and again at
Oxford. At Berlin, in the winter of 1883, I made quite a
sensation ; no one could come near me in cutting figures ! But
more than that, I may claim to have been a pioneer in the most
important of the improvements to which the said article refers.
I was the first man at Oxford to have a pair of skates made
zvithout 'the curious, up-curling thing in front,' which was
functionless, and with the blade curved up at heel, which is
essential to skating backwards with ease and safety. I had the
advantage which your writer justly observes is rare of being
equally strong and steady on both feet, which enabled me to do
the outside edge backwards, as easily as I did it forwards ; and I
was master of the * cross-cuts ' in both. It is possible to have
the blades over-fine.' Yes ; quite true. But I rather demur to
a remark that follows : the curved blade has, certainly, ' much
revealed the gymnastic possibilities of skating ; ' but I doubt
whether it oughu to ' go further.' There are some figures such
as the ' Flying Mercury 'one of the grandest of all which
could scarcely be performed without a considerable portion of the
blade being in contact with the ice. So in this, as in other
more important matters, we must have a compromise ; and the
wisest plan is to keep to the ' via media ' !
Yours sincerely,
C. W., Bp.
This letter naturally led to a request for an explanation
of the ' Flying Mercury,' which was given a few days later
(29 November).
312 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vui
Take a run at full speed, end with short stroke outside edge
on right foot, then throw yourself round on left foot, and take,
with outside edge backward, as long a sweep as you can.
The difficulty is to throw yourself round at full speed, and it
requires great strength of foot, and no little skill, to avoid a
heavy fall at the turn. When the feat is well performed, it
produces a very fine effect. I only know one man, Cyril Page,
who was with me at Christ Church, and was afterwards a
leading member of the London Skating Club, who was pretty
sure of doing- it well. He was of a tall, graceful figure, bold, and
very firm on his skates.
4. Revival or continuation of old friendships. Literary
correspondence. Manning, Newman, d-c.
It is characteristic of the two English Cardinals that
the revival of a certain amount of intercourse with Cardinal
Manning was due to a cricketing reminiscence, while
Newman's letter was elicited by a present of Latin transla
tions from Keble. The Bishop in 1882 wrote a letter to
the ' St. Andrews Gazette ' headed ' Mr. Gladstone and
Cardinal Manning more than fifty years since,' correcting
some inaccurate statements as to their athletic perform
ances. It was followed by a letter of some interest from
Manning.
Archbishop's House, Westminster, S.W. :
6 October, 1882.
My very dear old Friend, I have just read your letter in
the Fifeshire paper. It comes to me like a kind voice from an
old world : and I must answer it. How many times I have been
on the point of writing to you and to your brother in these last
years I cannot tell you. For I have cherished all our old
affection with great fidelity and warmth. I have not written to
either of you, not knowing whether it would be acceptable.
From the year 1851 I have rejoiced to renew my intercourse
with all who sought it ; but I have never made the first advance.
And now for your letter. It brings back many happy
memories of Harrow. I can see you in your broad-brimmed
CH. viii EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 313
white hat and green cut-away coat : the admiration and envy of
all beholders. It reminds me of how much I owe you in my
books : and of your original ingratitude, for you know that I
coached you in logic. I have also other memories as to how,
the Bishop of St. Andrews and the Bishop of Lincoln preventing
me, the Grape House at Coombe Bank was entered by the roof
and robbed.
If you have the other verses from which you quote the
thanks for the bat, I should much like to see them. I have
burnt almost all the doggrel of those days.
I hope you are well in health. We have a long score to be
thankful for ; you, I think, 76, and I 74 years.
It would give me much pleasure to hear your voice again if
you ever come south.
Believe me, my dear Friend,
Yours affectionately,
HENRY E. C[ARD]. MANNING.
Dean Merivale's memory was also stirred to compare
past and present in regard to their old Harrow comrade.
He writes (28 November) thus :
Your reminiscences of Manning are amusing enough. He
was quite a crony of mine at Harrow, though I have seen very
little of him since. I liked him notwithstanding his singular
affectation. I jusf. now recall to mind how once in playing
cricket with him he hit a ball with a very pretty curve to the off
and thereupon, instead of making his run, threw his bat back
on his shoulder, exclaiming ' I say, Merivale, what a mysterious
thing a cricket ball is ! ' And so he has gone on and ' sibi
constat.'
The intercourse thus affectionately renewed was kept up
to some extent, but the Bishop never could bring himself
to conquer the distrust with which ' perverts ' inspired
him. Pointing to their works on his bookshelves he would
say, ' These are my black sheep.' Yet he was not bitter in
controversy with them, nor did he fail to keep up kindly
memories of past days.
314 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vm
The letter from Newman was, as I have said, elicited by
a present of the Bishop's translations of those parts of
Keble's ' Christian Year ' which refer to and describe the
Church's Ministry, to which he also added some beautiful
versions of Ken's hymns, written at Winchester, and pre
sented to the boys there many years before. The Bishop
had perhaps a special right to do such a work for Keble,
having been asked by him to revise the Latin of his famous
* PraelectioneX' and especially the dedication to the Poet
Wordsworth, of which a translation is on the memorial slab
in Grasmere Church.
(From J. H. Newman thanks for present of l Anni
Christiani &cS)
Birmingham : 13 November, 1882.
My dear Bishop of St. Andrews, Thank you for your
beautiful gift. The binding and letterpress are worthy of the
translations, and the translations (as far as I have read them)
are worthy of their originals in the ' Christian Year.'
It is not the first of my books with your name in it as the
donor. You gave me in 1844 Wetstein's ' Greek Testament,'
which has a place in our Oratory Library, as the present gift will
have, as lasting memorial, of you, when I am gone.
I am, my dear Bishop, Most truly yours,
JOHN H. CARD. NEWMAN.
The Bishop of St. Andrews.
The following criticism of Newman represents my
uncle's feeling about him, of which he has left several
similar expressions.
To W. Earl Hodgson, Esq. (On J. H. Newman)
Rydal Lodge, Ambleside : 17 August, 1890.
Your few remarks upon Newman in * Bod and Gun ' have
interested me much. They are more to the point than almost
anything else that (so far as I have seen) has been written about
him. I cannot regard the incense that is being offered, so uni-
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 315
versally, to his memory as a healthy sign. It proves to me that
we are living in an age of indifference to' Truth, or at least of
restlessness near akin to it. Newman's mind was essentially
sceptical ; but his own disposition, on the whole, was amiable,
and his intellectual gifts being of the very highest order, the world
is content to regard his scepticism as a recommendation rather
than the contrary. You seem to know his ' Grammar of Assent.'
It is a stiff book, and required more time than I had to give 'to
it, and perhaps more thought than I have at command ; but
there are some brilliant passages in it, which I remember im
perfectly, especially towards the end. Would it not be worth
your while to write an article which should give something like
a just estimate of the nature of Newman's influence ? Do you
know his Sermons ? They are of real value, and I suppose no
other sermons ever written or preached have produced so much
effect. And that effect will endure. But I doubt if the same
can be said of any of his other works. As to his moral fibre
it was not of the strongest. (You know I think the same of
Manning.) He was not ambitious in the same sense as Manning ;
but he was morbidly sensitive, when attacked, or not appreciated
as his conscience told him he deserved to be ; and he allowed
himself to act under that irritation which is not the sign of a
truly great man.
This may be a fitting place to record several similar
judgments addressed to friends old and new.
To W. Earl Hodgson, Esq. (On Abp. Trench)
Whitemoor : 12 September.
. . . Archbishop Trench and I were at Harrow together in
the same Dame's House, and in the same Remove ; but he went to
Cambridge and I to Oxford so that I almost lost sight of him
till (1) he invited me to preach one of the first sermons when he
began the nave services at Westminster Abbey ; (2) we met as
the two fellow preachers at Stratford on occasion of the Shake
speare Tercentenary ; and (3) again afterwards as Fellow Members
of the N. T. Revision Company. Take him all in all he was one
of the most remarkable men of the present century. Every thing
he did and he did an enormous amount of work of various
316 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
kinds showed great industry and talent combined, and his
character in every respect was first rate.
To Dean Boyle. (On Baxter)
Bishopshall, St. Andrews : 3 December, 1883.
My dear Dean, I have been much too long in writing to thank
you for your kindness in sending me a copy of your * Baxter ' ;
but I only finished it last night. It could not fail to be inter
esting in you hands, and you have done him, I think, full
justice. There is no doubt he was a ' man to be remembered '
and a man from whom if one does not learn much it is one's
own fault. But somehow or other he is also a disappointing
man. He was thinking always of what he was to do individu
ally no doubt, from the best motives and with the best inten
tions and I am afraid he never practically grasped the idea of
1 the Church ' and of the duties which flow from Church member
ship. And the consequence was he produced little lasting fruit
in comparison with his enormous amount of labour, and self-
sacrifice, and to some extent he stood in the way so as to prevent
good, with which he did not fully sympathise, being done by
others a curious combination of high and low, broad and narrow,
charitable and uncharitable.
At p. 23, and again at p. 98, you refer to his saying : * To
despise earth is easy to me, but not so easy to be acquainted and
conversant with Heaven.' I do not suppose that my uncle was
ever a great reader of ' Baxter ' ; and you will remember a
remarkable parallel in the * Excursion ' (Book iv.) :
' 'Tis by comparison an easy task
Earth to despise ; but to converse with Heaven
This is not easy &c.'
With kind regards to Mrs. Boyle,
I am Ever yours sincerely,
C. W., Bp.
(Clarendon &c.}
Eydal Lodge, Ambleside : 27 August, 1889.
My dear Dean, I am not yet good for much writing, but I
must not any longer omit to thank you heartily and to beg you
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 317
to thank with no less warmth Mrs. Smythe, and my other kind
friends at Methven for your affectionate remembrances and
good wishes on the occasion of my birthday, which please to
believe and to say to all concerned were most welcome and
highly gratifying to the receiver.
I have also to thank you sincerely for your valuable present
of the ' Selections from Clarendon ' which reached me here not
long ago. It is only about four years since I read the history
through, and I remember thinking at the time what a good thing
it would be if some one would undertake what you have so
successfully performed. Much of the mere narrative is heavy
and uninteresting, and the style crude and clumsy in the extreme ;
so that the book, which in the main is so instructive, has found,
I should fear, in these days very few readers : and your volume
of ' Selections ' is just what tvas wanted. You have forgotten,
I dare say, if you ever saw, what I wrote in recommendation of
the History as a study for the young, in my St. Cuthbert's
lecture (1886) ' The Yoke of Christ to be borne in youth 'and
the remarkable testimony of Lord Grenville (the Whig Prime
Minister) which I there quote (p. 22 sq. note), to its value and
impartiality. You might like to see the passage ; and I dare say
Mrs. Symthe can lend you the lecture. . . . With our united
kindest regards,
Ever yours most sincerely,
C. W., Bp.
(Hooker, ' Plea for Justice, 1866 ' Gladstone's Revieiv of
1 Ellen Middleton ')
St. Andrews : 12 January, 1890.
My dear Dean, Many thanks for your kind words of
sympathy .... and also for your present of ' The Church
man ' containing your paper on Hooker. Your memory has
made a slight slip at p. 187. It was not Tulloch's article (an
excellent one) in the ' North British Review ' which brought me
into friendly controversy with him ; but a lecture delivered first
to his Divinity Students here, and afterwards in Edinburgh, in
which he claimed not only Leighton, but Hooker, as 'having no
faith in Episcopacy,' and regarding it only as 'the best
ecclesiastical organisation, historically considered.' It was this
318 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
which called forth my ' Plea for Justice to Presbyterian Students
of Theology and to the Scotch Episcopal Church, 1866.' I
wish I had some copies remaining of that ' Plea.' I have only
one bound up with other pamphlets. I think I gave the last to
Barry, who mentions it in a note of his sermon on Hooker to
which you refer. By-the-bye, do you see that Gladstone says he
has not a single copy remaining of his Review of * Ellen Middle-
ton ' ? I am more fortunate ; for I possess the copy which
he gave me soon after it appeared. It is written with great
ability ; but the* influence of Newman and of the Oxford School,
under which he was at that time, is very obvious. I am not
surprised that he thought it more prudent not to reprint it
among his * Gleanings.' What must he think of some of his
leading followers if he now retains those sentiments !
The following extract from Canon Farquhar's Diary is
too characteristically exact to be omitted, and it contains a
judgment on two previous Scottish Bishops.
The Bishop's orderliness. Bishops John and William Skinner
14 September, 1887. A minute ago I put down the news
paper which I was reading. Whereupon the Bishop said, ' You
don't consider yourself a model of tidiness, do you ? You don't
fold lip your newspapers like this as I always do when I have
done with them.' Indeed, his tidiness is something extra
ordinary ; his library is in the most beautiful order, and though
lie has close on 7,000 volumes, he seems to know what each
volume is without looking at it. Mrs. Wordsworth says that,
when they were travelling in Italy, however long a day's journey
they had just completed, the Bishop never sat down till he had
re-arranged the sitting-room to his satisfaction. At breakfast
this morning the Bishop said, ' I see Dr. Walker is going to
bring out a " Life " of Primus John Skinner.' I. : That will be
interesting.' Bishop : ' Interesting enough to those who have
not read that volume over there. The union with the qualified
chapels is the main point of interest. But neither Bishop John
nor Bishop William Skinner had much real genius. William
especially was heavy but good, solid men. I wish we had more
CH. vni EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 319
like them now ! Plenty of common sense and knowledge of the
people.'
In July 1885 Dean Charles Merivale (of Ely), who was
our uncle by marriage, asked one of my sisters to find him
a good English verse translation of the following lines of
Statius, which described very fitly the circumstances of his
own father's death and his character :
Quid referam expositos, servato pondere, mores ?
Quae pietas ? quam vile lucrum ? quae cura pudoris ?
Quantus amor recti ? rursusque ubi dulce remitti
Gratia quae dictis ? animo quam nulla senectus ?
. . . Raperis, genitor, non indigus aevi,
Non nimius ; trinisque decem quinquennia lustris
Juncta ferens ; sed nee leti tibi janua tristis ;
Sed te torpor iners, et mors imitata quietem
Explicuit, falsoque tulit sub Tartara somno.
* Silvarum ' lib. v. 3, 246 foil.
My sister forwarded them to the Bishop of St. Andrews,
which drew from him the following letter to his old friend
Merivale who was an even greater master of Latin verse
of the t silver age ' than the Bishop, though not equal to
him in the language of the Augustan period.
The Stepping Stones, Ambleside : 28 July, 1885.
My dear Merivale, A note received here this morning from
my niece Susan W. informs me that you wish to have ' a good
English verse translation ' of some Latin lines which she
encloses. The lines are remarkable. I did not know that
Statius from what I remember of him had written anything
so good (except the ' Mosella,' 1 which is almost equal not quite
to your famous ' Hexameters on Skating ' !). They deserve a
good translation ; but this I cannot promise you. However, I
have tried my hand, and send you the result in blank verse.
Rhyme I think would only dilute the force of the original.
1 A slip of memory. The Mosella is by Ausonius.
320 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. vin
Probably the best thing about my attempt is the place from
whence it comes, viz. Rydal, where I am now staying for a
short holiday.
Yours sincerely,
C. W., Bp.
Why tell how frank, with balance nicely held,
His character ! his piety how true !
The quest of gain abhorred, but Modesty
How strictly cherished, Rectitude how loved !
And when it pleased him to relax awhile,
How charmingly he talked ! while on his mind
Old age no wrinkle had prevailed to fix.
Sudden, my father, wast thou snatched away,
Not scant of years, nor aught too full, tho' past
The three score limit, Yet to thee Death came
Not sad ; but softly thro' the opening gate
He bore thee hence ; and lulled in mimic sleep
To th' unknown world thy Spirit passed away.
Rydal, 28 July, 1885.
The answer was dated Deanery, Ely, 1 August, 1885:
Your letter reached me at Dawlish, whence we returned
yesterday. I am glad to have elicited such a poetical spark
from you. I don't think I ever saw a specimen of your English
verse before, even though strained through the Latin, which I
fancy is more congenial to both of us. My old friend Statius
has many bits that are well worth remembering and not easily
forgotten, though he did his best to make himself generally
unreadable. The lines which have been laid before you take my
fancy, particularly from the circumstances of his father's death
being so exactly the same as my own father's, by a sudden fit at
65. I also flatter myself that the charming character so charm
ingly given was the same in both. I cannot give up rhyme in
attempting to represent its sentiment in English which seems
more suitable to Pope than to Milton. The concise and rather
crabbed antitheses of the original must be preserved, even at
some sacrifice of the exact meaning of the words. I once urged
Sir T. Martin to do for Statius, or portions of him, what he had
done for Horace and Catullus, but he said the style was too
CH. vni EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 321
hard for him, too epigrammatic and suggestive, and so no doubt it
is. Pope did the first book of the Thebaid in his own way (as a
youth). I must look at it again.
I set my young ladies the task of rendering my prose trans
lation of the Latin, and they set some of their young friends to
work also Elizabeth Wordsworth among them. I am not
quite satisfied with any of their attempts, though they show
much of the freedom and facility of verse-making for which the
young ladies of the present day are deservedly famous. You
shall have a copy of my poor old man's effort, for which I may
plead Th. Martin's excuse also. The thing is too hard. You
are certainly very exact in the meaning, and not less graceful in
language ; but, as I hinted, I think you wander away too far
from the style and sentiments of the passage. You are too
Wordsworthian.
[The following is the version enclosed.]
His spirit ever frank yet grave and plain,
Steadfast his honour, proud his scorn of gain,
How strict his sense of right and love of good
Yet sweet his converse in his softer mood.
With mind unworn by age's slow distress,
With no defect of years and no excess,
To twice five lustres three he added more,
Then lightly turned aside death's yielding door ;
Unnerved he swoon'd away in torpor laid,
And sank as one asleep to nether shade.
C. M.
The classical reader will not be surprised when he is
told that quite a controversy was once raised between these
two eminent scholars as to the correctness of the form ' cseli-
genus ' (heaven-born), which the Bishop asserted ought to
have been ' caeligena.' It ended by the following post-card.
On the top Merivale wrote, sticking to his method of forma
tion as both ancient and revived in the ' Silver ' age :
En ! pro vitigeno juvenilis carminis cestro
Melligenus senio jam subeunte sapor.
C. M.
Ely, 8 December, 1882.
322 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. VHI
Below the Bishop replied by suggesting that in leaving
the Latin of the Golden or Augustan age the Dean was
likely to fall below the Silver into the Iron period.
At tua, posthabito linguae meliore metallo,
Ne senio fiat ferrea musa, cave !
St. Andrews. C. W., Bishop, 11 December, 1882.
Rev. W. Tiwkwell's ' Tongues in Trees.'
Kilrymont, St. Andrews : 1 January, 1892.
What a gem of a book ! One of my daughters has fallen in
love with it, and carried it off. In turning over the pages I felt
drawn to it in many ways. How can I sufficiently thank the
author and kind giver ? For many weeks and months I have
been sadly troubled with constant and painful eczema and am
now worse otherwise I should have written sooner, and should
write more than I can do now. So you must kindly excuse me.
Heartily wishing you all the blessings of the season, and a happy
New Year and many more to come
1 Multos felices, ultimum felicissimum.'
The following is to a Scottish newspaper (name un
known), and written just two months before his death :
Lord Tennyson's Prize Poem, 1829.
St. Andrews, 7 October, 1892.
Sir, In your interesting obituary notice of Lord Tennyson
you mention that his Cambridge prize poem on Timbuctoo,
* while not without faults, was not devoid of poetic promise,' and
that the promise was recognised by a favourable notice in the
' Athenaeum ' : but you do not mention that the poem was in
blank verse a thing quite unheard of up to that time ; so that
the examiners deserved great credit for breaking through the
tradition of rhyme, out of regard to the extraordinary merit of
young Alfred Tennyson's composition. It was under these
circumstances that I gave my opinion of the poem, when an
undergraduate at Oxford, in writing to my brother Christopher,
CH. vm EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 323
afterwards Bishop of Lincoln, and then an undergraduate at
Cambridge, 4 September, 1829, as follows :
' What do you think of Tennyson's prize poem ? (Timbuc-
too.) If such an exercise had been sent up at Oxford, the author
would have had a better chance of being rusticated with the
view of his passing a few months in a lunatic asylum than of
obtaining the prize. It is certainly a wonderful production ;
and if it had come out with Lord Byron's name it would ha^
been thought as fine as anything he ever wrote.' I am, &c.,
CHARLES WORDSWORTH, Bishop of St. Andrews.
I have already chronicled certain points of renewed
contact in later life with Mr. Gladstone ; but there was not
much intercourse, and no thorough healing of old disagree
ment. Yet there is no doubt that he prized the following
letter, of which an old Wykehamist and college friend, Sir
J. E. Eardley-Wilmot, sent him a copy. It was dated
December 1887 :
My dear Sir, It is extremely kind on your part to send me
your * Florilegium,' and I shall examine it with pleasure. In
your dedication you have placed it under high protection. I at
least admired very warmly the scholarship of Bishop Charles
Wordsworth, altho' I partook but little of its higher qualities.
Believe me, faithfully yours,
W. E. GLADSTONE.
This refers to the ' Mentoni Florilegium,' ed. 2, published
by Stanford, London, in that year, with a dedication * Viro
eruditissimo et Latinse poeseos egregie studioso Carolo
Wordsworth,' &c. The postscript, in black edges, gives the
history of the writer's sojourn on the Biviera in words that
too many an Englishman can echo. There are many
musical lines and much good sense and sentiment, some
times strong and sometimes gentle, in the other poems.
Spem mihi fallacem minium, Mentone, dedisti ;
Ardebat vitae lumine taeda brevi ;
Gaudia cum subita caligine vana recedunt ;
Mortua ploratur quae mihi vita fuit.
Y 2
324 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
As specimens of the long-continued intercourse with
another friend Bishop T. L. Claughton I may give the
following, which he amended for him :
Inscription on a bookcase given to Rev. G. D. Boyle, on his
becoming Dean of Salisbury, by his old curates.
Viro admodum Reverendo
Georgio Boyle, Decano Sarisburiensi,
Presbyterj qui sub ipso Duce atque auspice amicissimo
Dum Vicarii Kidderminsteriensis munere fungebatur
animarum curse concorditer inserviebant
Hoc librorum armarium
Amoris ac benevolently quantulumcunque indicium
Dono Dederunt
MDCCCLXXX
He constantly remembered his old friend's birthday
(6 November), and in 1882 sent him the following epigram
congratulating him on the successful operation for cataract
which was performed on that day.
Fortunate dies duplici dignissime creta :
Qui dederas lucem, restituisque datam !
[0 happy day ! I mark thee doubly white :
That gav'st my friend, and giv'st him back, the light.]
Claughton replied, from the Convocation House, April
1883, enclosing a suggested emendation of the Bishop
(Durnford) of Chichester's, an older man than my uncle,
and a delightful old-fashioned scholar.
Chichester thinks your couplet insufficient, and suggests :
' Fortunata dies ; lucem quae prima dedisti
Infanti, amissam restituisque seni.'
[* happy day ! which gav'st my friend the light
As infant, and in age restor'st his sight ']
%.
Rougher, but he thinks more complete.
OH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 32o
Bishop Claughton lived to celebrate his golden wedding
having resigned his See from ill-health in February
1890 on 14 June, 1892, and his old friend did not forget
him.
Tibi aurearum nuptiarum haud immemor,
Amice, amicus chartulam hanc mitto vetus,
Precans in seternum ut det omnia aurea
Tibi tuaeque noster in cselo Pater.
Not mindless of thy golden wedding, friend,
I, friend of auld lang syne, this greeting send,
With prayers that God may all things golden pour
On thee and thine now and for evermore !
He died 25 July of the same year, and my uncle less
than five months later.
Another golden wedding some eight years earlier
(22 December, 1884), that of the Bishop of Salisbury and
Mrs. Moberly, had been commemorated rather more
elaborately.
Quinquaginta annos vitse tenor unus eodem
Consocians animas junxit amore duas.
Supplevit si quid deerat dulcedinis uxor,
Supplevit columen vir meritumque decus.
Interea circa mensam dum frondet oliva, 1
Quid possit pietas sensit uterque parens.
Hoc unum ambobus post caetera fausta precandum
Restat ut ascendant ad meliora simul.
1 hope that the family, to whose example and friendship
I am so deeply indebted, will forgive me for rendering these
lines so tamely :
For fifty years an even path of life
Two close-knit souls in loving concord ran :
Were sweetness needed promptly gave the wife ;
Were strength and honour ready was the man.
1 Ps. cxxviii. 4.
326 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
Green were the olive-branches round the board,
And duteous children cheered each parent's eyes.
This only now from Heaven may be implored,
' To better worlds together may they rise.'
I am happy, however, to recollect that this prayer was
not literally granted, and that after succeeding my dear old
master, Bishop Moberly, in 1885, I had the invaluable
privilege of enjoying Mrs. Moberly's friendship, counsel,
and keenly sympathetic wit, for a number of happy years.
I should be wanting in dutiful affection if I did not
acknowledge that the Bishop was kind enough to take a
keen interest in his nephews' writings as well as in his
brother's. I received from him an elaborate criticism of
my Four Addresses on ' Holy Communion,' superior to any
review with which (as far as I remember) the critics by
profession favoured me, and, in earlier days, his commen
dation of my Banrpton Lectures cheered me not a little.
My brother Christopher, now Eector of St. Peter's, Marl-
borough, when he was still a young tutor at Cambridge,
sent him, in 1874, a stout volume on * University Social
Life in the Eighteenth Century,' which was the expansion
of a prize essay. The Bishop bantered him on its growth,
and declared he could hardly conceive how it contrived to
enter his room, and hoped the author had not grown to the
same proportions. He characteristically picked out for
comment a note about the two faldstools at Durham which
were said to face eastwards, declaring that he had seen
them, and that the two only did so because there was not
good room for all on the sides where six others stood : and
withal he drew a neat little plan of the arrangement.
