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presented  to  the 
UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
SAN  DIEGO 

Dr.    and  Mrs.    John   r.^lh-rnn+.h 


) 


OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS, 


VOL.    I. 


OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 


BY 


THE    REV.    F.  ^RNOLD,    B.A. 

LATE   OF    CHRIST   CHUKCH,   OXFORD. 


IN  TWO  VOLUMES. 
VOL.   L 


LONDON : 
HURST   AND   BLACKETT,   PUBLISHERS, 

13,  GEEAT  MARLBOEOUGH  STEEET, 

1875. 

^U  Rights  Reserved. 


TO 


THE  REV.  HERBERT  TODD,  M.A. 

OF    TRINITY    COLLEGE,    CAMBRIDGE,    YICAR   OP   KILDWICK. 


My  Dear  Todd, 
I  do  not  suppose  in  dedicating  this  work  to 
you  that  you  will  endorse  all  its  opinions.  On 
the  contrary,  I  imagine  that  when  next  we  meet, 
in  travel  or  at  home,  there  will  be  some 
keen  discussion  on  sundry  matters  connected 
with  these  pages.  But  you,  at  least,  will  under- 
stand how  thoroughly  I  have  striven  to  be 
Catholic  and  impartial,  and  that  this  work  on 
contemporary  Church  history  should  be  free 
from  all  party  bias.  My  object  has  been  to  give 
a  view  of  the  present  state  of  the  Church  of 
England,  its  condition  and  its  prospects,  the 
great  names  and  the  remarkable  movements 
that  have  emerged  within  its  borders.  I  have 
sketched   out  a  kind  of  Episcopal  history  since 


VI  DEDICATION. 

the  days  of  the  Reformation,  doing  so  at  greater 
length  as  we  enter  on  the  present  reign,    and 
meet  with  some  great  men  whose  careers  will 
strongly  mould  ecclesiastical  history.     For  this 
reason  I  have  especially  dwelt  on  the  careers  of 
Bishop  Philpotts  and  Bishop  Wilberforce.     From 
this  point  I  have  advanced  to  a   survey  of  the 
present  aspect    of   the    Church  of   England.     I 
have  endeavoured   to  give  sketches  of  our  pre- 
sent bishops  and  deans,  so  far  as  they  illustrate 
the  ecclesiastical  and  literary  history  of  our  day, 
and  the  remarkable  phenomena  of  Ritualism  and 
Rationalism.     I  had  prepared   various  notes  on 
the  Irish,  the  Scottish,  and  the  Colonial  Episcopal 
churches,  but,  ''  spatiis  inclusus  iniquis,"  I  have 
forborne  to  trespass  too  far  on  the  attention  of  that 
general  reader,  immemorially  courteous  and  kind, 
to  whom  I  have  addressed  myself  in  these  pages. 
The  trouble  has  often  been  not  so  much    to   say 
things  as  to  leave  them  unsaid.     I  have  ventured 
to  avail  myself  of  various  social  and   anecdotic 
matters  suggested  by  my  subject.     Written  amid 
the  incessant  occupations  of  a  curate  s  life,  and 
amid  many  further  calls  on  my  time,  the  work 
may  not  be  adequately  ample  and  complete,  but  I 
trust  that  it  may  be  found  of  some  use  in  elucidat- 
ing contemporary  history,  and  perhaps  may  have 
some  little  part  in  promoting  necessary  reforms. 


DEDICATION.  \11 

It  seems  to  me  that  of  the  three  orders  of  the 
Church — Bishops,  Priests  and  Deacons — the 
great  body  of  the  priesthood  or  presbytery  is  in 
an  eminently  sound  condition,  and  efficiently 
doing  its  great  work,  but  that  both  in  the 
diaconate  and  episcopate,  the  Church  suffers  harm 
and  loss.  At  present  the  deacon's  office  is  practi- 
cally divided  only  by  a  line  from  the  priesthood, 
and  one  great  want  of  our  day  is  the  restoration 
of  the  lay  diaconates,  as  the  best  way  of  coping 
with  the  necessities  of  the  time.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  have  almost  lost  sight  of  the  original 
idea  of  the  Episcopate,  the  actual  overseeing  by 
a  chief  pastor,  of  the  clergy  and  their  flocks. 
We  have  substituted  for  the  Primitive  Catholic 
idea  an  abnormal  exaggeration,  that  of  the  baronial 
mediaeval  prelate.  A  very  large  increase  of  the 
Episcopate — in  which  rank  and  income  shall  be 
regarded  as  quite  secondary  to  the  extension  of  the 
office — and  a  large  extension  of  the  diaconate,  so 
that  it  shall  not  be  simply  a  clerical  diaconate, 
appear  to  be  necessary  to  carry  out  the  idea  of 
a  National  Church,  and  to  meet  the  national  wants. 
I  venture  to  think  also  that  a  large  Ecclesiastical 
Reform  Act,  dealing  with  the  practical  evils  of  the 
Church,  will  be  necessary  if  we  are  to  avoid 
an  ecclesiastical  revolution. 