Writing to my father he said, ' What an interesting volume
Chris has produced,' and he goes on to pity the next
generation of Wordsworths (who would have to come up to
so high a standard of quantity, quality, and bulk), and of
CH. VTTI EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 327
catalogue-makers, instancing the following entry he had
just seen :
Wordsworth (Bishop), Ecclesiastical Biography [really by the
Master of Trinity].
On Scottish Reformation [by Charles
Wordsworth].
Occasional Sermons [by Bishop Chr.
Wordsworth] .
I remember how no less a man than Professor Mommsen
once united my father, my uncle John, and myself, into a
single personality.
*5. Last Publications in Verse and Prose executed and
projected.
The Bishop's ill-health was, as we have seen, the
fruitful parent of poetical effusions. Probably the most
striking of the humorous ones is that given below, which is
equal to the occasion. It is on ' Night Mare,' and is worthy
of being introduced to the English reader.
Equa Nocturna (Night Mare)
VM tibi quae, fessis adimens solatia somni,
Portenta haud cessans irrequieta creas ;
Quae facis ut formaa fiant informia cunctae,
Et caput et sensus nil nisi triste chaos :
Nam tua res propria est, lusu natura procaci
Si quid abortivi degenerisve parit.
Te vexare juvat morbis gravioribus aegros,
Et qua vix aderat spes, renovare metum.
Quodcunque in vita patimur, quodcunque timemus,
Fit tibi ludibrium materiesque joci.
Navita naufragium patitur, nova vulnera miles,
Agricolae pluvia pascua mersa dolent.
Mercatoris opes nimiae, bacchante procella,
Oceani in tumidas ejiciuntur aquas.
328 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
Iratam baud merit6 sponsam sibi plorat amator,
Iratum baud merit6 maesta puella procum.
Quod dicturus erat lapsum est de mente diserti
Causidici, et pleno stat sine voce foro.
Nee minus infelix, jam ascendens pulpitum, bianti
Clericus amisit scripta legenda gregi ;
Aut ubi tempus adest, quum se vestire necesse est,
Candida non usquam est invenienda cblamys.
Saepe reluctantem in praeceps me impellere gaudes,
Tramite de recto vertere saepe pedem ;
Et modo cum simules te promptam cedere, formas
Mille resistendi texere, mille dolos ;
Qu6que magis trepidus labyrintho evadere conor,
Arctius astrictum me tua vincla tenent.
Fraude tua quoties factum est ut serus adessem
Cum gravis atque anceps res peragenda fuit ;
Aut vix sopitus clamarem, intrare fenestram
Latronem aspiciens, territus ' auxilium ! '
Quin et falsa tuum est veris, et sacra profanis
Commiscere ; tuum fanda nefanda loqui.
Quid plura ? accedunt, duce te, rixaeque minaaque,
Atque odium, et pugnae non cohibendus amor,
Et variae pcenarum artes, quas esse sub Oreo
Impositas culpis fabula prisca refert
Quod fatum ergo tibi fas est, Equa dira, precari,
Per noctem nobis quae mala tanta paras ?
Sors tua in infernas sit praeeipitarier undas,
Horrida qua, somni nescia, monstra natant,
Et, dum indefessa rabie furiosa minantur,
Te fieri praedam nocte dieque suam,
Quantumvis nisu tentes tentesque perenni,
E Stygio nunquam surgere posse vado.
C. W.
Kilrymont, St. Andrews, e Cubiculo, Jan. 1891.
I was at first disinclined to attempt the difficult task of
translating this poem ; but the enforced leisure of a sea-
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 329
voyage ] has given me an opportunity, of which the un
learned reader shall have the benefit.
Night Mare
Woe to thee, beast ! who mak'st the weary sigh,
Whose terrors drive sleep's solace from our bed,
Changing all shapes to shapeless fantasy,
Churning a chaos out of heart and head.
Thine are all sports of Nature's wantonness,
Her brood of foul abortion or decay.
Thou lov'st to vex the sick with new distress,
And dawning hope with fear to chase away.
Whate'er we suffer and whate'er we dread,
Are mirth and laughter to thy scornful mood.
The sailor drowns ; the soldier falls half dead ;
The farmer sees his pastures swept by flood.
The howling storm fulfils the merchant's fears,
And feeds the ocean with his hoarded gains.
The lover mourns his sweetheart's causeless tears ;
The maiden of her lover's spite complains.
The lawyer's speech hangs voiceless in the air,
While the packed court expectant hems him in ;
The parson, as he climbs the pulpit stair,
Has lost his sermon, while the people grin,
Or his white surplice seeks, and finds nowhere,
As the clock warns him service should begin.
Often thou hurl'st me headlong from a height,
Oft from the path my steps thy craft beguiles,
And, having made pretence of ready flight,
Thou turn'st upon me with a thousand wiles ;
Or, panting as in narrow maze I fight,
My struggles fix me firmer in thy toils.
1 From Alexandria to Marseilles, 5 November, 1898, returning from
Jerusalem after the consecration of St. George's Church (18 Oct.).
330 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
Oft hast thou made me late with cruel art
When some grave business needed instant care ;
Oft at some window-entering thief I start
From my first slumber, crying ' Help ! Who's there ? '
Thine too it is to mingle true with false,
Profane with sacred ; things both right and wrong
To utter ; in thy train are threats and brawls
And hatred, and a love of fight too strong
To brgok control, nay every pain that mauls
Poor souls (as story tells) in Pluto's throng.
What then, foul beast, should be my curse on thee,
Who makest night so hideous, and so grim ?
May'st thou be whelmed in th' infernal sea,
Where horrid sleepless monsters ever swim ;
And as they threaten with a ceaseless rage,
And tear thee, day and night, yet never tire,
Though thou should 'st struggle upward age on age,
May'st thou ne'er issue from the Stygian mire.
Of the Bishop's serious thoughts and religious studies
in this period we have a much larger evidence in the two
volumes of Latin verse of which one has already been men
tioned in connection with Cardinal Newman. The other was
a series of the Collects of the Book of Common Prayer, and
certain select Psalms and Hymns translated into elegiacs and
published by Murray in 1890. My uncle would probably have
liked, throughout his earlier life, to have made Mr. Murray
his publisher, but there had been a misunderstanding over
the ' Greek Grammar,' which Dean Gaisford recommended
should be transferred to the Delegates of the University
Press ; and he was therefore grateful to Mr. Earl Hodgson
for his intervention in regard to this little book, which,
beautiful as it is, brought, I fear, little gain to either author
or publisher.
Those who have the volume may be glad to add to it the
CH. viii EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 331
two Hymns that follow, which he printed (with Equa
Nocturna) for private circulation, and the version of ' Lead,
kindly Light,' which he had hardly finished, but which I
have ventured to publish. He first rendered it into elegiacs,
and then changed it into a metre more suggestive of the
original, and more terse in its rendering of the singularly
felicitous English, especially of the alternate lines.
The two Hymns here translated were, I believe, always
or, at least, regularly used by the Bishop at Confirma
tions, of course in their English form.
' Our Blest Redeemer, ere He breathed '
Hymns A. and M., No. 207.
Nos propter Dominus tolerata morte, priusquam
Supremum ex tenero dixit amore vale,
Consolatorem per testamenta ducemque,
Qui nobis pro se vellet adesse, dedit.
Ille ultro supera venit novus hospes ab aula
Spargere naturae dulcia dona suse,
Sicubi per terras inter rnortalia corda
Unum humile inveniat qua se habitare juvet.
Illius quoque vox, quam saepe audire solemus,
Vespertina levi spirat ut aura sono,
Omnem quae cohibet culpam, mulcetque timorem,
Et de caelesti mussat in aure domo.
Et si quam fuimus laudem virtutis adepti,
Carnis et improbitas si qua subacta fuit,
Et si quern verse sensum pietatis babemus,
Ille unus varii muneris auctor erat.
Spiritus, unde venit puri quodcunque bonique est,
Quam sumus infirmi respice, et affer opem ;
! magis apta lubens ut in illis incola fias,
Pectora fac renovans numine nostra tuo.
332 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
' Thine for ever, God of Love '
Hymns A. and M. 280.
SEMPER amans et amande Deus, quae poscimus audi,
Maximus in solio qua super astra sedes ;
Cessemus nunquam vel in hac vel sorte futura,
Cessemus nunquam nos, Deus, esse tui.
Cessemus nunquam esse tui ; Tu, vindice dextra,
Nos mala per vitae qualiacunque juva :
Tu via, tu verum, tu vita, ! dirige gressus
Fulgida qua regnum lux sine nocte tenet.
Cessemus nunquam esse tui ; nam terque quaterque
Felices in Te qui posuere fidem ;
Salvator, custos, Idem caelestis amicus,
Tutela ad finem sis quoque nostra, Deus !
Cessemus nunquam esse tui ; dilecte, paventem
Nos, Pastor, serves invalidumque gregem ;
Omnes ut, sine Te qui salvi baud possumus esse,
Simus participes in bonitate tua.
Cessemus nunquam esse tui ; Tu ducere praesens,
Tu quae deficiant suppeditare volens,
Omnia Tu peccata ultro delere paratus,
Nos hinc ad superam denique tolle domum.
* Lead, kindly Light '
Due circumfusas inter, Lux alma, tenebras,
Due, age, me fessum timidumque.
Due, age, nam fuscis tellurem amplectitur alis
Nox alta, atque domo procul absum.
Dirige tu gressus ; longinqua baud cernere posco :
Ire gradurn mihi sufficit unum.
Non sum qualis eram, cum incertis passibus errans,
Te non esse ducem cupiebam.
Deligere ipse viam mihimet scrutatus amabam,
Sed nunc signa sequi tua quaero.
Caecus amor mundi fastusque, ah ! non sine cura
Urgebant : meminisse ea noli !
OH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 333
Hue usque incolumis, duce te, per cuncta tetendi,
Spesque tui est eadem duels ultra.
Sit via per rupes, per stagna et tesqua, per undas,
Dum cselo nox atra recessit ;
Et mane ilia, olim dilecta et perdita posthac,
Ora iterum mihi rident.
April 1891.
The following is an acknowledgment of the gift of the
volume of Collects of more than usual interest on the part
of a brother Bishop, who sympathised much with the
Bishop of St. Andrews in many of his aspirations. It is
dated ' Palace, Kipon, 12 April, 1890 ' :
I owe you many apologies and many thanks. For pleasure
and profit you have given me thanks ! For long delayed
acknowledgment apologies. First, your Latin translations of
Collects and familiar songs of our Zion reached me safely.
Thank you for so kindly guessing that I should value them. I
do, and shall prize them. Secondly, the photograph of yourself,
which, now in frame, makes a welcome addition to my small
portrait gallery of honoured friends. For these thanks many
indeed. I was touched by the preface to the Latin translations. 1
Will you accept the enclosed as my answer ? Forgive its defects.
It will at least show that I am not unmindful of your kindness
or forgetful of our pleasant meeting at St. Andrews.
Ever yours gratefully,
W. B. EIPON.
' Nee cithara carentem.' Hon. Od. bk. i. 31.
1 A SAD old age becomes his certain lot
Who knows not whist.' So spake the wit of France,
Deeming the mimic skill in games of chance
Some solace in the years when joys are not.
Then who should murmur if the cultured mind,
Which shed a holy light on Shakespeare's page,
Should, after love's long labour, in its age
In sanctities of song its respite find ?
1 Or, rather, dedication to the reader, referring to his enforced leisure
from sickness, as an apology for time spent on such occupations.
334 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH OH. VHI
Nay wisely happy he sweet concord taught
(Toiling where Holy Andrew's name endears
His task), and in his riper age soars higher
And turns to praise : though life with pain be fraught,
His holy thoughts are ' wanting not the lyre,'
But wake new music in declining years.
But it would be a mistake to suppose that other studies
were absent. We have seen that the ' Annals ' were largely
composed in these last years, and other plans were pro
jected, particularly for volumes of sermons, addresses,
lectures, and reviews. One useful volume of sermons, ' The
Primary Witness to the Truth of the Gospel,' was actually
carried through the press, and published, with a dedication
to the members of the congregations in the united Diocese,
dated on the thirty-ninth anniversary of his consecration
(25 January, 1892), and containing also his Charge of the
previous autumn on ' Old testament Criticism.' The other
volumes projected were to be three in number :
I. A volume containing * Occasional Sermons preached in
Scotland and England.' 1. Four preached to St. Andrews
students ; 2. Three addresses to students in other universities,
one at Aberdeen and two in Edinburgh ; 3. Fasque sermon
(' History of Glenalmond '), consecration of Chapel, Glenalmond,
Special Synod, Enthroning at St. Ninian's ; 4. Glasgow Conse
cration (Barnabas and Luke), General Synod 1862, Consecration
of [St. Ninian's] Cathedral, General Synod 1890, Dundee Anni
versary (Philadelphia), Consecration of Newport, Comrie (?).
5. English sermons : Kidderminster, Norwich Musical Festival,
St. Albans Musical Festival, Westminster Abbey (Gadara),
Salisbury Cathedral (Daniel), Oxford (mending of nets), Oxford
(Trinity Sunday), and [others not clearly specified], and those at
Peterboro' and Chichester cathedrals.
II. A volume of ' Miscellaneous Sermons for all Seasons.'
III. ' Lectures and Reviews on subjects Secular and Sacred.'
i. * Three great Orators of Antiquity,' Demosthenes, Cicero,
St. John Chrysostom.
<JH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 335
ii. ' Pindar and Athletics.'
iii. ' Shakespeare.' 1. Life. 2. Teaching.
iv. ' Requirements of St. Cyril's Interpretation.' 1. Humility;
2. Learning ; 3. Stability.
v. Reviews. 1. 'Abp. Hamilton's Catechism'; 2. 'Lord
Bute's Breviary ' ; 3. ' Eastern Patriarchs and the Pope ' ; 4.
' Luther and Foreign Protestants on Episcopacy.' ' Plea for
Justice,' Duke of Argyll. 5. Lord Lindsay [on * Essays and
Reviews '].
vi. Names of days of the week. Coronation.
I trust that this latter volume at least may be published
some day, and also a third volume of ' Public Appeals,'
with an Index.
6. Manner of Preaching and Confirming
The Bishop's manner and method of preaching and
teaching has been incidentally, as well as directly, illus
trated in many parts of this volume. As a catechist he
was specially happy and impressive, and both in this duty
and in sermons and addresses he had a great hold upon
the young. I had not often the advantage of hearing
him preach, but there is no doubt that the effect of
his delivery was very great, from the intensity of his
conviction, the simplicity of his faith, the seriousness and
grandeur of the issues set before the audience, the clear
ness of his style, the natural dignity of his manner, and
the beauty and correct emphasis of his enunciation. Dr.
Danson criticised the sermons, and no doubt with some jus
tice, as too lucid, and, consequently, as leaving too little to
the intellect and imagination of the hearer, and as fail
ing to touch the deeper springs of human feeling. It must
indeed be acknowledged that the poetical suggestiveness,
which charms us in such a strange way in Newman, is
absent; that the felicity of elaboration and the delicacy
33S EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vm
of thought which delight us in Dean Church, and the sense
of masterful grasp of new and weighty ideas which holds us
in James Mozley, not to speak of the technical skill of more
rhetorical preachers, are equally deficient. But there are
too many testimonies to the effectiveness of his preaching
to permit any one to doubt the fact that it was much greater
than might be gathered from the mere reading in private of
the written words. I will give one from Canon Farquhar's
' Funeral Sermon ' which was specially appropriate as
delivered at St. Ninian's.
Who that ever heard him preach can forget his Sermons ?
These were as far removed as it is possible to conceive from the
slipshod rambling rhetoric that now so often passes as eloquence.
True, the Bishop's discourses were not addressed to those who
refused to listen, but as for those who did listen, how he used to
thrill them, with his beautiful, classic, English, his complete
logical arrangement, his exquisite taste, his fine sonorous voice,
his wealth of instruction, his massive good sense, his intellectual
force, his intense earnestness and his awakening power !
A reflection on the Bishop's effectiveness as a preacher
may be a comfort to those clergy who preach from manu
script : for my uncle never preached without book, and on
one occasion was strangely discomposed because of the acci
dental absence of his copy. He actually put off the Con
firmation for half an hour, and had begun to write an
address, when he recollected that his clerical host had
one of his printed Confirmation Addresses (his own gift)
in his study, which set him at ease, and, with a few fresh
touches, took the place of the lost manuscript.
His manner of confirming was peculiarly solemn and
impressive, and he was particular not to interrupt the ser
vice by addresses or hymns. His rule (writes one of his
daughters) was to have it prefaced by the Litany, if the
Litany had not been already said. Then followed Hymn
CH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 337
207 (A. and M.), * Our Blest Kedeemer,' then the Address,
then Hymn 157, 'Come, Holy Ghost,' or 209, ' Come,
gracious Spirit,' and then the whole Order of Confirmation
to its close. He usually confirmed standing, and generally
said the blessing separately for each person. Then followed
Hymn 280, ' Thine for Ever,' and then a general blessing
for the congregation. He was always anxious to have a
congregation of interested persons intelligently following,
as well as the candidates.
It may interest Scotsmen to be told that he used the
Edinburgh D.D. hood (purple and black) for Lent, and
the St. Andrews (purple and white) for Advent. Each of
them, to him, was a perpetual symbol of the possibilities of
Reunion.
After the Confirmation the Bishop distributed cards or
certificates bearing his signature. The card had certain
appropriate texts (Ps. Ixxvi. 11 and Ps. xxvii. 16) and
prayers, and his questions and answers intended as an
Appendix to the Catechism, A copy of it is among the docu
ments printed at the end of this volume (p. 357).
He required not only to have the names and ages, but
some description of the class to which the candidates be
longed, sent to him on a list before the time of Confirmation.
His last Confirmations were held at Newport chiefly, as
usual, for boys of the Mars training-ship and at Pitten-
weem, shortly before Easter in the year of his death.
In these public services of the Church, even to the end,
all lassitude and languor was thrown off, and the old man
acquired a picturesque beauty and a commanding vigour
which struck those, who had lately seen his weakness, with
astonishment, and even with awe.
338 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vm
7. Lord Selborne's Character of Bishop Wordsworth and the
Bishop's Comments
The following judgment of his friend's character from
the pen of Lord Selborne will be read with interest by
those who are not already familiar with it. See his * Family
and Personal Memorials,' i. chap. viii. 127-8 (Lond. 1896).
He was % man of impetuous feelings and great energy, but
liable (partly from physical causes, for his health always suffered
from anxiety or excessive exertion) to alternations of lassitude
and depression. Whatever he set his hand to do, he did it
with his might. If book-learning, he made himself thoroughly
master of it ; if teaching, he spared no pains to inform, raise,
and stimulate the hearts and minds of his scholars ; if govern
ment, he was lavish of his strength, and of his means also, for
the advancement of the work in hand ; if controversy, he put
on his armour in right earnest, and girded himself to the battle
without favour or fear. His intellectual temper was eager and
anxious, even to restlessness ; and in conversation about serious
matters he was sometimes too argumentative for his own or
other people's comfort. He had an ardent zeal for truth, from
which no attachment to party, no respect of persons could turn
him aside. If his health had been better and his temperament
less sensitive, if he had husbanded his strength more, and had
been less willing to spend and be spent ; if he had been less
self-sacrificing and single-minded, and had lived more in the
world and less in his library, he must have done greater things
than it was his lot to do.
The Bishop gladly received the book in which these
words first appeared, as a gift from his old friend, all the
more valued because of its character as a privately printed
volume intended only for family use. 1 The following letter
is so full of interest that I print it in its entirety.
1 The main part of it has since been published ; but the two books differ,
I believe, considerably.
OH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDEEWS 339
To Lord Selborne
6 November, 1891.
I have now finished the book (Memorials), and I thank you
most sincerely, first for the mark of confidence and affection
which the gift implies, and then for the gift itself. I hardly
know how to begin in speaking of it. Perhaps what struck me
most has been the unusual amount of blessing which you appear
to have enjoyed in the character of the various members of
your own family, and also of that of your Wife.
Next to your Father, I was naturally most interested in your
brother William ; but I am not sure that you tell much more
about him than I knew or fancied that I knew before. His
mind was a Gordian knot which no one could untie, and I think
he himself all but cut it rather than untied it. His views took
too wide a range to be brought within the practical scope of
individual endeavour ; but though he was ever striving after an
ideal beyond his reach, he was careful and conscientious about
the duties of everyday life, and with his head in the clouds did
not neglect TO, ei/ iroa-L ' Ingrediturque solo,' &c. [Aen. iv. 177].
Had he lived in days of old, he would have made a splendid Stoic,
another Seneca, but without his hollowness and inconsistency.
Newman kindly sent me a copy of his Russian Journal, which I
read with great interest, and I suppose I am almost the only person
who ever read through the thick, closely-printed volume of his
appeal to our Scottish Church. All through your volume it has
been a pleasure to me to mark the instances in which there has been
(sometimes quite unexpectedly) a striking resemblance between
the views and sentiments you express, especially upon religious
and ecclesiastical matters, and those which I have been holding,
though, during many years, there has been so little personal
intercourse between us : a resemblance which has sometimes
extended to actual experiences. If Horace could write to
Maecenas ' Utrumque nostrum,' &c., merely because one had
recovered from a serious illness, and the other had escaped
being killed by the fall of a tree about the same time, I have
much more reason to write the same to you who have been on
several accounts a Maecenas to me such as no one else has been,
unless I am to except dear W. K. Hamilton. Whether Persius
z 2
340 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
had better reason for adopting the same sentiment and applying
it, as he does, to Cornutus [Sat. v. 45, 46, 51]
Non equidem hoc dubites amborum fcedere certo
Consentire dies, et ab uno sidere duel :
Nescio quod certe est quod me tibi temperat astrum,
we cannot tell. Let me mention some of the resemblances.
1. You lost your Uncle Edward, Captain of the ' Nautilus,'
setat. twenty-six in 1807. I lost my Uncle John, Captain of the
' Abergavenny,' aetat. thirty-three, in 1805, and besides their
untimely fate there seems to have been much in common
between their characters.
2. I have before referred to the striking similarity, in many
respects, between the opinions entertained and the line adopted
by our two Fathers ; they would have concurred thoroughly
with Rose in condemning as unwise the publication of Froude's
' Remains ' ; with him they had more delight in contemplating
wherein we all agree than in moving controversy (p. 171) ; they
both understood and taught that ' the Fathers were to be read
with caution * (p. 132). They would quite have agreed about
Tract 90 as ' indiscreet and unsatisfactory ' enough (p. 198).
Altogether your memorial to your father is a noble and beautiful
monument of filial love and duty, and it is a happy circumstance
that you are able to crown it with the testimony of so good and
competent a judge as Burgon.
3. But to come to yourself and your own opinions. At
p. 260 the estimate which you give of Keble is precisely that
which I have formed, and so too of Pusey. ' He was not a strong
leader,' as I shall have occasion to show, if I am spared to
publish my second volume. At p. 295, where you describe Dr.
Yonge's opinions, you exactly represent mine as well as your
own, and again more fully at p. 358, and again in your address
of 10 March, 1852, p. 401. So, too, on the Gorham Judgment ;
I took, in our Diocesan Synod, precisely the line which you
recommend (p. 356), and was thanked by Bishop Phillpotts for it.
It is a great bathos to descend to a personal peculiarity such
as smoking ; but your 'experiment' at Winchester had been
anticipated at Harrow. Although I have always been quite
tolerant of smoking in others, I have always ' failed ' in forming
a habit of it for myself, which I rather regret, because, fortified
OH. vin EVENING OF LIFE AT ST. ANDREWS 341
with such an example as Barrow, I think I might, at times,
have derived comfort from it.
In 1846 we were both travelling in Italy, and visiting Rome
for the first time only you were two months earlier. You had
the advantage over me in the North, for you saw Milan, &c.,
which I missed ; and I had the advantage over you in the
South, for I saw Naples, Pompeii, and Paestum, which you do
not seem to have reached.
And now, before I conclude, to refer, for a moment, to what
you are so good as to say of me at pp. 88-6. What there is of
praise is far too lavish ; what there is of gently hinted disap
proval is far too lenient. I pass by the former ' oculo irretorto '
(knowing how little it is deserved, and how much in your friendly
retrospect distance of time had lent enchantment to the view) to
note the accuracy of the latter except in one respect. It seems,
I think, to imply that my friends regard me, and that I ought
to regard myself, as a disappointed man. But to this I must
demur. I was physically disqualified (as indeed you intimate)
for a post of greater labour, or heavier responsibility and anxiety
than that which I have filled. If I had ever had the offer of an
English Bishopric, I believe I should have refused it. I am
quite sure that I ought to have done so ; with my eager tempera
ment (which you also recognise) I should have broken down
under it much sooner than my brother did, or than Claughton
has done, both of whom had constitutions better than mine.