I  will  ask  you  to  accept  this  work  according  to 


Vlll  DEDICATION. 

the  good  old  fashion  of  dedications,  in  recollec- 
tion of  old  days  and  old  kindnesses.  I  sometimes 
gratefully  think  that  Providence  has  been  very 
good  to  me,  in  an  anxious  and  laborious  life,  in 
giving  me  the  sympathy  and  companionship  of 
many  friends,  and  there  is  none  of  whom  I  feel 
this  more  gratefully  than  in  reference  to  yourself, 
true  priest  and  poet. 

Yours  ever, 

Frederick  Arnold. 


CONTENTS 


OF 


THE    FIRST    VOLUME. 


CHAPTER  I. 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OF    THE    CHUKCH. 

The  Church  of  England  under  Queens  . 

Three  Movements  of  the  Victorian  Era 

The  Okl  Arrainian  Controversy 

The  Tractarian  Movement 

Ultramontanism  ..... 

Keble  and  Newman 

The  Evangelical  Party  ..... 

Their  Practical  Labours 

Their  Eloquence  ..... 

Missions  at  Home  and  Abroad 

The  Broad  Church  Movement    .... 

Coleridge,  Arnold,  Julius  Hare,   Manning 

Dr.  Manning's  Secession  to  Rome 

John  Frederick  Denison  Maurice 

Modern  Rationalism 

The  Liberal  Clergy  .... 

Modern  Ritualism         ..... 

A  Bishop  on  the  Ritualists  and  the  Ritualists  on  Bishops 

The  Series  of  Controversies       .... 


Page 
1 

4 
6 
8 
11 
11 
14 
17 
18 
22 
23 
25 
26 
27 
31 
33 
34 
37 
39 


X  COXTENTS. 

Page 

Bishops  and  Deans  not  the  Real  Leaders  of  Theological  Thought  40 
Increase  of  the  Episcopate  .  .  .  .  .43 

A  Debate  in  Convocation     .  .  .  .  .  45 

Speeches  of  the  Bishop  of  Norwich,  the  Bishop  of  Llandaff  and 

others    .  .  .  .  .  .  .47 

The  Evangelization  of    the  Masses,  the   Object  of  a  National 

Church         ......  49 

CHAPTER  11. 

GENEEA.L    COURSE    AND    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY,    ESPECIALLY    IN 

ENGLAND. 

The  Doctrine  of  Episcopacy       .             .             .             .  .50 

"  Presbyter  "  and  "  Bishop  "  originally  the  same       .              .  53 

The  Ignatian  Epistles    .             .             .             .             .  .54 

Episcopacy  emerges  after  the  Destruction  of  Jerusalem         .  56 

Canon  Lightfoot's  View             .             .             .             .  .57 

Dean  Field's  View   ......  58 

Spread  of  Episcopacy  through  the  Church          .              .  .60 

The  Question  of  the  Appointment  of  Bishops             .              .  62 

Martin  Marprelate         .              .              .              .              .  .64 

Lord  Bacon  on  Episcopacy  .             .             .             .             .  66 

Contrast  between  Elizabethan  and  Victorian  Episcopacy  .        67 

Usher's  Scheme  of  Moderated  Episcopacy     ...  70 

The  Smeetymnuan  Controversy               .             .             .  .73 

Biographical  History  of  Episcopacy.             ...  74 

Lancelot  Andrewes        .             .             .             .             .  .75 

Corbet          .......  86 

Joseph  Hall       .......       90 

Bull             .......  107 

Thomas  Wilson  of  Sodor  and  Man          .             .             .  .115 

Joseph  Butler           .             .             .             .             .             .  118 

Swift's  Archbishop         .             .             .             .             .  .129 

Lord  Bristol,  Bishop  of  Derry          ....  131 

George  Home  .             .             .             .             .             .  .134 

CHAPTER  IIL 

EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN. 