Happily, too, I was not ambitious, and, knowing well my manifold
defects, have never desired more than I have obtained. My
office in this country has afforded me ample (and upon the whole
pleasurable) scope for the exercise of my energies, without ex
hausting them, and I have abundant reason to believe (if I may
trust assurances from a variety of quarters) that I have been
permitted to do some good, by bringing people's minds to see
the evil and sinfulness of Ecclesiastical divisions, and to long for a
better state of things, though unable as yet to see their way to
its accomplishment. Meanwhile I have quite outlived the oppo
sition which at first the assertion of sound Church principles
naturally roused ; and in my own Diocese, whereas I received it
from my predecessor steeped in the worst animosities of party
spirit, all is now peace and mutual good will. In short, God's
Providence has dealt most mercifully with me, and I could not
have chosen for myself so well as He has all along graciously
342 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH CH. vin
chosen for me. The sphere in which I have been placed has been
exactly suited for me. My Winchester fellowship (thanks mainly
to you *) has supplied what was wanting for the sufficient main
tenance of my wife and family, and I must beg you to think
that if I have failed (as doubtless I have) to do all the good
that I might have done, the failure is due, not to lack of oppor
tunities, which have been placed abundantly within my reach,
but to my own short-comings. Your book would have been
finished and this letter would have been written sooner, but
since colder aveather has set in I have been sadly troubled again
with my old enemy, eczema, which laid me up for six months,
two years ago, and seems inclined, I fear, to repeat the visitation.
I have made a memorandum that the book is to go to my
daughter Charlotte's hands, in strict confidence, at my death.
8. Conclusion
I have now come to the end of my task, which I finish
on the eve of my departure for Jerusalem in October 1898.
A sufficiently long time has elapsed to make it easier to
speak on some of the more delicate and debatable points
than it would have been even five years ago. I rise from
its completion with much thankfulness for the privilege of
looking so closely into the records of a noble life, and with
a prayer that those who read this summary of them may
grow stronger in their faith in God's Providence, and more
determined to use their own opportunities, with diligence,
for the well-being of His Church.
OSMINGTON, 30 September, 1898.
1 The fellowship was vacant through the resignation of Bishop George
Moberly, who desired that my uncle should succeed him. There was some
hesitation on the part of the Warden and Fellows as to whether they might
claim to fill up the vacancy, and whether they could elect my uncle, who
was not, technically, a Wykehamist. Further, new statutes had been framed
and a new governing body named. Eoundell Palmer throughout strongly
urged my uncle's claims and encouraged the Warden and Fellows to elect,
which they did on 9 May, 1871. The new statutes came into operation
28 July of the same year. Cp. p. 32 n.
343
CONTENTS OF THE APPENDICES
PAGE
I. ON BISHOP TORRY'S PRAYER BOOK 345
II. PASTORAL LETTER ISSUED BY THE EPISCOPAL SYNOD (27 MAY,
1858) 349
III. SUGGESTED ADDITION TO CHURCH CATECHISM
(A) INTRODUCTORY EEMARKS (1878) ..... 353
(B) CONFIRMATION CARD 357
IV. KEMARKS ON THE ARCHBISHOP'S JUDGMENT (1890) . . 360
V. THE WAVERLEY NOVELS ARRANGED CHRONOLOGICALLY . . . 362
VI. THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE OF 1888 AND HOME EEUNION.
LETTER FROM BISHOP BARRY 363
VII. LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS OF CHARLES
WORDSWORTH IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER 366
VIII. CHURCHES AND PARSONAGES BUILT DURING HIS EPISCOPATE . 386
IX. THE BISHOP'S FAMILY 388
345
APPENDICES
APPENDIX I
(liefer ring to pp. 10-15)
ON BISHOP TOEEY'S PEAYEE BOOK
It may be interesting to the reader, as Bishop Torry's Prayer
Book is now very scarce, to be told what were the principal
differences which it presented when compared with the English
Prayer Book and the other Offices from which it was drawn.
The Calendar had sixteen additional saints, of course mostly
Scottish, taken from that prefixed to the book of 1637. 1
Permission was given to parents to become sponsors for their
children at Baptism, which was and, under certain conditions,
still is the rule of the Scottish Canons ; 2 and the Apostolic
Benediction was provided for use at the conclusion when
Baptism was administered apart from Divine service. In Con
firmation the following formula was provided, which is still in
use under Canon XL. of 1890 : 3 ' I sign thee with the Sign of the
1 These were SS. David, January 11 ; Mungo, January 13 ; Colman,
February 18 ; Constantine, March 11 ; Patrick, March 17 ; Cyril, March 18 ;
Cuthbert, March 20 ; Gilbert, April 1 ; Serf, April 20 ; Columba, June 9 ;
Palladius, July 6 ; Ninian, September 16 ; Adamnan, September 20 ;
Margaret, November 16 ; Ode V., November 27 ; Drostane, December 4.
2 See the XVIIth Canon of 1838 and the XXXVIIIth of 1890. The
latter has, section 2, ' In default of others the parents of the child may be
admitted as Godfathers and Godmothers, and in cases of necessity, of which
the clergyman shall be judge, one sponsor shall be deemed sufficient.'
3 As by the present Bishop (Wilkinson) of St. Andrews, whom I saw
confirm at Muthill on 29 August, 1895, and by the Bishop (Dowden) of
Edinburgh, who has sanctioned a form containing it published by the
St. Giles' Printing Co., York Place, Edinburgh. The late Bishop of St.
Andrews dropped it in 1862-63, after the General Synod of that date which
adopted the English Prayer-book one of the points which much distressed
Mr. George Forbes.
346 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Cross ; and I lay mine hands upon thee, in the Name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Defend, Lord,
this Thy child [or this Thy servant] ' &c.
The Office for the Communion of the Sick made provision for
the use of the reserved Sacrament, which is also directed in the
rubrics at the end of the Communion Office itself. 1
It was, however, in the 'Office for the Holy Communion'
that the greatest freedom was taken and the greatest offence
given. It is printed by Dr. Neale as an appendix to his 'Life of
Bishop Tony,' in a very convenient manner, side by side with
three othersj from which and from traditional usage it was
drawn. These three he calls * Laud's ' (1637), ' Nonjurors',' and
' Received Scottish Office.' It differed from the ' Received
S. 0.' in several points, one of the most obvious being the
printing of the earlier part of the service 2 with rubrics, partly
new and partly old. The first of these rubrics, though it might
have much to be said in its favour, was too important to be
introduced with so little authority. It runs thus :
So many as intend to be partakers of the Holy Communion shall
signify their names to the Curate at least some time the day before,
1 The Priest shall reserve so much of the consecrated gifts as may be
required for the Communion of the Sick and others who could not be present
at the Celebration in Church; and when he administers to them lie shall
proceed as directed in the Office for the Communion of the Sick. This
practice was no doubt adopted from the Nonjurors' Office of 1718, for which
see Bishop Dowden The Annotated Scottish Communion Office, p. 321,
Edinburgh, 1884. Bishop Jolly used to reserve for himself for Communion
on Sundays and Festivals, as he only celebrated publicly five times a year
(see his Life by Eev. W. Walker, p. 57, quoted by Bishop Dowden, ib. p. 328).
I find the following rubric at the end of the Communion Office of the
Church of Scotland bound up with an ordinary cheap modern English
Prayer Book, and having the imprint of Alex. Murray, Church Bookseller,
Aberdeen : According to a venerable custom of the Church of Scotland, the
Priest may reserve so miich of the consecrated gifts as may be required for
tlie Communion of the Sick, and others who could not be present at the
Celebration in Church. No rubrics, however, are found at the end of the
Office in Bishop Falconar's text of 1764, which Bishop Dowden has
reprinted as the one possessed of most authority. There is, however, no
definitely authorised book.
2 Up to 1844 this had never appeared in print, the ' wee bookies ' and
other forms beginning with the Exhortation. The edition of 1844 is a
handsome black-letter quarto, published in London by Burns, but the text
(says Dowden, p. 277) is unfortunately not satisfactory.
APPENDIX I. BISHOP TORRY'S PRAYER-BOOK 347
that he may ascertain that they believe all the Articles of the
Catholic Faith, and are free from deadly sin, or if not, that they
are truly penitent for it ; and in the case of strangers, that they
have been baptised and confirmed, and are regular Communicants of
the Church.
The next rubric refers to the case of a notorious evil-liver,
and introduces the condition of receiving absolution before such
a one may come to the Lord's Table.
The use of the term ' Altar ' in various parts of these rubrics
could hardly be objected to by anyone in Scotland, since it occurs
though only once in the rubrics of the ' Received S. 0.' The
following rubric is of some interest, as showing the position
which Bishop Torry probably took at the Altar at the beginning
of the service :
The Altar, when the Holy Eucharist is to be celebrated, shall
have a fair white linen cloth upon it, and the Priest, standing at the
north side thereof, shall say the Lord's Prayer, (&c.
The alternative use of the ' Summary of the Law ' for the
Ten Commandments, and of the Collect * Almighty Lord and
everlasting God, we beseech Thee to direct, sanctify, and govern,
&c.' for the prayer for the Sovereign, is no doubt according to
Scottish usage ; so also are the response * Glory be to Thee, God '
(not then ' Lord '),* before the Gospel, and the words of the
Priest, ' Here endeth the Holy Gospel,' and the response ' Thanks
be to Thee, Lord, for this Thy glorious Gospel,' after it.
A rubric was introduced from the English Office requiring
the curate to give notice of Holy Days, &c., but curiously enough
the publication of the Banns of Matrimony in this place, which
had been rightly preserved by the Nonjurors, was dropped in
accordance with the common English printers' mistake.
More remarkable still was the order for the dismissal of
non-Communicants which represented Bishop Torry's own very
strong opinion, and the practice of the Nonjurors, but had never
found a place before, as far as I know, in any printed Office,
1 So it is in Canon XXIX. of 1838, and so continued in later editions of
the Canon Of the due care of Churches ; of reverent Behaviour and Attention
in time of Divine service. But in the revision of 1890 the form prescribed
is, what I believe is more correct, ' Glory be to thee, Lord 'more correct
as more definitely addressed to our Saviour, who is speaking to us in the
Gospel.
348 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
and was contrary to the feelings and practice of his own friends
in the Cathedral of St. Ninian's. This is as follows :
Then shall follow the sermon: and when the Holy Eucharist is
to be celebrated, the Minister shall dismiss the non- Communicants
in these or like words : ' Let those who are not to Communicate now
depart. 1
In the remainder of the Office itself there are few, if any, 1
deviations from the * Received S. 0.' except the omission of the
Amen after the words of Institution in the Consecration Prayer,
and the changed order ' preserve thy body and soul ' following
the English and Aberdeen use instead of the Scottish 'thy
soul and body.' 2
But the rubrics at the end were also open to much comment.
That about frequency of Communion prescribed that the Holy
Communion shall be celebrated so often and at such times that
every member of the Church of Scotland ' come to a proper time
of life, may communicate at least three times in the year, whereof
the Feast of Easter or of Pentecost or of Christmas shall be
one,' thus dethroning Easter from its acknowledged supremacy.
That about the elements was remarkable on both sides as
making no reference whatever ' to wafers or wafer bread,' 3 and
as naming the custom of mixing ' a little pure and clean Water
with the Wine in the Eucharistic Cup, when the same is taken
from the Prothesis or Credence to be presented upon the Altar.'
Another gave permission for a celebration to take place in
cases of necessity with only one Communicant besides the Priest.
That for reservation has already been noticed. The last but
one is as follows :
It is customary for the Communicants in this Church to receive
the Sacrament of our LORD'S Body upon the palm of the right hand,
1 The omission of the words in the short Exhortation before the Con
fession ' meekly kneeling upon your knees,' noticed by Neale, is not really
an omission. They do not appear in Bishop Falconar's text, and indeed are
not in place, as the people are already kneeling. They appear in Skinner's
Aberdeen copy of 1807.
2 See Bishop Dowden ut supra, p. 278. Neale does not notice this, as
he seems to have followed Skinner's Aberdeen copy of the E. S. 0.
8 ' The best and purest wheaten bread that conveniently may be gotten
shall be used (not it shall suffice, <&c.) for the Holy Communion.'' The words
' such as is usual to be eaten ' do not, however, appear.
APPENDIX IT. SYNODAL LETTER, 1858 349
crossed over the left, and thus reverently raise It to the mouth, so as
not to let the smallest Particle fall to the ground.
The last provides for the omission of one of the exhortations
when there is not a celebration.
APPENDIX II
(See pp. 108-113)
COPY OF THE PASTORAL LETTER ISSUED BY THE
EPISCOPAL SYNOD
To all faithful Members of the Church in Scotland, the Bishops,
in Synod assembled, send greeting :
BEETHKEN BELOVED IN THE LOED,
IT must be only too well known to you all that a Charge
delivered to his Clergy, in the month of August last year, by our
Right Reverend Brother the BISHOP OP BEECHIN, and afterwards
published by him, has called forth much opposition, and given
rise, in an unusual degree, to anxiety and alarm. Our notice
was drawn to the publication by two of our Body, at our ordinary
Synod in September last ; and again, when we met for special
purposes in December, the same subject was brought before us
more formally. Unfortunately we were not then all present ;
and such being the case, and there being a difference of opinion
amongst us as to the course which it would be most expedient to
pursue in so grave a matter, it was ultimately resolved to postpone
the determination of it till our next ordinary Synod. At the
same time, it is right you should be informed that there was but
one feeling and one opinion expressed by those who were present,
as there is now but one opinion entertained by us all (except the
Bishop of Brechin), in regard to the publication itself. We
unanimously regret that such a Charge should have been de
livered and put forth by one of our Body. We regret it on other
accounts, and because it forces upon us the painful duty of
making known that we do not concur with our Right Reverend
Brother in the views he has expressed on so material a point as
the doctrine of the Holy Eucharist. We think those views, in
350 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
the extent in which he has denned and urged them, unsound,
erroneous, and calculated to lead, if not resolutely opposed, to
still graver error. The case may not amount to a direct call
for a formal presentment of the Bishop, as liable to judicial
penalties; and no such formal presentment has been lodged
before us. But the publication of such views in a document for
the guidance of Clergy, and, still more, the republication of
the Charge 'in its integrity,' notwithstanding the grave re
monstrances with which it had been met, and the scandal which
it had raised this, attended by the avowed confidence of the
author in the eventual ' triumph of his teaching ' (Preface, p. 6),
leaves us, we feel, no alternative but to declare our own dissent,
and to caution you against being led astray either by the teaching
itself, or by the undue confidence with which it is maintained.
At the same time, however, let it be clearly understood, that
we cordially concur with our Brother in his desire to protect the
most holy ordinance of our religion from all irreverence, and to
impress upon the hearts of all men a deep, faithful, thankful
conviction of its unspeakable blessedness. It is not on account
of any variance between us as to the importance of these duties,
but for the attempt which he has made to rest them upon a false
foundation, that we feel we have cause to differ from him. We
cannot forget that the aversion to the doctrine of Sacramental
Grace, and even its entire rejection, unhappily prevalent in many
quarters since the time of the Reformation, is to be regarded as
the natural reaction from excesses with which the Primitive
teaching had been overlaid ; and we have learnt abundantly,
both from history and experience, that the violence of such
reaction, instead of gradually diminishing, is liable to be renewed
and aggravated whenever it is attempted to restore those excesses.
This, we believe, is the fundamental error into which our Brother
has fallen. Anxious to assert and uphold the grace, the dignity,
and efficacy of the blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, he
has adopted a line of argument which, as it exceeds the truth of
God's holy Word, so it is calculated, we are sure, by no slow or
uncertain process, to defeat that very end. He has pleaded for
what has recently been called * the Real Objective Presence,' in
such a manner, that the inferences which he draws from it,
however doctrinally unsound, become, as he represents, logically
inevitable ; that is, Supreme Adoration becomes due to Christ,
APPENDIX II. SYNODAL LETTER, 1858 351
as mysteriously present in the gifts (p. 27), or, as it is expressed
elsewhere, ' to Christ in the gifts ' (pp. 28, 33) ; and the Sacrifice
of the Cross and the Sacrifice of the Altar become ' substantially
one,' and ' in some transcendental sense identical ' (p. 42).
Convinced, as we are, that neither of these conclusions is to
be found in Holy Scripture, or has been deduced therefrom by
the Church ; and persuaded that the teaching of them has given
rise to corruptions and superstitions, from which we have been
set free through the blessing of God vouchsafed to the wisdom
and courage of our forefathers ; we feel it our duty to resist the
attempt which has been made to press these conclusions upon
your acceptance, and we earnestly entreat you not to suffer
yourselves to be disturbed or misguided by it. After due con
sideration, we do not hesitate to say, that the reasoning by
which they are maintained is, in our opinion, fallacious; and
that the testimony of authorities produced in their support, when
fully and carefully examined, will generally be found not to
justify the use to which it has been applied.
More particularly, we feel called on, at this season of trial, to
exhort you, our dear brethren of the Clergy, that you be not
moved under the excitement that prevails around us, so as
either to exceed or fall short in your teaching of the Truth with
respect to the doctrine of the Blessed Sacrament which has
thus unhappily been brought into controversy.
1. Instructed by Scripture and the Formularies of the
Church, you will continue to teach that the consecrated elements
of Bread and Wine become, in a Mystery, the Body and Blood
of Christ ; for purposes of grace to all who receive them worthily,
and for condemnation to those who receive the same unworthily.
But you will not, we trust, attempt to define more nearly the
mode of this mysterious Presence. You will remember that, as
our Church has repudiated the doctrine of Transubstantiation,
so she has given us no authority whereby we can require it to
be believed that the substance of Christ's Body and Blood, still
less His entire Person as God and Man, now glorified in the
Heavens, is made to exist with, in, or under the material sub
stances of Bread and Wine.
2. You will continue to teach that this Sacrifice of the Altar
is to be regarded no otherwise than as the means whereby we
represent, commemorate, and plead, with praise and thanks-
352 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
giving, before God, the unspeakable merits of the precious death
of Christ ; and whereby He communicates and applies to our
souls all the benefits of that one full and all-sufficient Sacrifice
once made upon the Cross.
8. You will continue to teach that the consecrated elements,
being the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, are to
be received with lowly veneration and devout thankfulness. And
inasmuch as doubts have been raised with regard to the true
interpretation of the Rubric affixed to the Communion Office in
the Book of Common Prayer, we desire to remind you of a
Canon whicfr was passed by the Convocations of both Provinces
of the Church of England in 1640, and which we are satisfied to
accept meanwhile for our own guidance in determining the sense
of the aforesaid Rubric, the matter not having been ruled by a
General Synod of our own Church. According to that Canon,
it was resolved that gestures of adoration, in the celebration of
the Holy Eucharist, are to be performed 'not upon any opinion
of a corporal Presence of the Body of Jesus Christ on the Holy
Table, or in mystical elements, but only for the advancement of
God's Majesty, and to give Him alone that honour and glory
that is due to Him, and no otherwise.' l
These words of fatherly guidance and admonition, in a time
of trouble and offence, we claim to offer to you all by a right
essentially inherent in a Provincial Episcopate 2 a right which
was constantly exercised by the Bishops of the Primitive Church.
Whenever in the exercise of this right, or rather in the per
formance of this duty, they had occasion to animadvert upon the
teaching of one of their own Body, doubtless they would feel
their position of responsibility doubly difficult and painful. And
the same, most assuredly, has been felt by us. We would gladly
most gladly have avoided the course now taken, if we could
have done so consistently with the solemn obligations under which
we lie towards you all, and not least towards our Brother himself.
The reluctance we have shown to adopt any Synodical action
in this case, and the calls we have made upon our Brother, both
1 Can. vii. ; see Laud's Works, v. 626 ; Cardw. Synod, i. 406.
2 See Apos. Can. xxxvi. ; Nicene Can. v. ; Synod of Antioch, can. xx ;
and in our own Code can. xxxvi., compared with canons ii., xxxii., xxxvi.
[The last numeral should probably be xxxviii. on the issue of a Pastoral
Letter by Episcopal Synod.]
APPENDIX III. ADDITION TO CHURCH CATECHISM 353
privately and in Synod, and the opportunities we have given
him, to reconsider what he has written, are a proof of this. But
tracing, as we plainly do, in the teaching of this Charge, a
tendency to undermine the great foundations upon which our
Formularies rest, and to weaken our sense of gratitude and
respect towards the holy men from whom we have derived them
in their present state ; and seeing also, on his part, an apparent
determination not to surrender the position he has taken up we
have felt ourselves constrained to deal with the matter as we
have now done. For this purpose we have assembled in special
Synod, which a. due regard to the peace and security of the
Church appeared to us to require. We earnestly entreat you to
join with us in prayer, that the issue of our anxious and solemn
deliberations may be blessed to the restoration of mutual con
fidence and harmony, and to the avoiding of all causes of dis
sension and offence for the time to come.
Grace be with you, Brethren, and peace from God the
Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
C. H. TERROT, Bishop of Edinburgh, and Primus.
ALEXANDER EWING, Bishop of Argyll and the Isles,
W. J. TROWER, Bishop of Glasgow and Galloway.
ROBERT EDEN, Bishop of Moray and Ross.
CHARLES WORDSWORTH, Bishop of St. Andrews,
Dunkeld, and Dunblane.
THOMAS GEORGE SUTHER, Bishop of Aberdeen.
EDINBURGH, May 27, 1858.
APPENDIX III
(See page 224)
SUGGESTED ADDITION TO CHURCH CATECHISM, AND
CONFIRMATION CARD
A.
Introductory Eemarks (1878)
IT will be remembered by those who were present at the former
Lambeth Conference (1867) that the proceedings of the final
session were brought to a close somewhat abruptly, from want
A A
354 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
of sufficient time, combined with the fact that an engagement
had been made by the Archbishop and many of the Bishops to
be present at a meeting of the S.P.G. fixed for that afternoon.
Had this been otherwise, I had obtained permission from His
Grace the President to bring forward a proposal which I had
previously mentioned not only to him, but to several other of
the leading members of the Conference, e.g. the then Bishops
of Winchester (Sumner), of Oxford (Wilberforce), of Ohio
(M'llvaine), and of Salisbury (Hamilton) and had so far
secured their concurrence, that they recognised the importance
of the matfer, and gave me reason to expect their approval and
support. As it was, not a moment could be found for considera
tion of the subject, and it fell through.
My proposal was to have been to this effect : That a com
mittee should be appointed to draw up a short addition to the
Church Catechism, upon points which we must all recognise as
desiderata in our present formula, especially the Ministry of the
Church and Confirmation. It is well known that the Catechism,
as put forth in our first Reformed Prayer Books, went no further
than to the Question and Answer immediately following the
Lord's Prayer ; and that it was not till more than fifty years
afterwards, viz. in 1604, that the section concerning the Sacra
ments with which it now concludes was added, having been
drawn up by Dr. (afterwards Bishop) Overall, then Prolocutor of
the Lower House of Convocation and Dean of St. Paul's. It
may, I think, be supposed not unreasonably that the lax views
in respect to the Sacraments, and still more to other ordinances,
which had grown up in the meantime, and prevailed so generally
among the Puritans, were due in great measure to the defect of
authorised catechetical teaching concerning them during that
long interval. And to what are we to attribute the similar laxity
which still so commonly prevails amongst us with respect to the
nature and obligation of the Threefold Ministry, and of the
ordinance of Confirmation ? It may be safe, I think, to answer
that the same defect of authorised catechetical teaching con
cerning them leads very many to infer that our Church (having
justly repudiated them in her 25th Article, as ' Sacraments of
the Gospel ' in the highest sense) does not regard them as of
much or distinct importance. And yet it is idle to expect that
the question of Catholic unity, as held by our Reformed Churches,
APPENDIX III AUDITION TO CHURCH CATECHISM 355
will ever be understood and appreciated until those matters, which
constitute the very bond of formal visible union, have obtained
their proper affirmative (and not merely negative) place in our
Church's teaching, and are duly received and observed by all our
members.
We are all familiar with the remark, so frequently repeated
and I remember it was made again by one of our American
brethren in the first session of our present Conference (and
since this paper was drawn up I have seen it also reported in
the Times as proceeding from a Colonial Bishop at the Clerical
Conference held at St. Paul's), that, whereas the members of
other religious bodies, such as Roman Catholics on the one hand,
and various Nonconformists on the other, are generally found
to be well instructed in the distinctive tenets of the community
to which they belong, it is not so, for the most part, with our
own members. On the contrary, they are too often lamentably
ignorant in regard to the principles with which, as professing to
belong to our truly Catholic and truly Reformed Churches, they
ought to be conversant ; and so, if they do not actually fall away
under the seductive influences to which they may be exposed on
the right hand or on the left, they prove themselves very feeble,
very indifferent, or it may be even very mischievous supporters
of the cause, which, if better informed, they might have been
both able and willing to maintain with good effect.
With regard to the Questions and Answers which I have
drawn up, and which I venture to submit herewith, in order to
show more clearly the nature and extent of the addition which
my proposal contemplates, I wish it to be understood that, being
merely an experimental draft, they may be superseded at once by
any other, which, having the same objects in view, is likely to
meet with more approval. The necessity for some such * Addi
tion ' has been suggested by my own long experience in Scotland,
where ' Episcopalians ' are scarcely more than 2 per cent, of the
entire Christian population ; while in the American United States
they are, I believe, about 5 or 6 per cent. I am quite aware that the
experience of other Bishops, under different circumstances, might
lead them to prefer the use of bolder and more sharply-defined
language, and also to include a wider range of topics. For my
own part, I have thought that a readier acceptance of the Truth
which we hold, and are bound to teach, might be looked for not
A A 2
356
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
only among our own people, but also among those who are with
out, provided only that we abstain as much as possible from the
introduction of matters calculated to raise dispute even among
ourselves, and provided we adhere to the calm and temperate
tone which distinguishes the Book of Common Prayer.
It might also be considered whether an alternative Question
and Answer should not be added at the beginning of the Con
firmation Office (after the Preface), suited to meet the case of
those (very numerous in Scotland, and probably also in America)
who, having been baptised outside our Churches, have had no
' Godfathers or Godmothers.'
I need scarcely say that nothing more is sought for by the
proposal now made than such a recognition and approval of the
' Addition,' whatever form it may assume, as might lead to its
adoption with greater confidence in all cases where Bishops and
Clergy are disposed to recommend it, and to cause it to be printed
for general use.