Archbishop  Howley        .  .  .  .  -  .140 


CONTENTS. 


XI 


Archbishop  Sumner 

Bishop  Sumner  of  Winchester  . 

His  Private  History. 

Connection  with  Geneva 

Edits  Milton's  "  Doctrines  of  Christianity" 

Archbishop  Longley      .... 

His  Treatment  of  Romish  Practices . 

On  Privy  Council  Judgments     . 

Archbishop  Whately 

Whately  and  Newman  .... 

Whately  and  Pusey 

M.  Guizot  on  Whately 

Whately  on  Gladstone  and  Thackeray 

Bishop  Blomfield  .... 

His  Charge  of  1842 

Bishop  Philpotts  of  Exeter 

Birth  and  Education 

His  Preferments  in  Diocese  of  Durham  . 

Feud  with  the  "  Edinburgh  Review" 

At  Stanhope     ..... 

Controversy  with  Charles  Butler 

Correspondence  with  Macaulay  . 

His  Dubious  Conduct  on  Catholic  Emancipation 

Appointment  to  Exeter 

Controversy  with  Lord  John  Russell 

The  Gorham  Case  .  .  .  . 

He  excommunicates  Archbishop  Sumner 

His  Opinion  on  an  Exeter  Jury. 

His  Last  Years         .... 

Bishop  Lonsdale  .  .  .  . 

Correspondence  and  Anecdotes 

Bishop  Stanley  of  Norwich 

Bishop  Hamilton  of  Salisbury 


Pagi! 

142 
152 

15G 
158 
160 
161 
163 
166 
168 
169 
170 
170 
174 
176 
178 
180 
185 
184 
185 
187 
188 
189 
195 
197 
198 
200 
202 
204 
205 
206 
208 
211 
213 


CHAPTER  IV. 


BISHOP    WILBERFORCE    OF    WINCHESTER. 


His  Many-sidedness  of  Character 
William  Wilberforce 


219 
220 


Xll  CONTENTS. 

Page 

Sussex  and  Yorkshire    .              .              .              .              .  .221 

His  Rapid  Preferment           .....  224 

Dean  of  Westminster — Bishop  of  Oxford            .              .  .     227 

Seeks  to  make  his  Diocese  a  Model  Diocese  .             .             .  228 
Anecdotes         .......     229 

His  Opinion  on  Vestments   .....  230 

His  Writings     .              .              .              .              .              .  .232 

His  Oratory.              ......  240 

His  Pai'Uanientary  Career                         .              .              .  .243 

His  PoUcy  on  the  Irish  Church         ....  249 

His  Pulpit  and  Platform  Work.              .              .              .  .251 

His  Mode  of  Working          .             .             .             .             .  257 

His  Episcopal  Charges                .             .             .             .  .259 

His  action  in  Revival  of  Convocation                            .              .  261 

Supposed  to  have  incurred  the  Hostility  of  the  Court      .  .     262 
His  Diocesan  Work.             .              .              .              .              .264 

Connection  with  Robertson  of  Brighton               .              .  .     264 

Anecdotes     .......  266 

At  the  London  Library               .              .              .              .  .268 

With  Bishop  Boone              .....  269 

His  Sincerity    .             .             .                           .             .  .271 

His  Disappointments             .              .              .              .              .  272 

Promoted  to  Winchester              .             .              .              .  .273 

His  Sudden  Death  ......  274 

His  Last  Words  in  the  House  of  Lords.              .              .  .     277 

His  Condemnation  of  Ritualism        .              .              .              .  278 

CHAPTER  V. 

ARCHBISHOP    TAIT. 

His  Education  and  Reminiscences  ....     281 

The  University  of  Glasgow— the  Old  College           .              .  282 

Modifications  of  Scottish  Presbyterianism            .             .  .     287 

The  Influence  of  his  Early  Training.              .              .              .  289 

At  Oxford— The  "  Union "        .             .             .             .  .291 

At  Bonn      .......  292 

Applies  for  the  Greek  chair  at  Glasgow               .              .  .     294 

Draws  Attention  to  Tract  90            .             .             .             .  296 

Appointed  Head-master  of  Rugby  ....     298 


CONTENTS.  xm 

Page 

Dean  of  Carlisle       .  .  .  .     •        .  .  299 

Bishop  of  London  ......     302 

His  Primary  Charge  .....  303 

His  Sermons  and  Speeches        .....     304 

Bishop  of  London's  Fund    .....  308 

His  Administration  of  Patronage  .  .  .311 

His  Bill  for  the  Regulation  of  Public  Worship         .  .  312 

Convocation  and  Legislation      .  .  .  .  .313 


^O' 


CHAPTER  VI. 