I have only to add that the state of my health prevented me
from being present at Lambeth after the first day's session ;
otherwise I should have spoken upon the subject, in con
nection, probably, with the discussion held upon the last day
' On the condition, progress, and needs of the various branches
of the Anglican Communion.' We must all, I think, have felt
the need of some such measure as that which I have suggested ;
and there are few of us, I believe, especially in the Colonies, in
America, and in Scotland, who would not regard the adoption of
such a measure, if wisely executed, as calculated to improve the
condition and promote the progress of our respective Churches,
if not in the present, in future generations.
July 16, 1878.
THE foregoing remarks, together with the ' Suggested Addition,'
&c., were submitted, through the Bishop of Edinburgh, to the
Chairmen of two of the Committees, and though received not
unfavourably at least by one of them, and supported by the
Bishop himself (our Secretary of Committees), I was informed
that room could not be found for the introduction of the subject
into either of the reports partly, perhaps, because it had not
been mentioned at the proper time ; and, consequently, I resolved
that it would not be desirable to attempt to bring it up at the
APPENDIX III. CONFIRMATION CARD AND ADDITION 357
concluding sessions of the Conference. At the same time, the
encouragement I have met with from more than one highly
influential quarter has induced me to think that I ought not to
allow the matter to drop altogether. I have, therefore, caused
the ' Remarks,' &c., to be printed, in order that they may be sent
to each of the members of our Home Episcopate, and, if received
with sufficient favour by my brethren of the Episcopal Church in
Scotland, I shall probably take some step with a view to the
adoption of the ' Suggested Addition,' more or less formally, in
the first instance among ourselves, as advised by an English
Bishop.
Bishopshall, St. Andrews, August 1878.
[Then follow the Questions and Answers nearly as below, p. 358.]
B.
CONFIRMATION CARD
Promise unto the Lord your God, and keep it.
At
IN THE DIOCESE OF ST. ANDBEWS, &c.
WAS CONFIEMED
On
Bishop.
Eector.
Be strong and He shall comfort thine heart, and put thou thy trust in
the Lord.
PRAYER FOR CHARITY.
LORD, Who hast taught us that all our doings without
charity are nothing worth, send Thy Holy Ghost and pour into
my heart that most excellent gift ; so that I may love Thee,
Lord my God, with all my heart, with all my mind, with all my
soul, and with all my strength, and may love my neighbour as
358 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
myself. More particularly, I pray Thee to give me such a
measure of Thy loving grace, so that I may not envy, may
not vaunt myself, may not be puffed up, may not behave
myself unseemly, 1 may not seek my own things, may not be
easily provoked ; but contrariwise, so that I may think no evil,
may rejoice not in iniquity but in the truth, may bear all things
without murmuring, may believe all things of Thee, may hope
all things of my neighbour, may endure all things for Christ's
sake. Grant this, I humbly pray Thee, through the same Christ
Jesus, our Jjord ; Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the
Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
PRAYER FOR UNITY.
GOD, the Father of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, our only
Saviour, the Prince of Peace, give grace to us and to all Thy
people in this land, seriously to lay to heart the great dangers
we are in by our unhappy divisions. Take away all hatred and
prejudice, and whatsoever else may hinder us from godly Union
and Concord : that, as there is but one Body, and one Spirit,
and one hope of our Calling, one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism,
one God and Father of us all, so we may seek henceforth to be
all of one heart and of one soul, united in one holy bond of
Truth and Peace, of Faith and Charity, and may with one mind
and one mouth glorify Thee, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
SUGGESTED ADDITION TO CHURCH CATECHISM
Recommended by the Episcopal Synod of the Scottish Church.
Q. By whom are the HOLY SACRAMENTS administered ?
A. They are administered by Clergy, duly ordained and
licensed for that purpose.
Q. How many ORDERS OF CLERGY have there been in the
Church from the Apostles' time ?
A. There have been in the Church from the Apostles'
time Three Orders of Clergy, viz. Bishops, Priests
and Deacons. 2
1 I.e. in any way unbefitting a good Christian.
9 See Preface to Ordination Service in Book of Common Prayer.
APPENDIX III. CONFIRMATION CARD AND ADDITION 359
Q. What are the chief duties of a DEACON ?
A. It is a Deacon's duty to administer Baptism in the
absence of the Priest, to assist the Priest in Divine
Service, and to preach, if licensed thereto by the
Bishop.
Q. What are the proper duties of a PEIEST ?
A. A Priest has authority to bless God's people in His
name, to pronounce His pardon to the penitent, to
consecrate the Holy Communion, and to perform all
other Offices assigned to him in the Book of Common
Prayer.
Q. What are the duties proper to a BISHOP ?
A. A Bishop has authority to rule and administer discipline,
according to the Canons, in that portion of the
Church over which he is set, to ordain Clergy, 1 to
consecrate Churches and other places for sacred pur
poses, and to administer Confirmation.
Q. In what does CONFIRMATION consist ?
A. Confirmation consists in the Solemn Benediction and
laying on of hands by the Bishop upon the heads
of those whom he confirms, accompanied with his
prayers, and the prayers of the Congregation on their
behalf.
Q. To whom is Confirmation to be administered ?
A. To all those who, having come to years of discretion,
are prepared and desirous to renew the promises made
for them in their Baptism, and to ratify and confirm
the same openly before the Church.
Q. What does the New Testament teach in regard to the obliga
tion and benefits of Confirmation ?
A. The New Testament teaches that Confirmation is an
Apostolic Ordinance 2 (Acts viii. 14-17, Heb. vi. 1-2)
1 Viz. Deacons, by himself alone ; Priests, with the assistance of any
Priests who may be present ; and Bishops, with the co-operation of other
Bishops, commonly not less than two.
2 Compare Canon Ix. of the Church of England.
360 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
designed to convey an increased measure of the gifts
of the Holy Spirit to those who receive it worthily.
Q. What rule has the Church laid down with reference to admis
sion to Holy Communion ?
A. The Church orders that none shall be admitted to the
Holy Communion until he has been confirmed, or
be ready and desirous to be confirmed. 1
1 A Certificate of Confirmation, signed by the Bishop, shall
be given to each person who has been confirmed.' CANON xl. 7.
APPENDIX IV
REMARKS ON THE ARCHBISHOP'S JUDGMENT (1890)
The Bishop of St. Andrews welcomed the appointment of
Archbishop Benson in 1882 in the following lines :
As Abram's name to Abraham,
In earnest of undying fame,
Was changed by Voice from heaven ;
So, raised to the primatial throne,
May Benson changed to Benison
Henceforth proclaim in richest boon
Blessing received and given.
He was therefore ready to accept the Archbishop's Judgment in
1890, though in some respects it went beyond his own previous
conclusions. The following sentences express his opinion :
I do not quarrel with the conclusions of the Judgment as a whole,
but I think it would have gone upon safer ground if it had taken some
such line as this. Our Church does not disallow the doctrine of a
Sacrifice in the Holy Eucharist, but it desires to keep it within due
bounds.
The doctrine allowable is not that of the Mass, is not that of a con
tinuous sacrifice in any sense, so as to interfere with the perfect sacrifice
offered once for all ; and it is such as to yield greater prominence, as
the New Testament itself appears to do, to the doctrine of Holy Com
munion. Now fairness requires that this latter and more prominent
1 See Rubric at the end of the Confirmation Office.
APPENDIX IV ARCHBISHOP'S JUDGMENT (1890) 361
doctrine should not be obscured by the structure of an altar which
ceases to be a table, or, as Bishop Phillpotts preferred to call it ' God's
board.'
Bishop Andrewes writes in his famous Sermon of the ' Worship
ping of Imaginations ' [(Sermons, v. 66, A. C. L.) with regard to the
Imaginations of the Church of Rome concerning the Eucharist, ' that
she many times celebrateth the mystery sine fractione " without any
breaking " at all. Whereas, as heretofore hath been showed out of the
tenth chapter of the first of Corinthians, the eighteenth verse, it is of
the nature of a Eucharist or peace-offering : which was never offered
but it was eaten, that both these might be a representation of the
memory of that sacrifice, and together an application to each person by
partaking it.'] Let both therefore be indifferent ; let not the Altar so
intrude upon the Table as to obscure the significance which the latter
implies.
In a letter dated 3 December, 1890, and published in the
London Times, with the signature EPISCOPUS, he first praises
the spirit in which the Judgment was conceived and carried out,
and especially its concluding sentences. He then asks, what are
the practical results which wise men not mixed up with either
party, would desire to see, especially as to two points, the Eastward
Position and the singing of the Agnus. Setting aside doctrinal
considerations (as ruled by the Archbishop to be irrelevant) he
thinks the North end position to be preferred, as (a) facilitating
the breaking of bread before the people ; (b) not interfering with
the ordinary position of saying the prayers, but in harmony with it.
In any case * no Altar ought to be allowed to be so erected
that a clergyman cannot stand at the north end, which the
Judgment state? to be " beyond question a true Liturgical use of
the Church of England " and hitherto a far more general and
accepted course.'
In regard to the singing of the Agnus Dei before reception, he
notes that the Judgment, while holding it not unlawful, would
seem to regard it as unwise, because the words occur twice in
other places, viz. in the Litany and the Post- Communion. He
adds a further reason which he thinks far stronger, that in the
Proper Preface for Easter we do not say that the Lamb of God
' taketh away ' the sin of the world, but ' He is the very Paschal
Lamb which was offered for us and hath taken away the sin of
the world.' This has come down to us from the Gelasian
Sacramentary.
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
APPENDIX V
THE WAVERLEY NOVELS ARRANGED CHRONOLOGICALLY
(Intended to show how a student of Walter Scott might gain
an idea of almost the whole of modern history.)
1. Count Bobert of Paris (A.D. 1080 &c., First Crusade).
2. The Betrothed (A.D. 1187 &c.).
3. Ivanhoe (A.D. 1195 &c.).
4. The Talisfiian (A.D. 1205 &c.).
5. Castle Dangerous (A.D. 1306, Robert Bruce of Scotland).
6. Fair Maid of Perth (A.D. 1380, Robert III. of Scotland).
7. Quentin Durward (A.D. 1468).
8. Anne of Geierstein (A.D. 1477 &c.).
9. The Monastery (A.D. 1550 &c.).
10. The Abbot (A.D. 1558, Mary Queen of Scots).
11. Kenilworth (A.D. 1560).
12. Fortunes of Nigel (A.D. 1602, James I. of England).
13. Legend of Montrose (A.D. 1643-6, Charles I.).
14. Woodstock (A.D. 1649-60, Commonwealth and Restoration).
15. Peveril of the Peak (A.D. 1658, Commonwealth and Charles II.).
16. Old Mortality (A.D. 1679 &c. Charles II. and WiUiam III.).
17. Bride of Lammermoor (A.D. 1689, William III.).
18. Black Dwarf (A.D. 1707 &c.).
19. Bob Boy (A.D. 1715, George I.). l
20. Pirate (A.D. 17 George I. &c.).
21. Heart of Midlothian (A.D. 1736, George II.).
22. Waverley (A.D. 1745, George II.).
23. Bedgauntlet (A.D. 1750-65, George II. and III.).
24. Guy Mannering (George III., after A.D. 1777).
[The reference to Dr. Robertson as * the historian of Scotland,
of the Continent, and of America,' in chap, xxxvii., fixes the
date as after 1777, i.e. to the reign of George III., which
began in 1760. I owe this reference to Dean Boyle.]
25. Antiquary (George III., A.D. 1790-1800).
[* Waverley embraced the age of our fathers, Guy Mannermg
that of our own youth, and the Antiquary refers to the last
ten years of the eighteenth century.' Advertisement (1829).]
26. Highland Widow (circa A.D. 1790).
27. Surgeon's Daughter (A.D. 1800-1810 &c.).
28. St. Bonan's Well (do.).
1 The Bishop had not quite made up his mind as to the order of the
later novels. I have therefore made the series a little more exact.
APPENDIX VI. LAMBETH CONFERENCE, 1888 363
APPENDIX VI
THE LAMBETH CONFEEENCE OF 1888 AND HOME
EEUNION
(See pp. 253-259)
Letter from Bishop Barry, Chairman of the Committee
Bishop Barry has been good enough to accede to my request
to illustrate the proceedings of the important Committee over
which he presided, and of which my uncle was a member as far
as he could do so without breach of confidence. His lucid state
ment will be read with interest ; and it will, I hope, tend to
promote the end which the Lambeth Conference primarily had
in view, viz. the holding of Conferences with representatives of
the separated communions. His letter is dated 9 December
1898. J. S.
The published Eeport and Eesolution of 1888 will show clearly that
we held, as the only permanent basis of Eeunion, to what has been
called ' the Lambeth quadrilateral,' which was itself an amended, and
somewhat enlarged, revision of the basis previously suggested by the
American Church. On the * historic Episcopate ' we were, I think,
quite unanimously determined to take our stand in view, both of the
intrinsic merits of the case, and of the relation of our Church to the
great Latin and Eastern Communions. In fact, on the matter con
tained in our present Eeport, there was, except on mere details, no
difference of opinion. I can see now, in the light of the event, that it
would have probably better advanced the cause we had at heart, if we
had been contented to bring forward this only, and to wait for the
result of the Conferences therein proposed.
But it was urged by some members of the Committee holding (I
suppose) on the subject something like Bishop Wordsworth's position
that our proposal of these Conferences with the separated Com
munions would be absolutely fruitless, unless we were prepared to
suggest some means of bridging over the transitional period in any
process of Eeunion in regard to the crucial question of the Ministry
of Non-Episcopal Communions. That we held it to be irregular, and
contrary to primitive Church Order, was indicated by our previous
determination to accept the historic Episcopate as one of the permanent
bases of Eeunion. But were we to require that the members and
ministers of these Communions should acknowledge it to be absolutely
invalid ? Or, considering ' the [present distress,' could we go into
364 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
Conference with some acknowledgment on our part of a spiritual
reality in it as evidenced by spiritual fruits of its ministration
sufficient to prepare, if not for Corporate Reunion, at least for such
relations as might perhaps lead to it in the hereafter ? We were, of
course, aware that the position of the Ministry varied greatly in the
different Non- Conformist bodies, and that these must affect the degree
of recognition which could be rightly given to it. I think that Bishop
Wordsworth would have preferred that we should have dealt primarily
or exclusively with the strongest case the case of the Presbyterian
Ministry. 1 Certainly we had the Presbyterians, and perhaps also the
great Wesleyan Body, especially in view. But the Committee were
generally inclined to think that these differences between the various
Non- Conformist bodies would emerge, whenever the proposed Confer
ences were held, and that any Resolution on the subject must be for
the present couched in general terms.
On the question so raised there was, I need not say, great conflict
of opinion, and considerable opposition to any declaration on the subject
strong, although by no means so strong as that which was afterwards
manifested in the Conference itself. After much serious debate the final
Resolution was carried, with some considerable variation (I may
remark) from the original draft. It is curious that the particular phrase
' Ministerial character ' was not in that draft, but was substituted for
a clause, distinguishing between irregularity and invalidity, on the
motion of a leading member of the Committee, who was opposed to
the whole Resolution, and spoke strongly against it in the subsequent
debate of the Conference. Whether he attached to it the very definite
and almost technical meaning assigned to it by some speakers in that
debate, I do not know. But I think that the Committee generally
accepted it, rightly or wrongly, as a term of the widest generality,
leaving room for much variety of interpretation, and perhaps varying
also in its application to various cases. The position, as I understood
it, taken up by the majority of the Committee, was very much that of
the well-known declaration of Archbishop Bramhall 2 ; and this was
made plainer in the original Draft of the Resolution, which contained
the words ' whether by conditional reordination or otherwise.' Pro
bably they did not enter into the question how it could be practically
carried out, thinking that this belonged to the proposed Conferences,
1 The Bishop in a letter to one of his sons (Eydal, 1 August, 1888)
says : ' Though I was thankful upon the whole for Barry's Resolution and
heartily supported it, it was not the way (as I told the Committee) that I
myself should have chosen for dealing with the matter. It was too in-
discriminative and asserted the crucial principle too broadly. In England
you cannot afford to deal with Dissent en masse. What I asked for in my
Pamphlet was not that ; and I dare say I shall find that what I did ask for
has been granted.'
2 See above, pp. 262-3 note.
APPENDIX VI LAMBETH CONFERENCE, 1888 365
to which they wished to give a fair chance of success. It must be
remembered that they desired to see steps taken 'either towards
corporate reunion or towards such relation as may prepare for fuller
organic unity hereafter.' I imagine that the latter of these alternatives
was chiefly before their minds, as more likely to be practicable, and
that they had the idea of a kind of Federation of Congregations of the
Non-Episcopal Bodies if any proposal for Reunion was accepted
retaining their own present Ministers under Episcopal recognition,
with the understanding that in the hereafter there should be Episcopal
Ordination for their successors. Probably also some consecration to
the Episcopate per saltum was contemplated in the case of leading
Ministers of any of these Communions. But these ideas were not, and
could not be, embodied in the Resolution.
A subsequent question arose, whether this Resolution should be
simply left in the Report as the opinion of the Committee, or submitted
to the Conference for consideration and adoption by them. On this
there was again difference of opinion ; but it was decided to take the
latter course as most straightforward and explicit.
Bishop Wordsworth attended the final meeting of the Committee,
and signified his cordial adhesion to the Resolution. I remember his
saying, ' If this is carried, I may sing my Nunc Dimittis.' I do not
think that he took any part in the discussion of it in the Conference.
Before the Report was presented, this final Resolution by what I
must hold to have been a serious breach of the law of the Conference
was published in the Times without the explanation which led up
to it in the Report itself. The publication produced strong excitement,
and in some degree, I think, prejudiced the discussion which afterwards
took place upon it in the Conference itself.
It became my duty, as chairman of the Committee, to lay the
Report before the Conference and move the Resolutions appended to it.
The motion was, I remember, seconded; by a leading Bishop of the
American Church. A prolonged and most earnest discussion followed,
in which many of the leading members of the Conference took part.
I may remark that a report (which I saw in one of the papers), that
Bishop Lightfoot led the opposition to it, was absolutely erroneous.
He did not, so far as I remember, speak on the matter at all, and he
voted for a modification of the Resolution in question, which was pro
posed as an amendment. But it is sufficient to note the result of the
discussion, which was, that the Report was referred back to the Com
mittee with a virtual instruction to omit all the last section and the
Resolutibn based upon it. This was, of course, done, and the Report,
brought up nearly in its present form, was accepted, and the Resolutions
based upon it were carried, with some modifications of detail, as they
now stand in the Report of the Conference.
How far the proposed Conferences with the representatives of
Non-Conformist Communions were held I hardly know. For I was
366 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
obliged, for private and personal reasons, to resign almost immediately
my position as Primate of Australia, which would have enabled me to
initiate them there. But certainly no substantial results appear to
have followed from them. The question was no nearer solution when
the next Lambeth Conference met in 1897 ; and the Committee on the
subject, presided over by the Archbishop of Armagh, only recommended
one further practical step (which was adopted by the Conference), by
requesting the authorities of our Church to take a more distinct initia
tive in regard to the Conferences with other Communions, and to lay
reports on the subject before the next Lambeth Conference. But it
was profoundly significant that the Conference, on the recommendation
of the Committee, passed an emphatic Resolution declaring visible
unity among Christians to be an element of the Divine Revelation,
without, of course, denning the form which such unity should assume ;
and, indeed, in all its Resolutions referring to the great subject of
unity in all its various aspects it showed a marked desire to endeavour,
so far as might be, to prepare for some realisation of this fundamental
principle.
As yet it remains simply an ideal and an aspiration. But, even so,
it must call out serious thought and suggest earnest prayer. From
these we may trust that in God's good time there may follow practical
advance towards some measure of Reunion, to remove or soften our
unhappy divisions now splintering up the Christianity which ought to
be one.
APPENDIX VII
LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS OF
CHARLES WORDSWORTH IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
[The size given is as far as possible taken from the signature of the
sheets. In case of pamphlets of unusual gatherings they have been
noted as ' sm. 8vo ' when they were not obviously of smaller size.]
1827 (May).* Mexica, Poema Cancellarii praemio donatum et in
Theatro Sheldoniano recitatum sext.cal. Jun. MDCCCXXVII.
Excudebat G. King, Oxonii. [Oxford Prize Poem on Mexico,
signed ' Charles Wordsworth, Ch. Ch.'] Pp. 18 + fly-leaf, 8vo.
1831 (May).* Oratio Cancellarii praemio donata et in Theatro Shel
doniano habita, die lunii XV to A.D. MDCCCXXXI. Oxford.
Published by D. A. Talboys. Title Quaenam fuerit Oratorum
Atticorum apudpopulum Auctoritas. Signed ' Carolus Words
worth ex JMe Christi.' [Oxford Latin Prize Essay.] Pp. 41,
8vo. Oxford, Talboys. * Reprinted in Annals, i. 363-392.
1835 ? (no date). [Notes on the Life of Horace] headed: ' Upon the
Basis of the following Notes and Questions, chiefly formed
APPENDIX VII PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 367
from a chronological arrangement of passages to be found in
the poet's own works, compose A MEMOIR OF THE LIFE AND
TIMES OF HORACE, &c.' Apparently for school use at Win
chester. Pp. 12, 8vo. No printer's name.
1839 (January). Grcecce Grammaticce Eudimenta. In usum
Scholarum. [The Latin preface is signed 'C. W.,' Ventae
Belgarum, Mens. Jan. 1839. At the end of preface the
author refers to ' fratri meo Joanni Wordsworth, M. A. Collegii
SS. Trin. apud Cant. Socio.'] Pp. vi + 116, 12mo. Londini,
apud Joannem Murray.
1840 (12 July). A Sermon on 1 John v. 18, preached in Winchester
College Chapel. Pp. 15, 8vo.
1841 (11 November). Evangelical Repentance : A Sermon preached
in Winchester Cathedral for S.P.C.K. and S.P.G. Pp. xvi + 70,
8vo. Oxford, J. H. Parker ; London, Rivingtons.
1842 Appendix to a Sermon on Evangelical Repentance, &c. Pp.
vi + 138, 8vo. Oxford, J. H. Parker ; London, Rivingtons.
1842 Catechetical questions; including heads of lectures prepara
tory to Confirmation. With imprint ' Winchester College ' :
see 1844. [In possession of C. W. Holgate.]
1843 (?). [English translation of the Winchester School songDomum
in J. Hullah's Part-music]. Reprinted in The College of St.
Mary Winton, pp. 33, 35, and Annals, i. 394-5. (See 1848.)
1843 Communion in Prayer, or the Duty of the Congregation in
Public Worship. Three Sermons preached in the College
Chapel, Winchester. [Stamp, College Arms, designed by
H. G. Liddell.] Pp. [vi] + 88, sm. 8vo. London, James Burns,
17 Portman Street ; Oxford, J. H. Parker.
[1843 ?] Syntaxis et Prosodia. At the end of the third edition of
the Greek Grammar (pp.xii + 187, London, John Murray, 1841)
is this note : * Lectori. Syntaxim et Prosodiam, quae mox
prelo subjicientur, separatim licebit emere.' A copy of the
fourth edition of the Greek Grammar has not been obtainable
for the purpose of this bibliography, and, therefore, pre
sumably the fifth edition, 1844 (the first printed at Oxford) was
the first which contained the Syntax. Presumably, however, it
was at first printed as a separate work (though no copy of it
is now forthcoming), for, in the publisher's prefatory note to an
edition of the Eton Greek Grammar, published in 1845, it is
stated that * the Syntax used at Winchester has been adopted
at Eton, and will continue to be used instead of the second
part of the old Eton Greek Grammar.' See Bishop Charles
Wordsworth's Annals, vol. i. pp. 177-196. [Note by C. W. H.]
1844 Grcecce Grammaticce Rudimenta. In usum Scholarum. [First
edition published by the Oxford University Press. The Syn-
368 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
taxis here occupies pp. 163-218, but is not mentioned in the
Index. There is no new preface, but the prefaces to the first
three editions are included.] Editio quinta, Oxonii : e typo-
grapheo academico, mdcccxliv., pp. xii + 258, 8vo. [C. W. H.]
1844 Catechetical questions. [See 1842.] Pp. 88, 12mo. Second
edition. London, F. and J. Rivington.
1845 (Whitsunday). A Lecture to the Communicants of Winchester
College, preparatory to the Holy Communion. Pp. 27, 8vo.
1845 Family Prayers designed especially for the use of a Household
observing in one or more of its members Daily attendance
upon the Services of the Church. Pp. ii + 76, 12mo. London,
F. an& J. Rivington.
1845 (December). [Bp. Ken's Morning, Evening, and Midnight hymns
in English and Latin.] Tres Hymni ad usum scholariwm
Wiccamicorum olim Anglice compositi nunc Latine redditi.
Wintoniae : veneunt apud D. Nutt, Collegii Bibliopolam.
College arms on cover. Dedication to Wykehamists signed
C. W. Pp. 29 + 3, 8vo.
1845 [Keble's Morning and Evening Hymns in English and Latin.]
Dies oriens et occidens Christianas sive duo carmina libro,
qui " Annus Christianus " inscribitur, praemissa, Latine
reddita. Wintoniae : veneunt apud D. Nutt, Collegii biblio-
polam. College arms on cover. Dedication to J. Keble
* Auctori interpres ' &c. Pp. 24, 8vo.
1845 Rejoicing a Privilege of Watchful Christians. No. 8 in Alex.
Watson's Sermons for Sundays, Festivals and Fasts. 1st
series. 8vo. London, Masters &c.
1846 The Blessings of Purity. No. 19 in 2nd series of ditto, vol. i.
1846 (Quinquagesima Sunday). The better gifts and the more excellent
way. A Farewell Sermon in Winchester College Chapel.