ARCHBISHOP    THOMSON. 

At  Lincoln's  Inn  Chapel  .  .  .  .  .316 

His  Eminence  as  a  Preacher             .             .             .             .     .  320 

His  References  to  Contemporary  Literature       .             .             .  322 

Sermon  at  Buckingham  Palace  Chapel         .             .             .  324 

Oxford  Career  .......  328 

Provost  of  Queen's               .....  329 

Bishop  of  Gloucester  and  Bristol  .  .  .  .332 

His  Writings           ......  333 

Made  Archbishop  of  York          .             .             .             .             .  335 

Archiepiscopal  Experiences  .             .             .             .             .  337 

As  a  Controversialist    .......  338 

CHAPTER  VIL 

BISHOPS    OP    LONDON,    WINCHESTER    AND    DURHAM. 

Fulham  Palace  .......  340 

Gardens,  Buildings  and  Associations  .  .  .  343 
Bishop  Porteous  first  speaks  of  the  Spiritual  Arbitration  of  the 

Diocese               ......  344 

Character  and  Extent  of  the  Metropolitan  Diocese  .  .  345 
Connection  of  the  See  of  London  with   America,  and  English 

Churches  on  the  Continent         ....  347 

Bishop  Jackson's  Village  and  University  Sermons    .             .  349 

At  St.  James's,  Piccadilly          .....  350 

Religious  Life  in  London  .  .  .  .  .  351 
Bishop  Jackson's  Farewell  Sermon  at  Lincoln    .             .             .353 


XIV  CONTENT?. 

Page 

Winchester  Cathedral  and  Farnham  Castle                .             .  357 

Bishop  Harold  Brown's  Farewell  of  Ely  Cathedral         .  .     362 

His  Work  on  the  Articles  .....  363 
Speech  on  the  Public  Worship  Bill        ....     365 

Edits  the  "  Speaker's  Commentaiy "           .             .              .  367 

The  Old  Catholic  movement       .             .             .             .  .     370 

The  Bishop  of  Durham        .....  372 

An  Avowed  "  Party "  Man       .             .             .             .  .372 


ERRATA. 


VOL.  I. 

Page  16,  line    3,  for  "  primitive  "  read  "  privative." 
Page  52,  line    4,  omit  "  was." 
Page  72,  line    6,  for  "  eaxmple  "  read  "  example." 
Page  74,  line  22,  for  "  Byrne  "  read  "  Prynne." 
Page  87,  last  line,/or  "cottage"  read  "coUege." 

VOL.  II. 

Page      3,  line  13,  for  "  synchronieally  "  read  "synchronistically." 

Page    62,  line  32,  for  "  offended  "  read  "  afiected." 

Page  146,  line  12,  for  "Tertullian"  read  "Tertullus." 

Page  151,  line  12,  for  "  he  "  read  "  the  youthful  curate." 

Page  316,  line  19,  for  "  on  the  "  read  "  an." 

Page  317,  line    8,  for  "  with  "  read  "  within." 

Page  318,  Hne  12,  for  "  factors"  read  "fautors." 

„  Hne  18,  for  "  attend  "  read  "  reform." 

„  line  27,  omit  "  that." 

Page  319,  line  13,  for  "  contrast  "  read  "  contact." 


OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OP    THE    CHURCH. 

ENGLAND  loves  Queens,  and  during  the  reigns  of 
her  Queens,  the  land  has  been  free,  glorious  and 
prosperous.  The  epochs  of  Queen  EHzabeth,  Queen 
Anne,  and  Queen  Victoria,  have  been  ever  of  intensest 
life  and  activity  in  Church  and  State.  Already  the 
Victorian  era,  thanks  to  the  gracious  Providence  that 
has  so  long  continued  a  happy  reign,  has  its  distinc- 
tive magnificent  place  in  the  records  of  the  human 
race,  in  the  progress  of  intellectual  life,  in  the 
magnificent  development  of  all  national  resources. 
The  religious  history  of  the  reign  is  inseparably 
intertwined  with  its  art,  literature,  politics  and  great 
popular  movements.  A  whole  generation  of  mankind, 
as  we  count  generations,  has  passed  away  since  our 
Queen  came  to  the  throne,  and  it  is  by  looking  at 
this  nearer  history  that  we  may  best  comprehend  the 
signs  of  the  present  times. 

In  the  present  work,  I  endeavour  to  sketch  out  a 
view  of  the  contemporary  history  of  the  Established 
Church,  on  the  biographical  method  of  dealing  with 
those  who,  from  their  position,  appear  to  be  its  na- 

VOL.   I.  B 


Z  OUR    P.ISnOPS    AND    DEANS. 

tural  leaders,    and  wlio  are    more    or  less  identified 
with  those  schools   of  thought,  those  progressive  or 
retrogressive  ideas,    those  mutations  of  opinion  and 
fashion,  those  alterations  and  expansions  of  the  An- 
glican system  ;  those  religious,  political   and   literary- 
questions    with    which    the    religious    history    of  the 
Victorian    era   is    occupied.      It    is    a     difficult  and 
delicate  matter  to  discuss  living  people  in  connection 
with   contemporary   history ;  but   all   such   discussion 
will  be    rigorously    confined    within    the    limits    con- 
ceded to  contemporary  writers.     Ou  the  other  hand, 
it  may  be  an  advantage  to  exhibit  and  tabulate  results 
as  they  stand  at  present,  to  exhibit  the  living  influence 
while  it  is  still  present  with  us  and  to  project  on  the 
busy  religious    life  around    us  the    illumination  that 
may  be  derived  from  the  past  years  of  this  generation 
up  to  the  present  day.     We  shall  endeavour,  with  the 
utmost  impartiality,  and  from  a  mainly  literary  and 
historical  vantage  ground  to  give  a  view  of  current 
ecclesiastical  history.      AVe   are    well   aware  that   at 
the  present  moment  we  cannot  make  large  generali- 
zations from  ecclesiastical  facts,  so  as  to  measure  our 
own  age  with  past  eras  ;   we  cannot  stand  back  from 
our  own  times  so  as   to  survey  them  in  their  entirety. 
Our    knowledge    of    current    history    is    necessarily 
loose  and  imperfect,  for  it  is  only   the  lapse  of  time 
that  throws    open  the  secret   archives   of  public  life. 
But  even  with   these  limitations  and    drawbacks  we 
address    ourselves    to    the    task    of  delineating  some 
features  of  our  time.     W'e  shall  perhaps  best  lead  up 
to   it   by   discussing   some   governing  aspects  of  our 
own  time,  by  surveying  episcopacy  in   the  past,  and 
by    speaking   of    some    great    dignitaries    who    have 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA   OF   THE    CHURCH.  3 

passed  away  during  the  Reign,  before  we  come  to  the 
present  and  vanishing  names  which  occupy  the  fleet- 
ing moments  of  the  current  day.  We  shall  also 
have  to  deal  with  some  other  names,  as  potent  as 
those  of  the  highest  dignitaries,  in  giving  shape  and 
colour  to  the  human  destinies  of  the  Church. 

Speaking  roughly  there  are  now  about  a  hundred 
and  fifty  bishoprics  in  the  world  belonging  to  the 
Anglican  Church.  The  enormous  expansion  of  the 
Episcopal  system  is  one  of  the  most  remarkable 
features  of  our  age.  This  expansion,  however,  has 
been,  not  in  the  Mother  Church  but  in  the  daughters. 
When  the  Church  desired  a  new  bishopric  in  the  see 
of  Manchester,  Archdeacon  Hare  thought  that  they 
might  just  as  well  ask  for  fifty  bishops  while  they 
were  about  it.  Unfortunately  they  did  not  ask  for 
fifty,  and  the  time  for  such  asking,  at  least,  in  the 
present  condition  of  things,  in  the  present  unmodified 
form  of  Episcopacy,  has  gone  away.  The  earnestness 
of  the  Church  in  promoting  Episcopacy  in  our  Colonial 
Empire  may  eventually  have  a  reactionary  influence 
in  the  increase  of  the  Episcopacy  at  home.  The 
great  landmark  in  this  movement  is  the  year  1841  ; 
for  the  previous  attempt  in  the  erection  of  a 
Bishopric  of  Calcutta  in  1811,  stood  all  alone  for  a 
generation.  The  question  of  Episcopacy  has  now 
assumed  a  larger  form  and  presents  problems  that 
press  for  a  solution,  and  though  some  sporadic 
bishoprics  may  be  carved  out,  or  sufi*ragan  and  coad- 
jutor bishops  may  be  appointed,  probably  a  new 
settlement  of  the  institution  belonoj's  to  the  Church 
of  the  Future. 