Pp. 20, 8vo. London, Rivington ; Winchester, D. Nutt.
1846 (27 March). Christian Boyhood at a Public School : a collection
of Sermons and Lectures delivered at Winchester College. Two
vols. 8vo. Dedicated to Dr. Moberly. Vol. I. Duties and Ordi
nances. (Pp. xiv + 504.) Vol. II. (Pp. x + 459.) Graces and
Examples. London, F. and J. Rivington ; Winchester, D. Nutt.
1846 (13 August). The true charter of education for all classes in a
Christian land. A Sermon preached at Whitwick in behalf
of the parochial schools, and a Supplement [on Diocesan
organisation for Education]. Pp. 67, 8vo. London (n. p.)
1846 Address at Stone Laying of Trinity College, Glenalmond. 4to.
[B. M. 1220 f. 24.]
1847 (29 August). Two Sermons by the Lord Bishop of Oxford and
the Warden of Trinity College, Glenalmond, at the consecration
APPENDIX VII. PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 369
of St. Andrew's Chapel, Fasque. Pp. viii + 41, 8vo. Montrose,
Smith & Co., &c.
1848 The College of St. Mary, Winton, near Winchester. [No author's
name on title. Four elegiacs beginning 'Terra tulit flores,'
signed C. W. on p. [iii.]] Pp. [vi] + 136, sm. 4to. Oxford and
London, J. H. Parker ; Winchester, D. Nutt. (Printed by J.
Shrimpton, Oxford.)
1849 (27 March). An Address read at the meeting of the Special
Synod of the United Diocese of St. Andrews, Dunkeld, and Dun
blane. [Wm. Palmer's appeal ; passive communion ; confession
and absolution.] Pp. 19, 8vo. Printed by order of the Synod.
1849 (5 May). A Letter to Bev. W. Skinner, D.D., Bishop of Aberdeen
and Primus, respecting the further prosecution of the ques
tion of passive Communion. Pp. 28, 8vo. For private circu
lation only.
1849 Catechesis ; or, Christian Instruction preparatory to Con
firmation and first Communion. Pp. iv + 212, 8vo. First
edition. London, F. and J. Rivington. See 1842 and 1844.
1850 (26 July). A Letter to the Right Rev. Patrick Torry, Bishop
of the United Diocese of St. Andrews, &c. [On the Prayer-
book authorised by him.] Pp. 16, 8vo. Edinburgh, Grant ;
London and Oxford, J. H. Parker.
1850 (July and August). Seven Letters to the ' Guardian ' on the
Report of the Proceedings of the Synod of St. Andrews, &c.,
published in that paper, with appendix and postscript. [Also
on Bishop Torry's Prayer-book.] Pp. 72, 8vo. Edinburgh, R.
Grant and Son ; London and Oxford, J. H. Parker.
1850 (September). A Sermon on occasion of the Offertory directed
to be made in Scotland on behalf of Trinity College, Glen-
almond. Pp. 42, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son,
R. Lendrurn and Co. ; London, F. and J. Rivington ; Oxford,
J. H. Parker.
1850 Catechesis (see 1849). Second edition. Pp. [iv] + 228, 12mo.
London, F. and J. Rivington.
1851 (February). National Repentance. Scottish Eccl. Journal.
1851 (March). Religious Toleration. S. E. J.
1851 (May). Separation of Church and State. S. E. J.
1851 (June 19). Protestant Religion and the Catholic Faith. S. E. J.
1851 (July). On the present distress in the Church of England. S. E.J.
1851 (17 April, 21 August). Diocesan Episcopacy proved from the
Neiu Testament. (In two parts.) S. E. J.
1851 (10 September). National Christianity, an article of the Chris
tian Faith. A sermon preached in the Parish Church, Kidder
minster, for jubilee of S.P.G., on St. Matthew xxviii. 18-20.
B B
370 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
with Appendix on Appointments to the Episcopate in the
Colonies and Mother Country from S. E. J. June, 1851.
Pp. 35, 8vo. London, F. and J. Rivington.
1851 (18 September). The Archbishop of Dublin's Charge and the
Bangorian controversy. 8. E. J.
1851 (16 October, and November). Presbyterian ordination (contain
ing a catena of Anglican authorities on the invalidity of
Presbyterian orders). S. E. J.
1851 (18 December). The Duke of Argyll and the Oxford Protest ;
or how to reconcile the authority of the Church and the right
of private judgment. S. E. J.
1852 (January). Presbyterian Testimonies in favour of Episcopacy.
I. Luther and the German Protestants (1517-1546).
1852 (February). A letter to the Bight Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P.
on the Doctrine of Religious Liberty. First edition : pp. 63,
8vo. Oxford and London, J. H. Parker ; Edinburgh, Grant
and Son. Second edition : pp. 48, 12mo. London, Rivingtons ;
Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son.
1852 (March). The Change of Ministry. S. E. J.
1852 (April and May). The Council of Sardica and the Appellate
Jurisdiction of the See of Home. Also a letter Laymen in
Synods : ' Cautus ' and the Council of Sardica. S. E. J.
1852 (16 June). Lay Membership in Church Synods. An address
at the Synod of the United Diocese of St. Andrews, Dunkeld
and Dunblane. [Supporting Bishop Torry's opinion against
it. See 1870, 2 June.] Pp. 37, 8vo. London, F. and J.
Rivington ; R. Grant and Son, Edinburgh.
1852 (July). The Parliamentary Oath and the Coronation Service.
S. E. J.
1852 (August and September). Policy of English Churchmen at
the present Crisis. S. E. J.
1853 (6 April). Report of the Proceedings of the special Synod of the
United Dioceses of St. Andrews &c., with Sermon preached by
the Right Rev. the Bishop. [First Synod as Bishop, chiefly
on St. Ninian's.] Pp. ii + 72, 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant
and Son ; R. Lendrum and Co.
1853 (6 July). Code of Statutes for St. Ninian's, Perth, with the
Bishop's Address at the Diocesan Synod. Pp. 12, 8vo. Perth,
printed by C. G. Sidey.
1853 (9 July). The Constitution or Code of Statutes for St. Ninian's,
Perth. [Separately printed, in red and black.]
1853 (21 September). St. Matthew an example for the Church in
Scotland. A Sermon in the Cathedral of St. Ninian on St.
APPENDIX VII PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 371
Matthew's Day. (Enthronisation.) Pp. 18, sm. 8vo. Burnt-
island, printed at the Pitsligo Press.
1854 (21 September). A Primary Charge to the Clergy and Laity of
the Diocese of St. Andrews &c., delivered in St. Ninian's
Cathedral, Perth, on St. Matthew's Day. [On Presbyterian
Baptism.] Pp. 30, 8vo. Perth, E. G. Sydey [sic/]; Edin
burgh, R. Grant and Son, R. Lendrum and Co. ; London and
Oxford, J. H. Parker.
1854 St. Andrew's Tracts. No. 1. Ad Ministros. Bingham on the
Unity and Discipline observed in the ancient Church, with
Appendix. Pp. 51, 8vo. Burntisland, Pitsligo Press ; Edin
burgh, Grant and Son, R. Lendrum and Co.
1854 [Twenty -four] Sermons preached at Trinity College, Glenalmond.
[No author's name on title. Preface signed ' C. W., S. Andr.
Ep.' Nos. 1, 2, 6, 11, 13, 23, 24, are by him.] Pp. vi + 335,
12mo. Edinburgh, Grant and Son, R. Lendrum and Co. ;
Aberdeen, A. Wilson; London and Oxford, J. H. Parker;
Cambridge, Macmillan.
1855 (January). Three short Sermons on The Holy Communion, as
a Sacrifice, Sacrament, and Eucharist, with notice of the differ
ences between the Scotch and English offices. Pp. vii + 80.
London and Oxford, J. H. Parker ; Edinburgh, Grant and Son,
Lendrum and Co.
1855 (April). What is National Humiliation without National
Repentance ? together with two letters, one to the secretaries
of the Protestant Conference, and one to Presbyterian Ministers
of all denominations within the Diocese of St. Andrews. Pp.
54, 12mo. Glasgow, Maurice Ogle and Son ; London and
Oxford, J. H. Parker ; Perth, Sidey.
1855 (28, 29 August). A Eeport of the Proceedings of the Synod and
Visitation, including the Bishop's Visitation Sermon on
2 Tim. iv. 5, The Twofold Ministry of Clergy and Laity.
[Baptism by immersion.] With Appendix of Diocesan Statistics.
Pp. 36, 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, J. H.
and J. Parker.
1855 (September). Eeport of Diocesan Synod. S. E. J.
1855 (September). The Bishop of St. Andrews' Visitation Sermon
S. E. J.
1856 (16 September). Papal Aggression in the East, or the Protestant
ism of the Oriental Churches. Republished from the Scottish
Ecclesiastical Journal. Pp. 23, 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant
and Son ; London and Oxford, J. H. Parker.
1856 The heart purified by Faith. A Sermon preached in St. John
Baptist Church, Perth, dedicated to the memory of Capt. the
BB 2
372 EPISCOPATE OF CHAELES WORDSWORTH
Hon. R. Drummond. Pp. 15, 8vo. Perth, Printed by
C. Paton.
1857 (Trinity Sunday) Mending of the Nets. Oxford Ramsden Sermon
for 1857, upon Church Extension in the Colonies and Depen
dencies of the British Empire. Pp. 32, 8vo. London, Bell
and Daldy.
1857 (29 December). Statement in regard to the action of the Epi
scopal Synod of 11 December signed by Bishops Eden and
Wordsworth.
1857 Catechesis dc. [see 1849]. Post 8vo., third edition. London.
Rivington.
1858 (16 February). Pastoral Letter addressed, to the Laity of the
United Diocese. [On the Eucharist.] Reprinted as Appendix I.
to Charge of 13 September, 1859.
1858 (7 March). The Christian Embassy. A sermon at Westminster
Abbey. Pp. 13, 12mo. London, Bell and Daldy.
1858 (27 May). [The Six Bishops' Synodal Letter on the Charge of
Bishop Forbes of Brechin.] Fly sheet, folio. See Appendix II.
1858 (14 September). Charge to the Clergy at the Diocesan Synod,
1858, with Appendix. [Eucharistic controversy. Synodal
Letter of Six Bishops, 27 May, 1858.] Pp. 28, 8vo. Edin
burgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, J. H. and J. Parker.
1858 (14 September). Report of Proceedings at the Synod of the
Diocese of St. Andrews, &c. [Scottish Office, &c.] Pp. 35,
8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son; London, J. H. and
J. Parker.
1858 (September). Notes to assist towards forming a right judge
ment on the Eucharistic Controversy, with copy of Synodal
Letter from the Six Bishops to all faithful members of the
Church in Scotland (27 May). Pp. 66, 4to. Privately printed.
1858 (4 November). Opinion of the Bishop of St. Andrews on the
Appeal of Rev. P. Cheyne, delivered at the Episcopal Synod
at Edinburgh, with Letter to the Clergy of the Diocese on the
same subject. Pp. 36, 8vo. William Blackwood and Sons,
Edinburgh and London.
1858 (Advent). Supplement to Notes on the Eucharistic Contro
versy. Pp. 14, 4to. Privately printed.
1859 (5 February). Letter to the Clergy of the Diocese of St.
Andrews dc. [On an article reprinted from the Christian
Remembrancer sent round to the Clergy, and similar letters
touching the Eucharistic Controversy.] Pp. 8, 8vo.
1859 (20 March). A Plain Tract on the Scotch Communion Office,
its History, Principles and Advantages. Pp. 23, 8vo. Edin
burgh, R. Grant and Son.
APPENDIX VII. PRINCIPAL PKIXTED WRITINGS 373
1859 (13 September). Charge to the Clergy of the Diocese of St.
Andrews &c. at the Annual Synod. [St. Ninian's Declara
tion. Position of the Celebrant at Holy Communion.]
With Appendix I. Pastoral Letter to tlie Laity, 16 February,
1858 ; II. Pastoral Letter issued by Episcopal Synod, 27 May,
1858; III. Perth Collegiate School. Pp. 39, 8vo. Edin
burgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, Rivington.
1859 Proposals for Peace, or a few remarks on the Eucharistic
Doctrine of Bishops Taylor, Ken and Wilson with reference to
the recent Pastoral of the Bishop of Brechin, with a postscript
on the case of Mr. Cheyne. [Anon.] Pp. 48, 8vo. Edinburgh,
Thomas Constable and Co.; Hamilton, Adams and Co.,
London.
1860 (25 August). The Bishop's Charge at the ordinary Synod held
at Dunkeld. [Short address, Diocesan troubles.] S. E.
Journal, p. 153.
1861 (29 August). Charge at Ordinary Synod held at Dunblane.
[On 1661 and 1761.] S. E. Journal, p. 124.
1861 Opinion of tlie Bishop of St. Andrews, delivered in tlie Epi
scopal Synod at Edinburgh. [On Bishop Forbes' case.]
15 March, 1860. Pp. 64 + viii (Supplementary Note, Pre
sentment and Sentence], 8vo. Printed for private circulation,
Greenock, A. Mackenzie and Co.
1861 A Common Catechism, or fundamental Christian Instruction,
wherein are combined the Catechism of the Book of Common
Prayer, and the Shorter (Westminster) Catechism, with a
Preface. Pp. x + 21, 8vo. Edinburgh. Printed by Thomas
Constable. Not published.
1861 (30 November, 4 and 7 December). Scepticism and the Church
of England. [A review of Lord Lindsay's two letters with
that title on Essays and Reviews, Murray, 1861.] Edinburgh
Evening Courant.
1861 (December). A United Church of Scotland, England, and
Ireland advocated. A Discourse on the Scottish Reforma
tion, to which are added Proofs and Illustrations, designed to
form a manual of Reformation facts and principles. First ed.
Pp. viii + 154, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, Edmonston and Douglas.
1862 (22 August). Reunion of the Church in Great Britain. Bicen
tenary Address at Kidderminster. Pp. 47, 12mo. Edin
burgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, Rivingtons.
1862 (16 September). Charge delivered to the Clergy of the Diocese
of St. Andrews at the Synod held in St. John's Church,
Perth. [On General Synod and Scottish Office.] Pp. 27, 8vo.
Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son; London, Rivingtons. [Also
374 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
in S.E.J. Latter part reprinted in Contribution to Sedbwry
Commemoration^
1863 A United Church for the United Kingdom advocated. A
Discourse on the Scottish Reformation, to which are added
Proofs and Illustrations. Second ed. (See 1861.) Pp. 106,
12mo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, Rivingtons.
1863 (19 February). Letter to Bev. J. Torry, Dean ofSt Andrews, &c.
[concerning the Bishop's proposed resignation] . Pp. 16, 8vo.
Printed at the Perthshire Journal office.
1863 (June). Our Lord's Testimony to the Truth and Authority of
the Old Testament. A Sermon preached in St. Paul's Church,
Balsall Heath, Birmingham [on Luke xvi. 31]. Pp. 16, 8vo.
Birmingham, Henry Wright ; London, Rivingtons.
1863 (3 September). Uniformity in Church Government. Synodal
Charge at St. John's, Perth. Pp. 27, 12mo. London, Rivingtons ;
Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son.
1863 Inscription for a Summer House in a garden attached to the
Cathedral Close at Salisbury, beginning ' Hie est videndum
quicquid est pulcherrimi.' St. Andrews Magazine, p. 407.
1864 (April). On Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible.
Pp. xii + 309, crown 8vo., 1st ed. Smith, Elder and Co., 65
Cornhill.
1864 (24 April). Man's Excellency a Cause of Praise and Thankful
ness to God. A Sermon at Stratford-on-Avon on Ps. cxlv. 10.
Pp. 28, 12mo. London, Smith, Elder and Co. [Reprinted in
Shakespeare's Knowledge-and Use of the Bible, 3rd ed. 1880.]
1864 (October). The Principles of Episcopalians as a basis of
Christian Union. Charge at Annual Synod, St. John's, Perth.
Pp. 31, 8vo. The Scottish Guardian, pp. 412-442. See 1867.
Welsh translation published by S.P.C.K. 12mo. (1865 ?)
1864 (6 December). A National Catechism, being so much of the
Shorter Catechism as relates to the Creed, the Ten Command
ments, and the Lord's Prayer. Pp. 16, 12mo. Edinburgh,
printed by R. and R. Clark.
1864 Evidence before H.M. Commissioners for Schools. Report,
pp. 231-240.
1864 On Shakespeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible. Pp.
xiv + 366, post 8vo. London, Smith, Elder and Co. Second
edition, enlarged.
1865 (February). Address to the Members of the Church of Eng
land Institute at Berwick, delivered 22 December, 1864. Pp.
19, 8vo. The Scottish Guardian, pp. 41-60.
1865 (October). The Duty of the Church towards foreign Christians.
A paper read at the Norwich Church Congress. Pp. 10, 8vo.
APPENDIX VII PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 376
1865 (November). On the Position cmd Duty of the Episcopalian
Laity. Charge at Annual Synod, St. John's, Perth, delivered
13 September. Pp.31,8vo. The Scottish Guardian, pp. 473-494.
1866 (February). A Plea for Justice to Presbyterian Students of
Theology and to the Scottish Episcopal Church. In answer
to some remarks of Very Rev. John Tulloch, D.D. Pp. 61, 8vo.
Edinburgh, William Paterson.
1866 (March). A Pastoral Letter [addressed by the Bishops of the
Church in Scotland to the Clergy and People, appointing
Tuesday, 29 March, a Day of Prayer and Humiliation on
account of the Cattle Plague] with Form of Prayer.
Pp. 11, 8vo. C. G. Sidey, Printer, Perth.
1866 (9 March). The School Greek Grammar. A Letter to Eev.
Dr. Moberly, D.C.L. Pp. 56, 8vo. Edinburgh: Printed by
Thomas Constable.
1866 (May). The Claims of the Poorer Brethren in Assemblies for
Christian Worship. A Sermon [on St. James ii. 10] preached
in St. John Evangelist's Church, Perth, on Sunday, 29 April.
Pp. 15, 8vo. Perth : printed at the Journal Office.
1866 (11 September). The Ministry of the Church historically
considered with reference to the circumstances of the
Church vn Scotland. A Synodal Address at St. John's, Perth,
with Appendix. Pp. iv + 70, 8vo. London, Macmillan and Co.
1867 The Principles of Episcopalians a Basis of Christian Union.
Synodal Address at Perth, September 1864, with Appendix.
Pp. viii + 124, sm. 8vo. London, Rivingtons; Edinburgh,
Grant and Son. See 1864.
1867 (7 November). The Lambeth Conference, its Aims and Per
formances : with some remarks upon the Address of the
Moderator in the last General Assembly of the Church of
Scotland. A Synodal Address delivered at St. John's, Perth.
Pp. 25, 8vo. Edinburgh, Robert Grant and Son ; Aberdeen,
A. Brown and Co.
1868 (July). Charles Wordsworth : from the Scotichronicon vol. vi.
edited by J. F. S. Gordon, D.D. [Not by the Bishop, but
mostly rewritten by Miss M. Barter and Rev. W. G. Shaw
under his direction.] Pp. 27, imp. 8vo.
1868 (September). Conference of Clergy and Laity at Perth con
taining address on Past History and Present Condition of
the Diocese. Reprinted from the Perthshire Journal and
Constitutional of Thursday, 1 October.
1868 Catechesis [see 1849]. Post 8vo. Fourth edition. London,
Rivingtons.
376 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
1869 (14 January). The Scottish Church in its Relations, past and
present, to the Church of England. Euodias and Syntyche.
Pp. 46, 12mo. Perth, Robert Whittet.
1869 Sermon on Confirmation. Pp. 19, 12mo. Perth, Robert
Whittet.
1870 (2 June). Admission of the Laity of the Scotch Episcopal
Church to Additional Powers and Functions in its Synods.
Synodal Address, School Chapel, Perth, with postscript. Pp.
iv + 40,8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son ; London, Rivingtons.
1870 (26 July). Choral Associations a Means of ' Stilling ' the
Enemies of the Gospel. Sermon in Norwich Cathedral at the
Eleventh Annual Festival of the Norfolk and Suffolk Church
Choral Association. Pp. 19, 12mo. London, Rivingtons ;
Norwich, Samuel Miller.
1871 (January ?) A Greek Primer for the Use of Beginners in
that Language. [No author's name on title. The translation
was made by his son Robert. Preface signed C. W., Perth,
December 1870.] Pp. 8 + 88, 8vo. Oxford, at the Clarendon
Press (published by Macmillan and Co., London).
1871 (January). St. Andrews Episcopal School Chapel, Perth. Fly
sheet, with List of Subscribers. Pp. 4, folio.
1871 (27 July). Preservation of St. Allans' Abbey a National Duty.
Sermon at St. Albans on the Fifth Festival of St. Albans'
Church Choral Association. Pp. 22, 12mo. London and
Oxford, James Parker and Co.
1871 (20 September). A Charge delivered at the Annual Synod of
the Diocese of St. Andrews, dc., in St. Andrew's School
Chapel, Perth. [Vacant Provostship, Primary Education,
Episcopalian weakness in preaching.] Appendix : The Con
stitution or Code of Statutes for St. Niniaris, Perth. Pp. 28,
8vo. Edinburgh, Thomas and Archibald Constable.
1871 (December). The Case of St. Ninian's, Perth, opinion of
J. Guthrie Smith, Esq., Advocate &c., and Chancellor of the
Diocese, with [Note] and Appendix to Case of St. Ninian's.
Pp. 3 + 1 + 4, 4to.
1872 (25 January). The Outlines of the Christian Ministry delineated
and brought to the test of reason, Holy Scripture, history
and experience. Pp. xxiii + 296, crown 8vo. London, Long
mans, Green and Co.
1872 (26 September). Proceedings at Annual Synod, School Chapel,
Perth, with Charge on St. Ninian's Cathedral. S. G. (October).
1872 Contemplations on the Historical Passages of the Old and New
Testaments, by the Eight Rev. Joseph Hall, D.D., Bishop of
APPENDIX VII. PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 377
Exeter and afterwards of Norwich, with Introductory Memoir
and notices of his other works. [The memoir by Charles W.
consists of xl. pp.] London, S.P.C.K.
1872-3 Two addresses delivered to the Synod of the Diocese. 26
September, 1872, and 8 May, 1873. Also address to the
Chapter of St. Ninian's 6 March, 1873, with Appendix. Pp.
50, 4to. Privately printed.
1873 (30 January). [Articles of Presentment against Right Rev. C.
Wordsworth, D.C.L., Bishop of St. Andrews &c., by Canon
Humble and others.] Appendix, Eeport of the Charge
delivered by Right Rev. C. Wordsworth, Bishop of St. An
drews &c. to the Synod, September, 1872. Pp. 42, 4to.
1873 (6 March). Some Considerations respecting St. Ninian's Cathe
dral with the Bishop's Address delivered at the Meeting of
Chapter. Pp. 50, 4to., privately printed.
1873 (8 June). The Doctrine of the Trinity as affected by recent
criticism of the Text of the New Testament. A Sermon on
St. Matthew vi. 13, preached before the University of Oxford in
the Chapel of New College on Trinity Sunday, 1873, with some
remarks on the congregational use of the Athanasian Creed.
Pp. xiv + 17, 8vo. London, Longmans, Green, and Co.
1873 (Christmas). New Infants School in Perth. Fly sheet with List
of Subscribers. Pp. 3, 4to.
1874 (12 January). [Answer to Address of the Dean and 18 Presbyters
re St. Niniaris.] Pp, 4, 8vo.
1874 (29 January). Answer to Mr. Burton's Circular. Fly sheet 4to.
1874 (15 April). Letter to the Dean of the Diocese, announcing his
intention of resigning the Bishopric. Fly-leaf.
1874 (26 May). Letter to the Dean, postponing his resignation.
1874 (6 July). Some Remarks on the Proposal to legalise the
Eastward Position in the Celebration of Holy Communion.
Letter to Mr. Beresford Hope- (Second impression with addi
tions.) Fly sheet, 4to.
1874 (25 September). Preface to Burghclere Sunday-School Exer
cises under the teaching of Rev. W. B. Barter. [On the
character t and work of Mr. Barter.] Pp. iii-vi, crown 8vo.
Oxford and London, James Parker and Co. [ed. 2, 1875.]
1874 (7 October). Synodal Address, School Chapel, Perth. [Statistical
returns, Gladstone's Essay on Ritualism.] Report only.
1874 (1 November). The Gospel a Defence against Evil Tidings. A
Sermon preached at Forfar on the occasion of the death of the
Rev. W. G. Shaw, Incumbent of St. John's Episcopal Church,
Forfar. Pp. 8, 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Sons ; Forfar,
W. Shepherd.
378
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
1875 (1 January). Spiritual Edification in Eeference to the Public
Worship of God. Sermon in St. Ninian's Cathedral. Pp. 7,
12mo. Perth Constitutional Office.
1875 (March). The Convocation of York, on the Eastward Position.
Letter to the Editor of the Times. Fly-leaf.
1875 (6 October). Charge at Diocesan Synod. [Edinb. Ch. Congress.]
Scottish Guardian, 8 October ; Perthshire Constitutional,^ Oct.
1876 (8 August). Charge at Diocesan Synod. [Preparation for
General Synod. Trinity College, Glenalmond.] Perthshire
Constitutional and Journal, 9 August.
1876 (19 September). Three Conclusive Proofs that the use of the
Eastward Position in the Celebration of the Holy Eucharist
is contrary to the mind and intention of our Reformed
Church, with Appendix of Letters to Beresford Hope and the
Times. Pp. 40, 8vo. London, Rivingtons ; Edinburgh,
R. Grant and Son ; Dublin, Hodges, Foster and Co.
1876 (1 November). Worship of God to be maintained under all cir
cumstances : one of Three Sermons preached at the reopening
of the Choir of Salisbury Cathedral. On Daniel vi. 10. On pp.