There  had  been  a  long  period  of  comparative  calm 

B  2 


4  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DRANS. 

before  the  great  questions  were  sharply  defined 
which  make  the  conflicts  of  the  day.  It  might 
almost  seem  that  the  Church  of  Ens^land  itself 
seemed  specially  to  deprecate  any  attempt  to 
destroy  the  harmony  that  prevailed.  Her  heart 
seemed  fixed  on  the  idea  of  quietude  and  repose. 
In  her  Liturgy  she  prays  that  we  being  hurt  by  no 
persecution  may  evermore  give  thanks,  that  we  may 
serve  God  with  a  quiet  mind  ;  and  again  in  the  third 
Collect  for  Evensong:  that  "  we  beino^  defended  from 
the  fear  of  our  enemies  may  pass  our  time  in  rest 
and  quietness."  Often  in  the  mellow  afternoon  when 
the  spirit  of  deep  peace  seemed  brooding  over  the 
village  church,  when  the  rustling  of  the  leaves  out- 
side harmonised  with  the  silvery  cadences  of  the 
white-haired  clergyman's  voice  within,  did  this 
supplication  seem  to  breathe  the  very  spirit  and 
aspiration  of  the  Church.  But,  alas,  the  Church 
may  have  to  learn  collectively  what,  as  individuals, 
we  so  often  find  to  be  true,  that  trial,  and  strife, 
and  warfare,  are,  after  all,  often  the  healthiest 
discipline  for  us.  And  yet  again  it  may  be  possible 
for  all  of  us  to  learn  that  there  is  such  a  thins:  as 
central  peace  subsisting  at  the  heart  of  endless 
agitation,  and  whatever  may  be  the  storms  of  au 
unfriendly  world,  the  Church  has  that  peace  which 
the  world  cannot  give  or  take  away. 

Speaking  broadly,  there  have  been  three  principal 
movements  in  the  history  of  the  Victorian  era.  These 
are  the  High  Church  movement,  the  Broad  Church, 
and    the  Ritualistic*     The   two    latter   have   in   the 

*  High,  Low,  and  Broad  is  a  rough  and  ready,  though  convenient 
classification.      Mr.   Conjbeare,  in  his  memorable  Essay,    points   out 


THE    VICTORIAN    EKA    OF    THE    CHUECH.  5 

course  of  time  proceeded  to  an  exaggerated  and 
abnormal  form.  Ritualism  is  something  very  diffe- 
rent from  the  Oxford  movement,  and  the  Broad 
Churchism  of  some  London  sensational  pulpits  at  the 
present  day  is  almost  a  caricature  of  the  intellectual 
system  of  Hare  and  Arnold.  In  point  of  time  the 
Oxford  era  is  earlier  than  the  commencement  of  this 
reign  ;  but  the  outcome  of  the  Oxford  movement  in 
the  perversions  to  Rome  did  not  take  place  till  a  few- 
years  after  the  Accession.  To  use  a  phrase  of  Julius 
Hare's,  men  had  ogrled  and  flirted  with  the  Church  of 
Rome,  while  submittinsf  with  a  sisj'h  to  the  bond 
which  tied  them  to  the  Church  of  England.  The 
ogling  and  and  flirtation  had  now  gone  to  the  extent 
of  an  actual  elopement.  We  may  now,  as  it  were, 
step  back  a  few  paces  from  the  scene  and  contem- 
plate the  whole  past  movement  in  its  entirety. 