45-66. 12mo. Salisbury, Brown and Co., &c.
1876 In re Burntisland. Pp. 38, 4to. Privately printed.
1876 Episcopal Congregation, Burntisland. Fly sheet, 4to.
1877 Graecae Grammaticae Rudimenta in usum Scholarum. Editio
octava-decima. [No author's name on title. With the Latin
prefaces of the 1st ed., 2nd ed., and 16th ed., each signed C.W.]
Pp. xii + 260, 12mo. Oxonii, e typographeo Clarendoniano.
1878 (February). Scotch Disestablishment and Papal Aggression. An
article in the Nineteenth Century Magazine, February 1878.
Pp. 22, imp. 8vo.
1878 (May). The Law of Unity in the Christian Church. An
Article in the Nineteenth Century Magazine. Pp. 20.
1878 (August). Suggested Additions to Church Catechism, with
Introductory Remarks, dated July 16, 1878, and a further note
(after the Lambeth Conference, to which they were submitted)
dated Bishopshall, St. Andrews, August 1878. [The suggestions
are generally the same as on the card used at Confirmation.]
Folio, fly sheet, 3 pp. and title. See Appendix VI.
1878 (19 September). Charge at Synod. [On Lambeth Conference
and Laity in Synods.] Scotsman and Edinburgh Courant,
20 September.
1878 (19 October). The Duty of Episcopalian Landowners to God,
their Church, and their Country. A Sermon preached at the
Consecration of St. David's Church, Weem. On Ps. Ixix. 6.
Pp. 15, 8vo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son.
APPENDIX VII PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 379
1878 (1 November). A Greek Primer [see 1871.] [Preface dated and
signed C. W.] Pp. viii + 16, 12mo. Sixth edition. Oxford,
at the Clarendon Press.
1878 (3 November). The Church in Philadelphia a type of the
Episcopal Church in Scotland. Sermon preached at Dedica
tion Festival at St. Paul's, Dundee. [On Rev. iii. 11.] Pp. 15,
8vo. Dundee, Winter, Duncan and Co.
1879 Final Suggestions on New Testament Revision: the Four
Gospels. Pp. 32, 4to. Marked Private and Confidential.'
Printed at Oxford by the Printer to the University.
1879 (17 January). Final Suggestions. Letter with the above, signed
' A member of the N. T. Company.' Pp. 3, 4to.
1879 (19 February), The Primus and the French Old Catholics.
Letter to Scottish Guardian, 21 February, p. 92.
1879 (21 July). Remarks on Dr. Lightfoot's Essay on the Christian
Ministry. Pp. iv + 78. Sm. 8vo. Oxford and London, James
Parker and Co.
1879 (17 September). Congregational Hymnody, and tlie Temperance
Question. Charge at the Diocesan Synod of St. Andrews,
Dunkeld and Dunblane, in School Chapel, Perth. Pp.20, sm.
8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1879 (October). The Domestic System of the Church in the Educa
tion of her Sons, and especially of Candidates for the Sacred
Ministry. A sermon on behalf of Trinity College, Glenalmond
(preached in 1850). Pp. 43, 8vo. Reprinted with appendix.
Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son, etc.
1879 (30 October). More than Solomon is here. A sermon preached
at the Consecration of St. Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh.
[On Matt. xii. 42.] Pp. 12, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's
Printing Co.
1879 (16 December). Lord Bute's Breviary : a review. The Edin
burgh Courant, p. 2.
1880 (1 June). The Rules laid down in Holy Scripture for its own
Interpretation. (Part I.) A Lecture delivered in the Chap
ter House of St. Paul's Cathedral to the members of the
Church Homiletical Society. Pp. 14, 8vo. The Clergyman's
Magazine, July 1880.
1880 (16 June). Speech at the Wykehamist Dinner. Guardian,
23 June. Scottish Guardian, 2 July.
1880 (August). The Rules laid down in Holy Scripture for its own
Interpretation. (Part II.) A Lecture delivered hi the Chapter
House of St. Paul's Cathedral to the members of the Church
Homiletical Society. Pp. 16, 8vo. The Clergyman's Maga
zine, August 1880.
380
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
1880 (August ?) Shakspeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible . . .
Third edition, with appendix containing additional illustra
tions and tercentenary sermon. Pp. xiv + 420. London,
Smith, Elder and Co.
1880 (22 September). Charge in School Chapel, Perth, on Dismember
ment of Trinity College, and the Duke of Argyll's speech at
Ballachulish.
1880 (October). Commentary on The Wisdom of Jesus the Son of
Sirach or Ecclesiasticus in The Old Testament according to
the A.V., with a Brief Commentary by various authors.
London : S.P.C.K. 1881. [The Editorial Secretary, however,
gives tRe date October 1880. The book covers 137 pages.]
1880 (30 November). Anni Christiani quce ad Clerum pertinent
Latine reddita, necnon Carmen Matutinum et Vespertinum:
accedunt Hymni Tres Keniani. Pp. viii + 111. Edinburgh,
Grant et fil.
1881 (5 February). The Pastoral Letter of the Scotch Bishops, May
1858. Letter in Reply to Mr. W. Forbes. Guardian,
February 9, p. 207. Scottish Guardian, February 18.
1881 (May). A Discourse on Scottish Church History from the
Reformation to the Present Time. With prefatory remarks
on St. Giles's Lectures, and Appendix, with notes, &c. Pp. 105.
8vo. London and Edinburgh', William Blackwood and Son.
1881 (30 August). How to know the Love of Christ, or The Saintly
Character exemplified in Queen Margaret, with Appendix.
Sermon at the Consecration of St. Margaret's Church, Leven.
[On Eph. iii. 17-19.] Pp. 22. sm. 8vo. Edinburgh and London,
William Blackwood and Son.
188] (22 September). Charge on the Revised New Testament. Scots
man, Glasgow Herald, Glasgow News, of 23 September.
1881 (30 November). The Syllogism of Chillingworth on the Chris
tian Ministry . A tract for Scotland. Pp. 7, 12mo. Fifeshire
Journal office.
1882 Grcecce Grammaticce Rudimenta, In usum Scholarum, Editio
undevicesima. [This was the last edition of the Greek
Grammar published in the author's lifetime, and is the current
edition still. It contains the Prefaces to the first, second, arid
sixteenth editions, but has no Special Preface.] Oxonii, e
typographeo Clarendoniano, mdccclxxxii.
1882 (19 September). Prospects of Reconciliation between Presbytery
and Episcopacy. Charge in St. Ninian's Cathedral, Perth,
[with account of the presentation of the Bishop's portrait].
Pp. 28, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1883 Speech after Consecration of the Bishop of Aberdeen, 1 May,
1883. The Aberdeen Daily Free Press, p. 6, column 4.
APPENDIX VII PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 381
1883 (July). A Chapter of Autobiography. [An Account of his
Oxford private pupils, 1830-1833 ; with notices of the first
Athletic contests between Oxford and Cambridge.] Pp. 21.
Fortnightly Review.
1883 (5 September). Sermon at St. Ninian's Choral Festival. Scot
tish Guardian, 14 September.
1883 (6 September). The Duty of Maintaining the Balance of
Revealed Truth, with Particular Eeference to the Holy
Eucharist. Synodal Charge in St. Ninian's Cathedral. Pp. 24,
sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1883 (6 September). The Bishop of Liverpool in Scotland. Part of
Charge at Diocesan Synod. Scottish Guardian, 14 Sept
ember.
1883 (November). Luther and the Original Protestants all favour
able to Episcopacy. (A contribution to the Luther Commemo
ration.) [Reprinted from S. E. J. January 1852.] Pp. 15,
sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1883 Shakspeare's Historical Plays Roman and English, with re
vised text, introductions, and notes, critical and historical.
3 vols. Vol. 1, pp. xlvi + 443 ; vol. 2, pp. xx + 458 ; vol. 3,
pp. xx + 464, 8vo. William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh
and London.
1884 (January). St. Chrysostom as an Orator : Part I. Disturbance
at Antioch, A.D. 387; Part II., The Fall of the High
Chamberlain Eutropius, A.D. 399. A Popular Lecture. Pp. 32,
8vo. The Scottish Church Review, vol. i.
1884 (February). St. Chrysostom as an Orator (cont.), Part III. The
Empress Eudoxia and Chrysostom's Banishment, A.D. 403-
404. A Popular Lecture. Pp. 24, 8vo. The Scottish Church
Review.
1884 (17 March). Letter to the Very Rev. N. Johnston, Dean of St.
Andrews. [On Preaching in Presbyterian Churches.]
1884 (May). Union or Separation. Article reprinted from The
Scottish Church Review. Pp. 23, 8vo.
1884 (July). Union or Separation. Letter by Sacerdos Tertius,
Scottish Guardian, 4 July, p. 359.
1884 (5 August). He maketh HIM families like a Flock. Ps. cvii.
41, 42. Sermon preached at the opening Service of the Mission
Church of St. Fillan, Comrie. Pp. 7, 12mo. Crieff, Herald
office.
1884 (27 August). Speech at Opening of the Bazaar for Spire and
Tower of Episcopal Church, St. Andrews. [In defence of
Bazaars for Church purposes.] Fifeshire Journal, 28 August,
p. 5.
382 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
1884 (September). A Contribution to the Seabury Commemoration :
(1) Mending of the Nets, Oxford Ramsden Sermon (1857) ;
(2) Confirmation an Ordinance Scriptural and Apostolical.
(A plain Sermon) ; (3) Eucharistical Offices, English, Scotch,
American (Part of Charge of 1862). Pp. 70, 8vo. Aberdeen,
John Avery and Co.
1884 (23 September). Charge in Cathedral on Debate in General
Assembly on Church Union, and on stringency of Presbyterian
ordination formula.
1884 (29 September). An Address written for the opening of the
Seabury Commemoration. Pp. 32, 8vo. Edinburgh and
Londdh, William Blackwood and Sons.
1884 The Ark's Progress to Mount Sion. A Sermon, on 1 Chron.
xiii. 6, preached at St. Mary's Church, Carlisle, before the
Church Congress. Pp. 10, 8vo. London and Derby, Bemrose
and Sons.
1884 (30 September). WJiat can England learn from Scotland and
Ireland in 'Religious Matters ? A Paper read at the Carlisle
Church Congress. Pp. 8, 8vo. Derby, Bemrose and Sons.
1885 (January). Archbishop Hamilton's Catechism, 1552, with
Mr. Gladstone's Preface. Pp. 21, 8vo. Scottish Church
Review.
1885 (April) . Shakespeare as a Teacher of Moral Duty and Religious
Truth. A popular Lecture. Pp. 23, 8vo. Scottish Church
Review.
1885 (May). (Continuation). Pp. 22, 8vo. Scottish Church Review.
1885 (June). (Continuation). Pp. 17, 8vo. Scottish Church Review.
1885 (July). (Conclusion). Pp. 19, 8vo. Scottish Church Review.
1885 (3 September). The Case of Non-Episcopal Ordination fairly
considered. Charge delivered in St. Ninian's Cathedral, Perth.
Pp. 19, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1885 (2 October). N. or M. once more. [Defends the Explanation,
' Nicholas or Mary.'J New York Churchman, 24 October.
1885 (3 October). St. Ninian's Cathedral, Perth : Chronological
Table. Fly sheet, 4to., marked PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL.
1886 (25 January to 31 July). Public Appeals on behalf of Christian
Unity. Twelve parts bound in 2 vols. sm. 8vo., paged con
tinuously. Pp. viii + 722. Edinburgh, Macniven and Wallace.
1886 (21 February). * Donee Perveniamus Omnes. J On the True
Perspective of Christian Duty. Address, on Eph. iv. 13,
delivered in Marischall College Hall, to the Students of the
University of Aberdeen. Pp. 20, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, Mac
niven and Wallace.
APPENDIX VII. PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 383
1886 (20 July). Ecclesiastical Union between England and Scotland.
Letter to the Times, 24 July.
1886 (30 August). Ecclesiastical Union between England and Scot
land. Letter to the Scotsman, August 14.
1886 (2 September). The Study, Use, and Value of the Book of
Common Prayer. Charge in Cathedral, Perth, with a preface in
which certain criticisms on the Charge are noticed and replied
to. Pp. 23, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1886 (30 November). The Yoke of Christ to be borne in Youth. An
Address to the Young Men's Christian Association at St. Cuth-
bert's, Edinburgh. Pp. 40, sm. 8vo. and wrapper. Edinburgh,
Macniven and Wallace.
1887 (5 March). Obstacles to Union. [Answer to Col. Harington
Stewart.] Letter to Scottish Guardian, 11 March, p. 112.
1887 (3 June). On Church Union. Letter to the Scottish News,
June 6.
1887 (21 June). Some Considerations on the Queen's Jubilee: an
address delivered at St. Andrew's Church, St. Andrews. St.
Leonard's School Gazette, extra number.
1887 (21 June). A Jubilee Tract for the People of Scotland, on the
Christian Ministry, with part of a sermon on The Evangeli
zation of the Heathen. Pp. 12, 12mo. Perth, S. Cowan and Co.
1887 (18 July). Ad Agnatam Ramsay Cantabrigiae in classico Tripode
facile prvncipem. (Verses, Latin and English.) St. Leonard's
School Gazette, November.
1887 (1 August). Letter on the Question of a Metropolitan (reprinted
from Scottish Guardian of 5 August). Pp. 12, sm. 8vo.
1887 (1 September). ' Church Union : Steps to promote it.' [Reply
to Dr. Cunningham's Lee Lecture.] Charge in Cathedral,
Perth. Pp. 24, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1887 (December) Ignatian Episcopacy a basis for Christian Union,
with Appendix on St. Clement as a Witness for the Threefold
Ministry. Pp. 14, 8vo. Perth, S. Cowan and Co. (first part
reprinted from The Scots Magazine).
1888 (21 January). Pindar and Athletics, Ancient and Modern. An
address delivered to the Students of the University of St.
Andrews. Pp. 24, National Review (April 1888).
1888 (April). Ignatianism not Presbyteria/nism, in answer to Princi
pal Cunningham. Pp. 12, 8vo. Perth, S. Cowan and Co.
(reprinted from The Scots Magazine).
1888 (July). Ecclesiastical Union between England and Scotland,
a letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, President of the
Lambeth Conference. Pp. 44, 8vo. Edinburgh, Macniven
and Wallace ; London, Macmillan.
384 EPISCOPATE OF CHAKLES WORDSWORTH
1888 (29 August). The Lambeth Conference and Church Reunion.
Charge in Cathedral, Perth, with Preface and Appendix.
Pp. 39, 8vo. Edinburgh, Macniven and Wallace.
1888 (15 November). Concession or no Concession. Letter to the
Scotsman, 16 November.
1889 (18 April). A threefold Rule of Christian Duty specially needed
for these Times. Commemoration Sermon, at St. Giles's Cath
edral, Edinburgh. Pp. 27, 8vo. Edinburgh, Macniven and
Wallace.
1889 (12 November). Revision of the Scotch Communion Office
A Charge delivered at the Diocesan Synod held at Perth.
Pp. fs + 2, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1889 (Christmas). Mark Antony's Friendship for Julius Ccesar.
Pp. 5, 8vo. From Remington's Annual.
1890 [October, 1889]. The Waverley Proverbial Birthday Boole.
Dedicated to Lady Rollo of Duncrub Park. Pp. 288, 16mo.
London. Remington and Co.
1890 (18 February). Lessons from Experience of the Past, on the
Present Controversy respecting the Scottish Communion
Office. Letter to the Scottish Guardian, 21 February,
pp. 103-105.
1890 Structural Arrangement of Communion Offices. [Present
English (1552), Present Scotch] (1764), First English (1549),
First Scotch (1637), with preliminary remarks and notes.]
4to, fly sheet.
1890 (April). Confirmation Address delivered at the Church of St.
Columba, Crieff. Published at the request of the Incumbent,
Rev. A. G. Maitland. Pp. 20, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's
Printing Co.
1890 Series Collectarum ex Liturgia Anglicand Versibus Latinis
Reddita necnon Selecti Hymni Psalmique ad Praecipuas
Ecclesice Ferias pertinentes cum Paucis Aliis similiter versi.
Pp. 127, sm. 8vo. London, John Murray.
1890 (3 June). Religious Toleration not to be confounded with In
difference to Religious Truth. Address before the opening of
the General Synod in St. Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh.
Pp. 30, 32mo. Edinburgh, R. Grant and Son.
1890 (30 October). St. Ninian's Cathedral. The General Synod of
1890. Synodal Charge delivered in the Cathedral, Perth.
Pp. 27, sm. 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co., and R.
Grant and Son.
f
1890 (12 November). St. Ninian's Cathedral, Perth : Pastoral
Letter. Fly sheet, 3 pp., 4to.
APPENDIX VII. PRINCIPAL PRINTED WRITINGS 385
1891 (January). Annals of My Early Life, 1806 to 1846. Pp.
xvi + 420, 8vo. London, Longmans, Green and Co.
1891 (1 October). An unspoken Speech intended for the Glenalmond
Jubilee. Scottish Guardian, 16 October.
1891 (7 October). Charge at Diocesan Synod especially on Modern
Teaching on the Canon of the Old Testament. [See also
1892 (25 January).] Scottish Guardian, 9 October.
1892 (14 January). The Duke of Argyll and Bishop Lightfoot.
Letter to the Scotsman, 16 January. Reprinted in Scottish
Guardian, 22 January.
1892 (22 January). The Duke of Argyll and Bishop Lightfoot
(second letter). Scotsman, 25 January. Reprinted in Scottish
Guardian, 29 January.
1892 (25 January). Primary Witness to the Truth of the Gospel ;
also a Charge on Modern Teaching on the Canon of the Old
Testament (1891). Pp. xi + 333, crown 8vo. London, Long
mans, Green and Co.
1892 (5 October). Farewell Charge [read by the Dean in the Bishop's
absence]. Scottish Guardian, 1 October.
1892 (13 October). Apologia pro Vita Sua. [A letter to the
Scotsman defending his position and action in the Reunion
movement.] Scotsman, 15 October. Scottish Guardian,
28 October.
1892 (21 November). An Attempt to Remove Misunderstanding.
[Letter written within a fortnight of his death in reply to a
speech made by a clergyman of the Diocese against his reunion
policy.] Scottish Guardian, 25 November.
1892 Shakspeare's Knowledge and Use of the Bible. Pp. xii + 420,
crown 8vo. Fourth edition, revised. Eden, Remington and
Co., London and Sydney.
1893 (March). Annals of My Life, 1847 to 1856. Edited by W. Earl
Hodgson. Pp. xxxvi + 230, 8vo. London, Longmans, Green
and Co.
1894 A Plain Tract on the ' Scottish Communion Office : ' its His
tory, Principles, and Advantages. [Reprint by Rev. W. M.
Meredith.] Pp. 20, 8vo. Edinburgh, St. Giles's Printing Co.
1888 Catalogue of an extensive collection of books, including a
portion of the library of Bishop Wordsworth and the . . .
architectural library of . . . Hew M. Wardrop . . . to be sold
by auction 16 January 1888. 8vo. Edinburgh, Printed by
Morrison and Gibb. The books were sold on 16-18 Jan. 1888,
by Mr. Dowell, at 18 George Street, Edinburgh. [Bodl. 2591.
d. 19 (1).]
C C
386 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
APPENDIX VIII
CHURCHES AND PARSONAGES BUILT OR PROVIDED
DURING HIS EPISCOPATE 1
1856. [Alyth Church built.]
1857. 19 June. First stone of Birnam Church laid.
16 September. Alyth, St. Ninian's, Church consecrated.
22 September. Callander, St. Andrew's, Church consecrated.
9 l^pvember. Kirkcaldy, St. Peter's, Church consecrated.
[Bridge of Allan Church built.]
1858. 10 June. Pitlochry Church opened.
I July. Birnam, St. Mary's, Church consecrated.
1860. 11 April. Duncrub Chapel opened.
18 August. Pitlochry, Holy Trinity, Church consecrated.
1861. 11 September. First stone of the Hall, Glenalmond College,
laid.
[Cupar-Fife, St. James's, Church enlarged.]
1863. [Kinloch-Rannoch Church built.]
1864. 29 August. Kinloch-Rannoch, All Saints', Church consecrated
[Weem, St. David's, Church built ; opened 27 June 1869.]
1866. 17 May. Crieff, St. Columba's Church (the first), consecrated.
1867. 22 December. Cupar-Fife, St. James s, new church, opened.
1868. 23 August. Perth, St. Andrew's School Chapel opened.
1869. 8 April. St. Andrews, new church, opened.
II September. Meigle, St. Margaret's. Church consecrated.
28 November. Pittenweem, St. John the Evangelist's, Church
reopened after enlargement.
1872. [Bridge of Allan, St. Saviour's, Church enlarged.]
1873. 7 September. Callander, St. Andrew's, chancel consecrated.
1874. 26 August. Cromlix, private chapel, opened.
4 October. Kinross new Church opened.
1875. [Strath-tay Iron-Church built.]
1876. 1 July. Culross, St. Serfs, Church consecrated.
[2 July. Killin Iron-Church opened.]
1 I fear that this list is not complete, notwithstanding the kind help of
Archdeacon Aglen and Rev. Canon J. W. Hunter, the Synod Clerk. Most
of the entries are from the Bishop's own almanacks. Those in [brackets]
are supplied from other sources.
St. Andrews, St. Andrew's, Church consecrated.
Doune, St. Modoc's, Church (near Dunblane)
APPENDIX VIII.-CHURCHES AND PARSONAGES 387
1876. 19 November. Kirkcaldy, St. Peter's, Church reopened.
3 December. Burntisland, new chapel, opened.
1877. 2 August. Crieff, St. Columba's Church (the second) conse
crated.
30 November.
1878. 29 August.
consecrated.
19 October. Weem Church, St. David's, consecrated.
[Taymouth (Kenmore), private chapel, opened.]
1881. 30 August. Leven, St. Margaret's of Scotland, Church conse
crated.
4 October. Kinross, St. Paul's, Church consecrated.
27 October. Forfar, St. John's, Church consecrated.
1882. 6 July. Dollar, St. James the Great's, Church consecrated.
1883. 29 June. [Birnam, St. Mary's, enlarged; N. aisle consecrated.]
1884. 5 August. Comrie, St. Fillan's, Church opened.
1887. 28 April. [Newport-on-Tay, St. Mary's, Church consecrated.]
1889. 25 May. Dunfermline, Masterton Chapel, St. Margaret's,
consecrated.
1890. 7 August. Perth, St. Ninian's Cathedral, nave, consecrated.
[Pitlochry Church enlarged a second time.]
1891. 24 September. Dunfermline, Holy Trinity, Church consecrated.
During this period eighteen parsonages were built or provided. I
give the names and dates as far as I can learn them : Alyth (about
1862), Birnam (1872), Blairgowrie (1866), Bridge of Allan (about 1858),
CaUaiider (1872), Coupar- Angus (1887), Crieff (1868), Cupar-Fife
(1856), Dollar (1888), Dunfermline (about 1885), Forfar (1856 and 1866),
Kinross, Kirkcaldy (1856), Leven (1887), Perth St. Ninian's (Provost's
House), Perth St. John's (1857), Pitlochry (1866), Strath-tay (1866).
A chaplain's house was also provided at Glamis Castle.
Memus mentioned on p. 193 is a hamlet in the parish of Tannadice,
Forfarshire. Canon Hunter infers from the old Diocesan Minute-
book that there was either a congregation at Memus served by the
priest in charge of Cortachy, or that he had his residence there.
Meetings of clergy of the District or Diocese of Dunkeld were held
there 15 November 1743, and 30 April 1745. The Rev. John Ramsay
4 of Memus ' died in 1756. Cortachy appears to have been united to
Kirriemuir about that date. I much regret to have to record the
death of my kind friend Canon Douglas on 13 March 1899. He had
been Incumbent of Kirriemuir since 1851.
cc 2
388 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
APPENDIX IX
THE BISHOP'S FAMILY
Charles Wordsworth, b. 22 August 1806 ; m. 1st (29 December
1835) , Miss Charlotte Day, daughter of Rev. George Day, Rector
of Earsham, near Bungay, Norfolk, by whom he had one daughter,
Charlotte Emmeline, b. 10 May 1839, who became a member of
the Community of the Sisters of the Church (Kilburn), and is
now a member of the Sisterhood of the Ascension residing at
Bury, Lancashire. Mrs. Wordsworth died on the day her
daughter was born.
M. 2nd (28 October 1846), Miss Katharine Mary Barter
(b. 21 October 1828), eldest daughter of Rev. William Brudenell
Barter, Rector of Highclere and Burghclere, Hants, by whom
he had five sons and seven daughters. He died 5 December
1892. She died 23 April 1897. The issue of this marriage was :
1. Charles Samuel, b. 30 March 1848, educated at Trinity
College, Glenalmond, and at Winton Lodge, Clifton, and a
scholar of Winchester College (1860-1866), at University Coll.,
Oxford (3rd 01. Mod., 4th 01. Lit. Hum.) ; B.A. 1870, M.A.
1879; ordained Deacon 1871, Priest 1872, Dio. Rochester;
Curate of Romford 1871-3, Kidderminster 1873-8 ; Rector of
Old Swinford, Worcestershire, 1878-92 ; m. Emily, daughter of
Rev. Charles Craufurd, sometime Rector of Old Swinford,
17 April 1879 ; and has issue, Charles William, b. 19 February
1880, elected to an exhibition at Trinity College, Cambridge,
1898 ; Christopher Robert, b. 18 October 1881 ; Emily Con
stance, b. 28 January 1883 ; John Craufurd, b. 14 April 1885 ;
Andrew Gordon, b. 25 July 1886; Geoffrey Herbert, b.