One  good  effect  was,  as  Bishop  Thirl  wall  has 
pointed  out,  that  it  gave  rise  to  more  valuable  writings 
in  theology  than  had  been  known  for  many  years. 
The  enormous  extension  of  the  Episcopate  has  been 
due  more  to  the  High  Church  than  to  any  other 
body  of  men.  The  multiplication  of  churches,  chapels, 
services,  and  clergy  is  mainly  to  be  ascribed  to  them. 
The  mind  of  the  Church  sympathized  greatly  with  the 

that  each  is  susceptible  of  a  triple  division.  His  enumeration  is 
A,  Low  Church  (a)  normal  type  "  Evangelical"  (/3)  exaggerated  type, 
Recondite  (7)  stagnant  type  (Low  and  Slow).  B.  High  Church  («) 
normal  type,  "  Anglican,"  (/S)  exaggerated  type  "  Tractarian"  (y)  stag- 
nant type  "High  and  Dry."  C.  Broad  Cburch  («)  normal  type  (/3\ 
exaggerated  type,  i.e.,  concealed  infidels  (y)  stagnant  type,  C.  (/3)  is  put 
interrogatively  as  only  about  a  score,  and  the  "  Mountain  Clergy," 
calculated  at  one  thousand  are  unclassified,  as  if  such  distinctions 
were  too  refined  for  them. 


6  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

rnovement  until  the  era  of  the  perversions  set  in. 
It  is  now  true  that  the  High  Church  has  become 
two  houses,  one  division  retaining  its  former  nomen- 
clature, while  the  other  division,  is  known  by  its 
opponents  and  uot  disowned  by  itself,  as  the  Ilitua- 
listic  party.  To  this  length  proceeded  that  loyal 
Oxford  School  whose  great  and  moderate  tradition  had 
been  a  steadfast  adherence  to  the  constitutional  prin- 
ciple of  Church  and  King.  To  give  a  formal  date  to 
this  party  we  may  saj  that  the  modern  Anglican 
system  was  inaugurated  by  an  able  knot  of  writers 
who  met  in  1833,  and  solemnly  pledged  themselves 
to  revive  Anglican  principles,  and  for  this  purpose 
commenced  the  famous  "  Tracts  for  the  Times."  A 
distinctive  position  was  held  by  that  famous  founda- 
tion, Oriel  College,  Oxford. 

The  glory  of  Oriel  has  now,  to  a  great  degree, 
passed  over  to  BalUol  ;  but  Balliol  will  probably  never 
have  that  famous  position  in  the  progress  of  thought 
which  was  once  well  held  by  Oriel.  A  little  knot  of  men 
who  cared  to  hold  high  debate  in  the  college  common- 
room,  or  lingered  in  converse  or  meditation  in  the 
leafy  cloister  of  the  Broad  Walks,  or  the  parks  by  the 
banks  of  the  Cherwell  and  the  Isis,  have  gone  far 
silently  to  revolutionize  the  ecclesiastical  character  of 
our  times.  The  system  of  throwing  open  tlie  great 
college  prizes  to  the  highest  merit  in  the  University 
had.  renewed  the  life  of  Oxford,  and  as  its  reward  Oriel 
had  gained  Pusey  and  Newman  for  its  common-room, 
the  recognized  leaders  of  what  is  known  by  the  narrow 
name  of  Puseyism,or  the  broader  name  of  Anglo-Catho- 
licism. The  history  of  the  Oxford  movement  has  often 
been  discussed,  but  it  may  here  be  as  well  to  take  a 


THE    VICTORIAN   ERA    OF    THE    CUURCH.  7 

general  view  of  it.     It  appears  to  have  Lad,  at   the 
outset,  rather  a  political   than  a  religious  cause.     The 
ecclesiastical    atmosphere    had    been    calm   since    the 
time  of  the  Nonjurors,  and  had  hardly  been  disturbed 
by  the  great  Wesleyan  Revival.     Indeed,  it  appeared 
doubtful  in  what  direction  the  storm  might  burst  that 
should    next  disturb  the  heavens.     According  to  all 
the  laws  of  storms,  a  cyclone  must  burst  out  in  some 
direction  shortly.     The  old  troubles    seemed    asleep. 
Jacobite    and    Nonjuror    were    even    as    Trojan    and 
Tyrian.     The    standing    controversy    in    all   clerical 
homes  was  concerning  Arminianism  and  Calvinism,  in 
which  the  disputants  were  often   more  Arminian  than 
Arminius,  more  Calvinistic  than  Calvin.     The  Church 
of  England  that  had   once  been  decidedly  Calvinistic 
became  decidedly  Arminian,  and  now  contained  both 
hemispheres    of    opinion.       That    obscure     problem 
which  emerged  in  philosophy  long  before  it  emerged 
in  Christianity  was  one  that,  in  those  placid  days  was 
found  to  yield  sufficient   exercise  to   heart,  intellect, 
and    temper.     Even   young   ladies     would    exchange 
essays  and  letters  on  this  interesting  subject,  which 
would  act  as  a  gentle  stimulant,  or  a  gentle  sedative. 
This   unsettled,   this   insoluble  problem    was    now   to 
give  way  to  one  that  should  throw  it,  at  least  tempo- 
rarily, into  the  shade.     There  were  two  sets  of  social 
circumstances    especially    which    rendered    agitation 
possible,  after  a  vigorous  and  incessant  fashion.  These 
were  the  cheapness  and   the  improvements  that  had 
been   imported  into  travelling  and  the  postal  system. 
Railways  and  cheap  postage,  in  many  respects,  altered 
the  entire  face  of  the  country.     The  clergy  were  a 
class  whose  activity  would  be  greatly  heightened  by 