11 November 1888 ; Dorothy, b. 5 October 1889.
2. Eobert Walter, b. at St. Andrews 30 July 1849,
educated at Trinity College, Glenalmond (Easter 1858 to Christ
mas 1860), at Winton Lodge, Clifton (1861 to Midsummer,
1862), a Commoner of Winchester College (Midsummer 1862
to Midsummer 1868) ; became agent to Earl Manvers, 13 May
1883 ; m. Blanche Amelia, daughter of Sir Robert Turing, Bart.
14 July 1886, and has issue, Blanche Katharine, b. 17 May
1887 ; Robert James, b. 28 July 1888.
APPENDIX IX. THE BISHOP'S FAMILY 389
3. William Barter, b. at St. Andrews, 4 August 1850,
educated at Trinity College Glenalmond, and at Somersetshire
College, Bath ; chosen Branch Manager of Lloyds Bank, Lich-
field, 17 December 1877.
4. Katharine Mary, b. at Glenalmond, 19 March 1852.
5. Kenneth Andrew, b. at Glenalmond, 12 May 1853 ; d. at
Trinity College, Glenalmond, as a schoolboy, 16 May 1862.
6. Margaret Walker, b. at Glenalmond, 16 April 1854
(Easter Day) ; ra. at Rydal, M. C. Macdonald, Esq., 7 August
1889 (he d. 3 January 1890) ; she d. 1 November 1895.
7. Emily Sarah, b. 24 July 1856, at Pitcullen Bank, Perth.
The author of this memoir has received much assistance from
her in its compilation. She now resides at St. Andrews.
8. Edith Louisa, b. 17 September 1857, at Pitcullen Bank.
9. Mary Barbara, b. 24 April 1859 (Easter Day), at the Feu
House, Perth. Besides at University Hall, St. Andrews.
10. Louisa Caroline, b. 19 April 1861, in Melville Street,
Edinburgh, d. 5 April 1894.
11. John Boundell, b. 14 February 1866 (Ash Wednesday),
at the Feu House, Perth ; educated at Glenalmond and New
College, Oxford; 2nd Lieut. 2nd Batt. North Staffordshire
(98th) Regt. 8 January 1890 ; d. 14 April 1890.
12. Harriet Susan, b. 26 September 1863, at the Feu House,
Perth ; m. John Stirling, Esq., of Muiravonside, Linlithgow,
18 July 1895.
391
INDEX
ABERNETHY
ABEBNETHY, 29
Aglen, Ven. A. S., made archdeacon,
268 ; help from, Preface vii, 386
Alexander Lycurgus, Archbishop of
Syra and Tenos, 210
1 Altar,' use of the word, 13, 68, 109,
347, 351, 360, 361
Ambrose, St., 10 n., 69
Anacharsis, quoted, 309
Andrewes, Bishop, on reception by
the wicked, 71 ; on the priest's
attitude in receiving, 93 n. ;
eucharistic teaching, 117, 122 ;
on Melchizedek, 140 ; on adora
tion, 145 ; on non-episcopal
churches, 243
Andrews, St. See St. Andrews
Aquinas, St. Thomas, doctrine of
supra-local presence, 91 ; on
Eucharistic sacrifice, 137
Archbishop, title of, 24, 25, 27, 189,
251, 383
Archibald, Kev. John, Historic Epi
scopate in the Colunaban Church,'
referred to, 151, 155, 173
Ardoch, camps at, x, 28
Argyll, Duke of, at Ballachulish, 227
Arnold, Thomas, D.D., late ordina
tion as priest, 3
Atkinson, Thomas, Bishop of North
Carolina, at Inverness, 173
Attendance, at communion, of those
who do not communicate, 99, 118,
125, 127
Auchterarder, mission at, 66, 193
Augustine, St., on Eucharistic sacri
fice, 93, 116, 140 n.
BALL, T. J., Provost of Cumbrae,
characters of Provost Fortescue
and Canon Humble, 46-50
Baptism, Presbyterian, 58 f., 62 f.
BOYD
Baptism, ministry of, 60 f.
Barry, Alfred, Bishop of Sydney
and Primate of Australia, on
validity of Presbyterian orders,
255; on Lambeth Conference
Committee, 256, 257 ; letter from,
App. VII., 363-66
Barter, Miss Katharine Mary,
married to Charles Wordsworth,
4-5. See Wordsworth
Barter, Miss Mary, Preface vii. ;
helps in 'Biography in Scoti-
chronicon,' 108, 191, 375 ; index
to book on Shakespeare, 169 n. ;
letter to, on visit to Gladstone,
210 ; on last Charge, 275
Barter, Eev. Charles, of Cornworthy,
121 n.
Barter, Eev. Charles, of Sarsden,
121 n. t 191
Barter, Kev. E. S., Warden of Win
chester, 3; death and character
of, 180, 181-83
Barter, Eev. Wm. B., 5 ; letter on
the Synodal letter of 1858, 110;
death and character, 121
Baxter, E., criticism of, 316
Benediction, service of, 91
Benson, Edward White, Archbishop
of Canterbury, 205, 235, 253, 255-
56, 360 f.
Beveridge, William, Bishop of St.
Asaph, 145
Bingham, Eev. Joseph, ' Scholastical
History of Lay-Baptism,' 63 n.
Birnam, Dunkeld, 80, 81, 192, 386-7
Bishops and Presbyters possibly one
order, 232, cp. 261
Bisset, Eev. Dr., remarkable address
as Moderator, 154, 157
Boyd, Very Eev. A. K. H., D.D., 222
299
392
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
BOYLE
Boyle, G. D., Dean of Salisbury,
Preface vii ; letters to, 316-18 i
inscription on his book-case, 324 ;
on date of ' Guy Mannering,' 362
Boyle, Hon. G. F. (Earl of Glasgow),
promoter of St. Ninian's, 51 ;
accepts new statutes, 52 f., 126 ;
his gifts and influence, 127 ;
concurs in appointment of Provost
Eorison, 265 ; his failure, 265
Bramhall, John, Archbishop of
Armagh, on Eucharistic sacrifice,
118; on nyn- episcopal churches,
243 ; on Presbyterian orders, 262
and n.
Bright, William, D.D., Canon of
Christchurch, 100 n. ; quoted, 62 n.
Browne, Harold, Bishop of Win
chester, letter from, 239
Buckeridge, Bishop, ' idem sacrifi-
catum,' 69 n.
Burton, John, Provost of St.
Ninian's, 198 f., 202, 204 ; changes
accepted by, 264 ; death, 265
CAMPBELL, Kev. G., minister of
Eastwood, 223
Campbell, Professor Lewis, 222, 287,
296, 297, 303
Campbell, Eev. E., 45, 125
Carpenter, William Boyd, Bishop
of Eipon, preaches in College
Chapel, St. Andrews, 235 ; letter
and sonnet to Charles Wordsworth,
333
Canning, Lord, early pupil of Charles
Wordsworth, 2
Chambers, Eev. J. Charles, share in
Bishop Torry's Prayer Book, 10,
13, 15
Chambers, J. D., Eecorder of Salis
bury, opinion on St. Ninian's
statutes, 127
Cheyne, Eev. Patrick (Aberdeen),
' Six Sermons,' 102-6 ; presented
by Dr. Eorison, 106 ; summoned,
107 ; condemned and suspended,
115 ; first appeal, 119, 122 ;
charged with disobeying sentence,
123 ; second appeal and sentence,
123 f., 131 ; restoration, 124
Chinnery-Haldane, J. E. Alexander,
Bishop of Argyll and the Isles,
59 n.
Chrysostom, St., on Eucharistic
sacrifice, 93, 116
EDEN
' Church Service Society,' 223, 224
Clarendon, Lord, criticism of, 316
Claughton, Thomas Legh, Bishop of
Eochester and St. Albans, his
consecration, 174, 185 ; letters
from, 191, 203 ; verses addressed
to on operation for cataract, 324 ;
golden wedding, 325
Comrie, mission at, 66 ; sermon at
consecration of St. Fillan's
Church, 334, 381, 387
Confirmation, how far necessary to
Presbyterian converts, 63 and n. ;
the Bishop's administration of,
336 ; card, 337, 357 f.
Cooper, James, D.D., of Aberdeen,
now Professor at Glasgow, 223 n.,
284
I Cosin, John, Bishop of Durham, on
the eucharistic sacrifice, 137 n.
DANSON, Eev. J. Myers, D.D., 32,
123 n. ; preaches in College Chapel,
St. Andrews, 235 n. ; estimate of
Charles Wordsworth, 280 foil.;
criticism of his sermons, 335
Day, Miss Charlotte, married to
Charles Wordsworth, 2-3 ; death, 3
De Dominis, Archbishop, M.A., 90 n.
De Tassy, Professor Garcin, 147
Disraeli, Benjamin (Earl of Beacons-
field), verses to, 290 foil. ; letter
from, 294
Douglas, Canon James J., of Kirrie-
muir, vii, 7, 387
Dowden, John, Bishop of Edinburgh,
election and consecration, 246-47 ;
letter to, on lecture at St. Cuth-
bert's, 247, 248, 279; custom in
confirmation, 345 n. ; quoted,
75 n., 346 n., 348
Drummond, William Abernethy,
Bishop of Brechin, Edinburgh
and Glasgow, cited, 132
Dunblane, 28
Duncrub Castle, 158, 192, 386
Dundee, sermon on Philadelphia at
St. Paul's, 334, 379
Dunfermline, 29, 387
Dunkeld, 28, 80 : see Birnam
j EASTWARD or other position of cele
brant, 9 n., 125, 129, 205, 361
Eden, Eobert, Bishop of Moray and
Eoss, retires from candidature at
INDEX
393
ELWIN
St. Andrews, 6 ; in Eucharistic
controversy joins Charles Words
worth in a ' Statement,' 100 ;
moves adoption of ' Synodal
Letter,' 110 ; did not join in final
condemnation of Cheyne, 124 ;
joins in censure of Bishop Forbes,
134 ; chosen Primus, 150 ; cha
racter and work of, 151 ; helps
in removal of disabilities, 155 ;
founds Inverness Cathedral, 173 ;
letter about archbishopric of St.
Andrews, 189 ; congratulates
Charles Wordsworth on his
' Conference,' 193 ; bad health
and death, 246 ; friendly relations
with Charles Wordsworth, 268
Elwin, Eev. Warwick, ' The Minister
of Baptism,' 58 n., 63 n.
Episcopacy, in Scotland, early, 21-23;
in Galloway, 22 ; Glasgow, 23 n. ;
north of the Forth, 23; at St.
Andrews, 23-25 ; Dunkeld, 25 ;
Dunblane, 25 ; in the three dioceses,
26 ; weakness of Non jurors, 27
Eucharist, Charles Wordsworth's
doctrine of, in ' Three Short
Sermons,' 9 f., 66 foil., 75
Eucharistic controversy, beginnings
of (1853), 66. See Cheyne, Forbes,
' Scottish Office,' Wordsworth
(Charles), III., and the whole of
Chapter IV.
' Euchologion,' 223. See Church
Service Society
' Euodias ( a) and Syntyche,' 159,
177, 178, 376
Eutyches, heresy of, 71 n.
Ewing, Alexander, Bishop of Argyll
and the Isles, part in Eucharistic
controversy, 98, 100 ; abstains
from voting against Cheyne, 120 f. ;
absent when Cheyne was finally
condemned, 124 ; and when
Forbes was censured, 134 ; helps
the removal of disabilities, 155 ;
preaches in University Church,
Glasgow, 197 ; his death, 207 ;
affectionate relation to Charles
Wordsworth, 268
FALCONEK, Bishop William, intro
duces change into Scottish Office,
74 ; Primus, 156
Farquhar, Canon George T., ' Epi
scopal History of Perth,' 9, 42, 43,
FORTESCUB
| 44, 52, 53 ; becomes Super
numerary ' of the diocese and
Canon, 265 ; his filial relation to
the Bishop, ib. ; assists him with
his books, 253 ; verses to, 267 ;
extracts from his ' Diary,' 271,
275 ; estimate of the Bishop's
work, 282; scene in his library,
&c., 318 ; on his preaching, 336
Field, Frederick, D.D., on Eevised
New Testament, 212
Forbes, Bishop A. P., of Brechin,
dissents from condemnation of
Torry's Prayer Book, 13 ; conse
crates St. Ninian's, Perth, 42;
character of his rule, 49 ; on
Presbyterian Baptism, 68; primary
Charge, 84-94 ; reasons for alarm
at, 95 f.; relations with Charles
Wordsworth, 97 ; comments on
Cheyne's ' Six Sermons,' 103 ;
second and third editions of Charge,
107 ; criticised in Synodal Letter,
108, 109 ; judicial proceedings in
prospect, 113, 130 ; Keble's relation
to, 108, 115, 133; letter to Congre
gation of St. Paul's, Dundee, 131 ;
theological defence, 133 ; judg
ment on, 134-35 ; candidate for
office of Primus, 150 ; later inter
course with Charles Wordsworth,
171; anxiety about his theology,
197-98 ; death, 207
Forbes, Eev. George H. (of Burnt-
island), and Bp. Torry's Prayer
Book, 11, 13, 15 ; and ' Scottish
Office,' 76, 77; approves Charles
Wordsworth's ' Opinion ' on his
brother's case, 136; used the
phrase ' Eeal Absence,' 146
Forbes, Lord, proposer of St. Ninian's
Cathedral, 42 ; his gifts, 127, 265
Forbes, Professor James D., ap
pointed Principal of St. Andrews,
147
Forbes, Professor John, of Corse,
122
Forbes, Bishop Eobert, of Eoss, in
troduces change into ' Scottish
Office,' 74
Forbes, Bishop William, of Edin
burgh, 95, 145
Forfar, 29, 33, 208, 265
Fortescue, E. B. K. (Provost of St.
Ninian's), did not vote at elec
tion to Bishopric, 7 ; election as
394
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
FRASER
Provost, 45 ; character and person
ality, 46 f. ; resignation, 48
Fraser, Dr. Campbell, letter from, 249
GALT, Annals of the Parish,' 35
Geste, Bishop of Salisbury, 88
Gladstone, William Ewart, early
pupil of Charles Wordsworth, 2 ;
brings Charles Wordsworth to
Glenalmond, 4 ; at consecration
of its Chapel, 5 ; difference of
Charles Wordsworth with, 16;
Mr. McColPs letter to, 123 n. ; Irish
Church Bill, 1.90, 191 ; Charles
Wordsworth visits, 210 ; at jubilee
of Trinity College, Glenalmond,
271 ; Charles Wordsworth quotes
him on Wolfian theory about
Homer, 272 ; as an athlete, letter
on, 312; letter of, on Charles
Wordsworth's Latin verse, 323
Glamis Castle, 29
Glenalmond and ' Ian Maclaren,'
35
Glenalmond, Trinity College,
founded, 4 ; Wardenship of, 5 ;
resigned in 1854, 6, 9, 16, 17 ; dis
severed from Diocese of St. An
drews, 81 ; removal of Divinity
students, 208-9 ; Jubilee of, 271
Golf, 303, 103
Goode, William, Dean of Kipon, on
the Eucharist, 88 n.
Gott, John, Bishop of Truro, pupil
of Charles Wordsworth at Win
chester, 4
Gray, Robert, Bishop of Capetown,
at first Lambeth Conference, 176 f . ;
on Dutch Eeformed Clergy, 243
Grub, Dr. George, the historian,
advocate of Cheyne, 119 n. ;
quoted, 22 n., 24 n., 25 n., 27 n.,
29 n.
HAMILTON, John, Archbishop of St.
Andrews, murdered, 25 n. ; his
Catechism, 240
Hamilton, Walter Kerr, Bishop of
Salisbury, early pupil of Charles
Wordsworth, 2 ; death, 197 ; his
character and generosity, 183-85,
339 ; Sermon on, 211, 279
Haskoll, Kev. Joseph, Sacristan of
St. Ninian's, 45
Hodgson, W. Earl, vi, vii, 3JO-12,
385
KEN
Hodson, Eev. S. B., 264-5
Holgate, Clifford Wyndham, help
in bibliography of early writings,
367-8
Hook, W. F., Dean of Chichester, his
experience at Leeds, 17 ; letter
from, 178
Hooker, Richard, on Presbyterian
Baptism, 58 ; on Eucharistic pre
sence, 89 n. ; on non-episcopal
churches, 243, 255
Horsley, Samuel, Bishop of St.
Davids and Rochester, a friend of
the Scottish Church, 31, 175
Humble, Henry, Canon and Precen
tor of St. Ninian's, account of, 48
f . ; pamphlet attacking the Bishop,
130 ; presents Bishop to Episcopal
Synod, 200 ; further conflict, 205 ;
death, 206
Hunter, Canon J. W., of Birnam,
help given by, Preface vii. and 84,
386-7
INNES, George, Bishop of Brechin,
cited, 132
Inverness Cathedral, Bishop Eden's
work, 151 ; foundation of, 173 ;
constitution of Chapter, 126 n.
JEBB, Rev. John, Canon of Hereford,
53
Jermyn, Hugh Willoughby, Bishop
of Colombo, appointed Bishop of
Brechin (1875), 207 ; made Primus
(1886), 246
j Johnston, Very Rev. N., made Dean,
234; death of, 268; verses to,
304
Jolly, Alexander, Bishop of Moray,
69, 132, 150 ; anecdote of, 178, 281
KEBLE, Rev. John, on Eucharistic
Adoration,' 86 ; ' Christian Year,'
presence ' not in the hands,' &c., 89 ;
on assisting at Holy Communion,
99 and n. ; intervenes in the Eu
charistic controversy, 101, 108;
'Considerations,' 114 f. ; writes on
Mr. Barter's death, 122; helps
Forbes' Defence, 133; interview
with Charles Wordsworth, 133;
later intercourse with, 172 ; cp. 313
Kellach, Bishop, in 906, 23
Ken, Bishop Thomas, cautious
Eucharistic doctrine, 89 n., 132 ;
INDEX
395
KILRYMONT
cited by A. P. Forbes, 131 ; three
hymns translated by Charles
Wordsworth, 314. See App. VII.
(1845), 368
Kilrymont, 252
Kinross, 30
Kirriemuir, 387
LATERAN Canon on Transubstantia-
tion, 68
Laud, William, Archbishop of
Canterbury, his epitaph, 287
Lee, Kev. Robert, D.D., 153, 154, 155,
163
Lees, Eev. Dr. Cameron, letter from,
249
Leighton, Robert, Bishop of Dun
blane and Archbishop of Glasgow,
26, 29, 156, 160, 203
Lendrum, Rev. Alexander, part in
Bishop Torry's Prayer Book, 10,
11, 13, 15 ; resigns Muthill, 64 ;
his opposition to Bishop, 129, 130 ;
retirement, 131
Lewis, Sir G. C., 147
Liddon, Canon H. P., 245-6
Lock, Walter, Warden of Keble
College, < John Keble,' 114 n.
Longley, Archbishop, at Inverness,
173 ; calls Lambeth Conference,
176, 177, 187
Lothian, Marquess of, 238
Lyttelton, Edward, on athletics, 308 f .
Lyon, Rev. C. J., Incumbent of St.
Andrews, his pressure upon Words
worth to vote, 6 n. ; his ' History
of St. Andrews ' quoted, 24 n.
MACGBEGOB, Rev. Dr. (St. Cuthbert's,
Edinburgh), invitation from, 245,
247, 248 ; verses to, 304
Mackey, Rev. Donald J., Memoir of
Bishop Forbes, 85 n., 100 n., 155
n. ; becomes Canon of St. Ninian's,
264 ; resigns, 265
Macleod, Rev. Norman, D.D., 154
Manning, Henry Edward (Cardinal),
early pupil of Charles Wordsworth,
2 ; renewal of intercourse with,
312 f.
Medwyn, Lord (father of Bishop A.
P. Forbes), 89
Melville, Rev. Henry, on Christ
pleading His Sacrifice, 138 n.
Meigle, 73, 192, 386
Meredith, Rev. W. M., vii, 65
PALMER
Metropolitan, on question of a, 251 :
see Archbishop
Milligan, Rev. Dr., of Aberdeen, x,
216 n., 225-7, 277
Moberly, George, Bishop of Salis
bury, 3, 211, 232, 287 ; translation of
Pindar, 309 ; golden wedding, 324
Moir, David, Bishop of Brechin, his
Eucharistic teaching, 132
I Munns, H. T., portrait of Charles
Wordsworth (1882), the fronti
spiece to this volume, xxvi, 233
Muthill, Charles Wordsworth at,
64 f., 73 ; an old centre, 33
NEAI.E, John Mason, D.D., offered
Provostship of St. Ninian's, 45 ;
life of Bishop Torry quoted, 11 n.,
14 n. 41 n. y 51 n.
Nestorianism, charge of, against the
' Six Bishops' Pastoral,' 115, 145
Nicholas, Bishop of Dunkeld, con
secrates cloister and cemetery of
New College, 309 f.
j Newman, John Henry, Cardinal,
renewal of intercourse with, 312,
314; judgment on, 314 f., 318;
Charles Wordsworth's translation
of ' Lead, kindly Light,' 332
Non-communicating or non-recipi
ent attendance, 99, 118, 125, 127
! Nonjurors, Charles Wordsworth on,
229
| Novatians, their baptism admitted,
their orders questioned, 62 n., 253,
256
OSMINGTON, Dorset, 288, 342
Oxenham, Rev. F. N., reprint of
Waterland's 'Letters on Lay-
Baptism,' 59 n.
Oxford movement, Charles Words
worth s relation to, 3
PALMEB, Ven. Edwin, Archdeacon of
Oxford, on Revision, 215
Palmer, Roundell, Earl of Selborne,
opinion on right of Episcopal
Synod to issue a Pastoral, 113;
correspondence on Establishment,
194-95 ; 'Rector ' of St. Andrews,
304 ; character of Charles Words
worth, 338; letter to, on his
Family Memorials, 339 f . ; helped
Charles Wordsworth's election to
Winchester Fellowship, 342
396
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
PALMER
Palmer. Rev. Wm., 11, 82 ; charac
ter of, 339
Pannonius. Janus, a Hungarian
Bishop, 288
Pirie, Rev. Dr., Principal of Aber
deen, 157
Perth, in Diocese of St. Andrews,
41 n. ; fine situation of, 23, 28,
40-41 ; Canon Farquhar's ' Epi
scopal History of ' quoted, 19, 42,
43, 44, 52, 53, 276 ; churches at,
56; St. Andrew's School Chapel
founded (1866J, 170, 375, 376, 377
Presbvterianism; strong points of,
33 foil., 161, 222, 231, 242
Primate, title of. 251 and 252 n.
Primus, Bishop Terrot's resignation
and election of Bishop Eden to
office of, 150 ; election of Bishop
(Jermyn) of Brechin, 246; pro
posed change of name to Primate,
251 f.
Pusey, Rev. Edward Bouverie, D.D.,
17, 86, 87 n., 105 n., 108, 109 ;
helps Forbes, 133, 134; Charles
Wordsworth's breach with, 135 ;
character of, 340
RAMSAY, Miss Agnata (Mrs. M.
Butler), 301 f.
Rattray. Thomas, Bishop of Dun-
keldi 26, 281
Ridding, George, Bishop of South
well, testimony to Charles Words
worth, 4
Roberts. Rev. Dr.. of St. Andrews, on
disunion, 248 ; on Revised Version,
212
Rollo, Lord, Preface vii.. 66 ; readi
ness to help Reunion Conference,
158 ; promotes memorial to the
Bishop, 266
Rollo, Lady, Waverley birthday
book dedicated to, 384
Rorison, Rev. Gilbert, D.D., of Peter-
head, presents Mr. Cheyne, 106 ;
effort at reunion, 158
Rorison, Very Rev. V. L., Provost
(Dean) of St. Xinian's, 265, 267
Ross, A. J., Memoir of Bishop Ewing,
85, 120, 124, 155
' SACERDOTALISM,' note on, 219
Sage, John, Bishop, ' Principles of
the Cyprianic Age.' 112 n.
St. Andrews, City and University of ,
SCOTTISH OFFICE
28, 207, 221 foil., 273, 381, 297-
304 ; degree, 233 ; preaching at,
234 foil. ; burial at, 278 foil. ; use
of hood, 337
St. Andrews, Diocese of, see Chap,
n. 23-39: title dropped and
resumed, 27, cp. 32 n.; interest
of, 28 foil. ; character of the
people, 31, 34 foil. See Words
worth (Charles), 13. B.
St. John's Town = Perth, 56
St. Xinian's Cathedral, early history
of, 42 ; constitution, 43-45 ;
chapter of, 45 ; new statutes of,
52 f . ; building, 55 f . ; used by
Charles Wordsworth, 81, 118;
strained relations with, 119 ; open
rupture, 124 ; reasonable fears
concerning, 125 ; interpretation of
Statutes. 126 foU. ; 'Cathedral
Declaration ' and withdrawal of
Bishop, 128 f. ; renewed trouble
under Provost Burton (1871 on
wards), 198-202; modus rivendi
(1874), 204 ; happier relations
(1878 onwards), 264 foil.; Lord
Glasgow's failure (1885), 265;
Provost Rorison's success, enlarge
ment of Cathedral, 265 foil.;
recognised by Canon, 266, 270 ;
Canon Farquhar's good work, 265,
267 ; Bishop's satisfaction with
Cathedral, 266. See also Words
worth (Charles), III.
Scone, 23,41,42
4 Scotinhronicon,' Memoir of Charles
Wordsworth in, 108, 191, 375
Scott, Major Hugh, of Gala, editor
of ' Scottish Guardian,' 159 ;
letter to, on Keble memorial, 172
Scott, Sir Walter, on Perthshire, 21,
28, 35 ; Waverley novels in
chronological order, 362 ; Waver
ley Birthday Book (1890), 384
' Scottish Church,' title adopted in
1890, 252 w.
'Scottish Church Society,' founda
tion of, 277
' Scottish Office,' used at Glenalmond
alternately with English, 9;
references to, 67; its character,
73 ; peculiar feature of, 74 ;
Charles Wordsworth on, 75-80;
in General Synod of 1862-3, 77 ;
G. Forbes' defence of, 77 ; possible
revision of, 78
INDEX
397
SELLAR
Sellar, Rev. J. A., 45, 55, 119
Selwyn, Bishop G. A., 308
Shakespeare, works on, 168-70
Shaw, Eev. W. G., of Forfar, 108 n. ;
character and death, 208, 265
Short, T. V., Bishop of St. Asaph, 71
Skating, 2, 311, 312
Skinner, John, Bishop of Aberdeen
and Primus, cited, 132, 318
Skinner, R., Incumbent of St.
Andrews, 160
Skinner, William, Bishop of Aber
deen, his character, 318
Smythe, Mr., of Methven, 193 ;
family of, 317
Sprott, Rev. Dr., 232
Stanley, Arthur Penrhyn, D.D., on
'Euodias and Syntyche,' 178;
' the Burning Bush,' 218 ; on
priestly charisma, 219 ; friendship
and co-operation with, 286, 288 ;
translated lines to Dean Ramsay,
289 f. ; and Lord Beaconsfield,
292 f . ; ' Beaumont and Fletcher,'
294 ; his ' valediction,' 295
Stewart, two brothers, gift to Charles
Wordsworth, 132 n.
Stewart, House of, memorials at
Dunfermline and Kinross, 30
Story, R. H., D.D., ' Life of Robert
Lee,' 153 n. ; joins Church Service
Society, 223 ; lecture on Church
history, 228
Suther, T. G., Bishop of Aberdeen,
candidate for Bishopric of St.
Andrews, 6 ; accepts presentation
of Mr. Cheyne, 106 ; condemns
and suspends him, 115 ; finds him
guilty of disobedience, 123 ; with
draws his suspension, 124 ;
opinion on Presbyterian orders,
259
Sutton, Charles Manners (Arch
bishop of Canterbury), sponsor to
Charles Wordsworth, 2
Synod, General (now Provincial), of
Scottish Church, its rare meetings,
149 ; constitution, 149 n. ; meet
ings of 1862-3, 151; of 1876,
establishes representative Church
Council, 194, 208-10 ; of 1890, its
enactments, 269-70
Synod, Episcopal,of Scottish Church,
powers of, in censuring, 113 ; rela
tion to General Synod, 149 ;
meetings of on Prayer Book (1850),
TORRY
13; on Forbes' Charge (1857),
97, 98, and (1858) 108-10; Cheyne's
appeals (1858), 122-24; on Forbes,
133-34 ; move for General Synod
(1859), 149 ; for election of Primus
(1862), 150-51 ; on laymen in
Synods (1869), 193 and (1873)
194 ; presentment by Mr. Humble
(1873), 200; preparation for
General Synod (1875), 208; for
election of Primus (1886), 246
Synod,' in Established Church of
Scotland, 34 ; Synod of Lothian,
R. Lee's speech at, 153
TAYLOR, Jeremy, cited by A. P.
Forbes, 131 ; by Charles Words
worth, 132 ; commendation of a
section of his Ductor Dubitan-
tium,' 71 f.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, his prize-
poem, 322
Terrot, Charles Hughes, Bishop of
Edinburgh, joins in ' declaration '
on Eucharist, 100 ; absent from
Cheyne's first trial, 119-20;
presides at second, 123 ; resigna
tion as Primus, 150 ; death, 150,
197
Tertullian, on lay baptism, 61
Theodoret on Eucharist, 116-17
Torry, Patrick, Bishop of St.
Andrews, his Prayer Book, 10-13,
and App. I., 345-9 ; his relation to
his Diocese, 14 ; determined atti
tude towards the Episcopal Col-
lege, 15 ; orders dismissal of non-
communicants, 15 ; helps to
found St. Ninian's Cathedral, 42-
45; doctrine on Eucharist, 132,
136, 137 n.
Torry, John, Dean of the Diocese,
votes for Charles Wordsworth, 7 ;
relation to Bishop Terry's Prayer
Book, 10, 13 ; letter from Charles
Wordsworth on his proposed
resignation (1863), 152 ; forwards
address about St. Ninian's, 202 ;
various circulars addressed to,
202 ; letter from Charles Words
worth on his resignation (1874),
203 ; on postponement of, 204 ;
his death, 234
Trower, Walter John, Bishop of
Glasgow : much opposed to Bishop
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
TULLOCH
A. P. Forbes, 98, 100, 109 TO.,
114 ; eager in Eucharistic con
troversy, joins in 'Declaration,'
100 ; attack on Dr. Bright, 100 TO. ;
' Pastoral,' 114 ; retirement, 124 n.
Tulloch, John, D.D., Principal of St.
Mary's, St. Andrews, 153, 154,
160 (' A Plea for Justice ') ; friend
ship with Charles Wordsworth,
222-23 ; elegy on, 300 f .
UBIQUITY, reference to, in ' Black
Eubric,' 91 ; controversy on, 141
WALFOED, J. D., Mathematical Master
at Winchester, 168
Walker, Dean W., of Monymusk,
100 n., 119 n., 150 TO.
Waterland, on Lay-Baptism, 59
Weem, 192, 378, 386-7
Will, Dr. and Mrs. Ogilvie, 238
Williams, J., Bishop of Connecticut,
letter on disloyal clergy, 199-200 ;
on the book on the ' Christian
Ministry,' 218 ; at Seabury Com
memoration, 238
Williams, Kev. Isaac, 72
Wilson, Very Kev. John Skinner,
Dean of Edinburgh, 268
Wilson, Thomas, Bishop of Sodor
and Man, cited by A. P. Forbes,
131 ; cautious language on the
Eucharistic presence, 132
Wilson, Wm. Scott, Bishop of Glas
gow, in Cheyne case, 123 ; reads
finding in Forbes' case, 134
WORDSWORTH, CHARLES, subject of
this Memoir :
The principal references are
collected under the following
heads or sections :
I. External and domestic
events. Character.
II. Episcopal work in Scot
land. A. General. B. Diocesan.
III. The EucJiaristic Con
troversy and St. Ninian's Cathe
dral.
IV. Reunion work.
V. Public work in England.
VI. Literary work (general) :
A. Tlieological. B. Secular. C.
Judgments on men and books.
VII. Verses by.
WORDSWORTH
I. External and domestic
events.
Early life (1806-35), 1-2 ;
Second Master of Winchester
1835-46), 3-4; father's death
1846), 4 ; Warden of Glenalmond
1847-54), 4-6 ; circumstances of
his election as Bishop of St.
Andrews (1852), 6-8 ; his claims
on Churchmen, 9; reasons for
opposition to, 10-17; condem
nation of Bishop Torry's Prayer
Book, 10, 14 ; strong views on
Establishment, 15 ; opposition to
W. E. Gladstone, 16 ; opposed by
Tractarian party, 17 ; his conse
cration as Bishop(25 Jan. 1853), 5 ;
his character, 18-20 ; mottos in
almanacks, 21, 40, 81, 290 ; inter
est in the Scottish people, 31
foil.; resigns Glenalmond (1854),
6 ; visits to England, 40 ; lodges at
Perth, 40 ; first Synods, 51 ; en
thronement, 55 ; primary Charge
(1854), 56 ; takes charge of Mut-
hill (1854-55), 64 f. ; ' Three Ser
mons on Holy Communion,' 67
foil. ; move to Birnam Cottage,
Dunkeld (1855), 80 ; after three
years finds a home at Pitcullen
Bank, Perth (1856), 81 ; settles for
nineteen years at the Feu House,
Perth (1858-76), 82 ; his taste in
architecture and gardening, ter
race walk at the Feu, 82 ; name
put forward for Principalship of
St. Andrews (1859), 147; death
and character of Warden Barter
(1861), 180, 181-83; death of
Kenneth Wordsworth (1862), 180
foil. ; disappointment as to office
of Primus (1862), 150 ; objects to
canon of General Synod (1863),
151 ; offers his resignation, 152 ;
success of his'Greek Grammar, 167;
Bishop Hamilton's generosity, 183
foil. ; correspondence with Boun-
dell Palmer on ' Establishment,'
194-96 ; Christopher Wordsworth
made Bishop of Lincoln (1869),
196 foil.; visit to Seaton, 197;
death of Bishop Hamilton (1
Aug. 1869), 197 ; made Fellow of
Winchester College (1871), 197,
342 ; death of Bishop Ewing (1873),
INDEX
399
WORDSWORTH
207 ; announces his resignation
(1874), 203 ; postpones and finally
drops it, 204; death of W. G.
Shaw, of Forfar (1874), 207; re
moval of Glenalmond divinity
students to Edinburgh, 209 ;
death of Bishop A. P. Forbes
(1875), 207; of Canon Humble
(1876), 206 ; removal to ' Bishop's
Hall ' or ' Bishopshall,' St. Andrews
(1876), 207, 221-22; lines for
summer-house at, 287 ; happier
residence at St. Andrews, 222 ; j
takes up reunion work again j
(1879), 224 ; death of Dean Torry |
and appointment of Johnston ,
(1879-80), 234 n.\ letter from
'A Son of Toil' (1881), 229 f . ; j
portrait painted by H. T. Munns
(1882), 233; honorary D.D. of |
St. Andrews and Edinburgh Uni- j
versities (1884), 233 foil.; de-
scription of his preaching Univer- ;
sity sermon at St. Andrews, 236 ; i
part in Seabury Commemoration
(1884), 238; death of Bishop \
Christopher Wordsworth (1885), \
240 ; relation of the brothers, 241 ; i
death of Provost Burton (1885), :
265 ; V. L. Rorison becomes Pro
vost, 265 ; Lord Glasgow's failure, I
ib. ; last change of residence to I
' Kilrymont ' on the Scores (1887), !
252 ; moving of Library, 253 ; fre
quent visits to Bydal, 256 ; deaths
of Mr. Macdonald and J. R. Words
worth (1890), 267 ; death of Dean ;
Johnston and appointment of Pro- I
vost Eorison as Dean (1890), 268 ; I
A. S. Aglen of Alyth made Arch
deacon, definition of his duties, '
268-69 ; severe illness, 270 ; speaks
at Glenalmond Jubilee (1891), 271; I
publishes 'Annals,' vol. i., its I
rapid success, 271 ; receives Epi
scopal Chair and Pastoral Staff, i
(Easter Eve, 1892), 273 ; last j
Charge delivered in absence (5 Oct.
1892), 275 ; untoward incident
after it, 276 foil. ; last illness and
death (5 Dec. 1892), 278 ; impres
sive funeral service in Cathedral
yard, St. Andrews, 279 ; epitaph, i
280 ; character of the Bishop, 18-
20 ; faith and patience, 81 ; natural \
impetuosity, 195, 203, 338 ; eager- ,
WORDSWORTH
ness and sensitiveness, 338 ; desire
for completeness, 18, 97, 135 ; order
liness, 228, 253, 318 ; affectionate-
ness, 130 ; athletic and sanguine
temper, 18, 182, 307, 308, 310, 312 ;
judgments of friends respecting
him : Lord Selborne, 195, 338 ;
Canon Farqubar, 282, 283, 318,
336; Dr. Danson, 280-82; Pro
fessor Cooper, 284; Bishop of
Glasgow (Harrison), 282.
II. Episcopal work in Scotland.
A. General. B. Diocesan.
A. General. Moves for a Gene
ral Synod (1859), 149; Committee
on Canons, 150; Synod meets
(1862), 151 ; proposed Canon on
elections leads to his withdrawal
and offer of resignation, 151 foil. ;
correspondence with Tulloch, 'A
Plea for Justice ' (1865-66), 160 ;
educational projects, 162 foil.: see
IV. ; takes part in the foun
dation of Inverness Cathedral
(1866), 173; supports resolution
to permit a consecration for Natal
in Scotland (1868), 187 ; explana
tion of his position, 188 ; question
of archiepiscopal title, 189, 251;
urges the extension of the powers of
laymen in Synods, 193 ; with par
tial success, 194 ; supports Bishop
Swing's action in preaching in
University Church, Glasgow, 197 ;
Mr. Humble's presentment of him
to Episcopal Synod dismissed
(1873), 200 ; moves for a General
Synod on subject of Cathedrals,
Trinity College, Glenalmond, and
regular meetings of General Synod
(1875), 208; remarks on the re
moval of Divinity students from
Glenalmond, 209 ; General Synod
meets and establishes Representa
tive Church Council (1876), 210 ;
sermon at Dedication Festival of
St. Paul's, Dundee (1878), 379;
difference with the Primus as to
his oversight of the French Old
Catholics (1879), 278, 379 ; sermon
at consecration of Edinburgh
Cathedral, 224, 225 ; assists in
consecration of the Bishop of
Aberdeen (1883), 380 ; ' The Bishop
of Liverpool in Scotland' (1883),
400 EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
WORDSWORTH
381; position at Seabury Com
memoration (1884) , 288-40 ; Bishop
Jermyn made Primus (1886), 246 ;
' Jubilee Tract for Scotland ' and
* On Question of a Metropolitan '
(1887), 250-51 ; on * Eevision of
Scotch Communion Office ' (1889),
78, 384 [on p. 78, 1. 4, for ' printed '
read ' separately published '] ; ser
mon at General Synod (1890),
267-68 ; cordial relations with his
colleagues, 268 ; work of General
Synod, 269-70; takes part in
Jubilee of Trinity Coll. (1891), 271
B. Diocesan. Cp. III. and IV.
Description of the Diocese. See
chap. II. Statistics of, 33, 192
foil., 275 foil., 386, Appendix VIII.
Church work at :
Alyth, 73, 192, 386
Auchterarder, 66, 193
Balgowan, 193
Birnam, 80, 192, 386
Blair Atholl, 193
Blairgowrie, 73, 387
Bridge of Allan, 192, 386
Burntisland, 378, 387
Callander, 192, 386
Comrie, 66, 334, 381, 387
Cortachy, 193, 387
Coupar-Angus, 387
Crieff, 192, 381, 384, 386
Croiscraig, 192
Cromlix, 386
Culross, 386
Cupar-Fife, 192, 386
Dollar, 192, 387
Doune, 192, 387
Dunblane, 28
Duncrub, 158, 192, 386
Dunfermline, 29, 387
Dunkeld, 28, 80 : see Birnam
Dunning, 192
Dupplin Castle, 192
Elie, 192
Forfar, 29, 33, 73, 208, 265, 387
Glamis Castle, 29, 193, 387
Glenalmond, 35
Glenalmond (Trinity College),
4,5, 6,9, 16, 17,81,208,271,
334, 368, 371,379, 386
Kinclaven, 193
Kinloch-Rannoch, 192, 386
Kinross, 387
WORDSWORTH
Kirkcaldy, 386-7
Leven, 192, 387 ; sermon at, 380
Meigle, 73, 192, 386
Memus, 193, 387
Muthill, 33, 64 foil., 73
Newport, 334, 337, 387
Perth, St. Ninian's : see III. ;
other churches, 56, 170; St.
Andrew's School Chapel, 170,
375, 376, 377, 386
Pitlochry, 192, 386
Pittenweem, 337
Strath-tay, 73, 193, 386-7
St. Andrews, 28, 207, 221 foil.,
273, 381, 297-304, 386
Tummel Bridge, 193
Weem, 192, 378, 386
III. Eucharistic controversy and
St. Ninian's.
Sec Scottish Office, Burton,
Cheyne, Forbes, Fortescue,
Humble, Lendrum. Charles
Wordsworth's position before he
became Bishop, 9 ; ' Three Short
Sermons' on Holy Communion,
10, 67-73, 75 ; beginnings of the
controversy in England (1854),
66 ; introduced by Bishop Forbes
into Scotland (1857), 84 ; his part
in the Eucharistic controversy,
96; relation to Bishop Forbes,
97 ; opinion on his Charge on its
appearance, 98 ; strong feeling
against non-communicating at
tendance, 98 f. ; ' Statement ' in
concert with Bishop Eden, 100,
cp. 99 n. ; ' Pastoral Letter ' to
Laity ' (February, 1858), 101 ; drafts
Synodal Letter, 108 ; its character,
109, 349 ; letter to Sir A. Edmon-
stone on, 111 ; ' Notes to assist on
Euch. Controversy,' 115-18 ; 'Sup
plement to Notes,' 122 ; ' Opinion '
on Mr. Cheyne's first appeal, 120 ;
affirms his suspension, 123; rup
ture with Cathedral Clergy, 124 ;
on celebration with one communi
cant, 125 ; discussion of statutes,
127 ; retires from Cathedral for
twelve years (1859-72), 128 ; Charge
of 1859, 129 ; pamphlets of Humble
and Lendrum, 130; anonymous
' Proposals for Peace,' 131 ; inter
view with Keble, 133 ; ' Opinion '
INDEX
401
WORDSWORTH
on Bishop Forbes' case, 134; G.
Forbes on it, 136 ; Charles Words
worth's notes on the case, 135-38 ;
on Melchizedekian Priesthood of |
Christ, 139-40; doctrine com- !
plained of disturbs the proportions \
of the faith, 98, 140; renewed
troubles at St. Ninian's, 197 ; Mr.
Burton Provost (1871-1885), 198 ;
Charge of 1872, a censure of St.
Ninian's, 199 ; Special Synod of
1873, proposed Committee, 201 ;
address by Dean and other clergy, I
202 ; various circulars, 202 ; modus \
vivendivfiih Provost Burton (1874),
204 ; its partial success, 204 ; ;
letters on the Eastward position.
205, cp. Appendix IV., 360, and j
377, 378 ; changes in 1878, 264 ;
happier relations, Mr. Hodson, |
supernumerary, 264 ; Charges
again delivered in the Cathedral,
1882 onward, 265 ; Mr. Farquhar
succeeds Mr. Hodson, 265 ; V. L.
Eorison Provost (1885), 265 ; Lord
Glasgow's failure a blessing in
disguise, 265 ; enlargement, 265-
66 ; recognised by Canon (1890),
266, 270; Bishop's satisfaction,
266; verses to G. T. Farquhar,
267.
IV. Reunion Work. See espe
cially chapters V and VII.
General policy, 37-39; princi
ples of Church polity, 230 foil. ;
details of : accepts Presbyterian
Baptism, 58 ; how far he insisted
on Confirmation, 63 n. ; suggests
the validity, under circumstances,
of their orders, 237 f. ; arguments
on, 242-44 ; in letter to Arch
bishop Benson, 253-55 ; in Lam
beth Conference Committee, 257-
59 ; and Appendix VI., 363-66 ;
preaching in Presbyterian
churches, 38, 39, 197, 233-36, 245,
247-49, 259 foil. ; appreciation of
some features of Presbyterian
polity, 33, 34, 222, 231 ; efforts for
' a common Catechism,' 163-65 ;
' a National Catechism,' 165-66 ;
final defence of Keunion policy,
275-77 ; reference to it in his
epitaph, 280
WORDSWORTH
V. Public work in England.
Assists at Consecrations of T.
L. Claughton to Eochester (1867),
174; of Christopher Wordsworth to
Lincoln (1869), 196-97 ; of H. Mac
kenzie to Nottingham (1870), 210;
Confirmations at Eadley and
Stanford in the Vale, 174; part
in Lambeth Conferences of 1867,
175 ; of 1878, 224, 353 foil. ; of
1888, 253-59, 363-66 ; takes part
in New Testament revision (1870-
1881), 211-15; At Church Con
gress, Wolverhampton, 178; at
Church Congress, Carlisle, sermon
and paper (1884), 382; sermons
at Oxford, 'Mending of Nets'
(1857), 372, 239 foil.; and 'Doc-
trine of the Trinity ' (1873), 378 ;
Kidderminster, ' Eeunion of Church
of Great Britain' (1862), 156-59 ;
Stratford, on Shakespeare (1864),
169, 374; Chichester, 'Euodias
and Syntyche' (1867), 159, 177,
376; Norwich, 1870 (Choral
Festival) and 1875, 210, 211, 376 ;
Peterborough (1870), 210; St.
Albans (Choral Festival), 1871,
211, 376; Eochester (1872), 210;
Salisbury, 1872 and 1876 (reopen
ing of cho^r), 210, 279, 378 ; Dur
ham (1873), 210 ; Chester (1876),
210
VI. Literary work (general).
See especially 334-5, and
Appendix VII.
A. Theological. Charge on
modern teaching on Old Testa
ment Canon, 271 foil. ; on value
of Book of Common Prayer, 246
foil. ; works on the Christian
Ministry, 38; lectures on, 81;
Synodal address (1866), 159, 216-
219 : see also IV. ; 'A Common
Catechism and ' a National Cate
chism,' 163-60; addition to
Church Catechism, 224; and
Appendix iii., 358-60 ; Archbishop
Hamilton's Catechism, 240 ; Lord
Bute's 'Breviary,' 225; 'Papal
Aggression in the East,' 82
B. Secular. Greek Grammar
and Primer, 167-68 ; ' Pindar and
Modern Athletics,' 310: Statius,
D D
402
EPISCOPATE OF CHARLES WORDSWORTH
WORDSWORTH
219; books on Shakespeare, 168-
70 ; ' Waverley Novels in Chrono
logical Order,' Appendix V., 362 ;
Wordsworth Society, 302; on
Tennyson's ' Timbuctoo,' 322 f. ;
Three great Orators of Antiquity,
334
C. Judgments on 'men and books.
Jeremy Taylor, 171 ; Baxter, 316 ;
Lord Clarendon, 316 f . ; J. H.
Newman, 314 f. ; Keble's ' Chris
tian Year,' 172 ; Archbishop
Trench, 31.r; Gladstone's 'Ellen
Middleton,' 318
VII. Verses by Charles Words
worth. On the ' Times ' and the
' Scotsman,' 173 ; epitaph on Ken
neth Wordsworth, 181 ; to Canon
Farquhar, 267 ; to Dean Ramsay,
290 f . ; to Lord Beaconsfield, 291 f . ;
on Dean Stanley's versions, 295 ;
Sophocles' thank's to Lewis Camp
bell, 297 ; to the same on his
recovery from bronchitis, 298 ; to
Dr. Boyd, 299 ; elegy on Principal
Tulloch, 300 ; to Agnata Ramsay,
302 ; ' The Scarlet Gown,' 303 ;
to Dr. Macgregor, 305 ; to Rev. N.
Johnston, 305 ; translation of
some lines of Statins, 320 ; to
Bishop Claughton on his birthday,
324 ; on his golden wedding, 325 ;
to Bishop and Mrs. Moberly on
theirs, 325 ; on ' Nightmare,' 327 ;
translation of ' Our Blessed Re
deemer,' 331 ; and of ' Thine for
ever ' and ' Lead, kindly Light,'
332. See also 360 (Archbishop
Benson), 374 (1863), 380 (1880),
384 (1890)
Wordsworth, Charles Samuel, the
Bishop's eldest son, curate of
Kidderminster, 204; career and
family of, 388
Wordsworth, Christopher (Master of
Trinity), 1 ; death, 4 ; on Keble's
' Christian Year,' 172
Wordsworth, Christopher (Bishop
of Lincoln), 1 n. ; letter on the
Six Bishops' Pastoral, 111 ; on 'a
WORDSWORTH
Common Catechism,' 164 ; ap
pointed Bishop of Lincoln, 196 ;
on Charles Wordsworth's proposed
resignation, 203; death of, 240;
on his brother's efforts, 241
Wordsworth, Christopher (Canon,
Rector of St. Peter's, Maiiborough),
his book on ' University Life,' 326
Wordsworth, John (Fellow of
Trinity), 1 n.
Wordsworth, John (Bishop of Salis
bury), at Winchester, 181 ; visits
to Scotland, 241 and Preface ix-x ;
consecration as Bishop, 246 n. ;
letter from, 255; debt to Charles
Wordsworth's criticism, 326 ;
chapter of this book written at
Osmington, 288, 342 ; opinions on
questions discussed, Preface x-xi ;
on ministry of Baptism, 60-63 ; on
crucial point in Scottish office,
78-79 ; on Eucharistic Adoration
and Sacrifice, 140-47 ; on Cate
chism, 166 ; on use of Revised
Version, 215-16 ; on Presbyterian
ordination, 260-64 ; translations
by, 174, 180 ; Stanley's ' Valedic
tion,' 296 ; Sophocles to L. Camp
bell, 297-98 ; to A. K. H. Boyd,
299 ; on Tulloch, 301 ; ' The
Scarlet Gown,' 304 ; to Macgregor
and Johnston, 305 ; Bishop Mober-
ley's golden wedding, 325 ; ' Night
mare,' 329
Wordsworth, John Roundell,267 and
387
Wordsworth, Robert Walter, the
Bishop's second son translates
Greek Primer, 168 ; letter on his
father's funeral, 297 ; Preface v,
and Appendix IX., 388
Wordsworth, William (the Poet),
sponsor to Charles Wordsworth, 2 ;
description of Scottish character,
35 ; his love of a terrace, 82
Wordsworth, William Barter, Pre
face v, xxvi, and App. IX., 389
For other members of the
family see Preface v, 5, 64, 65, 80,
81, (Kenneth) 180-81, 203, 222,
252, 267, 278, 327, 336-7, 388-9
and Co. Printers, New-street Square, London
WORKS BY JOHN WORDSWORTH, D.D.
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