8  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

these  facilities ;  they  are  now  as  remarkable  for  loco- 
motion as  they  were  once  for  being  stationary.  That 
kind  of  agitation  which  Lord  Macaulay  and  other 
historians  have  described  as  occurring  in  the  days  of 
the  Exclusion  Bill  and  the  Trial  of  the  Seven  Bishops 
was  now  rendered  possible  at  any  time,  and  almost 
on  any  occasion.  Such  a  spectacle  as  that  presented 
annually  by  a  Church  Congress  would  have  been  im- 
possible under  the  old  conditions.  There  was  a  kind 
of  historical  unity  in  the  subject  that  now  so  promi- 
nently emerged.  It  was  a  recommencement  in  a  new 
form,  and  under  new  conditions,  of  the  old  conflicts  of 
Elizabethan  and  Carolinian  days.  The  High  Church- 
man exhibited  many  of  the  characteristics  of  Laud's 
Anglican  and  Charles's  Cavalier,  until  he  pushed  his 
views  to  that  extravagant  extreme  in  which  his  faith 
and  liberty  were  handed  over  alike  to  Ultramon- 
tanism. 

The  first  of  these  celebrated  tracts  appeared  on  the 
9th  of  September,  1833.  It  was  the  first  movement 
of  tlie  ecclesiastical  reaction  against  the  predominant 
Liberalism  that  resulted  from  the  wave  of  revolution 
which  had  passed  over  a  great  portion  of  Europe.  The 
writer  complained  that  the  times  were  very  evil,  and 
yet  that  no  one  spoke  against  them.  The  first  note 
sounded  was  that  of  Apostolical  Succession.  Dr. 
Newman  tells  us  that  he  had  been  some  years  in 
Oxford  before  he  was  taught  the  doctrine  by  a  friend 
as  he  walked  with  him  once  in  the  college  garden  ; 
and  he  heard  it  with  impatience.  Bishop  Blomfield 
contemptuously  remarked  that  Apostolical  Succession 
was  a  notion  that  had  gone  out  with  the  Nonjurors. 
As  an  historical  probability,  the  argument  in  favour  of 


THE    VICTOEIAN    ERA    OF    THE    CnURCH.  \) 

Apostolical  Successions  appears  to  be  exceedingly 
strong.  If  it  cannot  be  demonstrated,  it  nevertheless 
appears  to  have  powerful  grounds  for  moral  belief. 
The  question  nevertheless  arises,  as  Macaulay  acutely 
puts  it,  that  supposing  you  have  proved  Apostolical 
'Succession,  what  does  Apostolical  Succession  prove? 
In  this  very  first  tract  the  hypothesis  of  Dises- 
tablishment was  strongly  put  forward.  The  language 
loses  nothing  of  its  force  at  the  present  day.  "  Should 
the  government  and  the  country  so  far  forget  their 
God  as  to  cut  off  the  Church,  to  deprive  it  of  its 
temporal  honours  and  substance,  on  ivhat  ?  will  you 
rest  the  claims  to  respect  and  attention  which  you 
make  upon  your  flocks  ?  Hitherto  you  have  been  up- 
held by  your  birth,  your  education,  your  wealth,  your 
connection ;  should  these  secular  advantages  cease,  on 
what  must  Christ's  ministers  depend  ?"  The  writer 
proceeds  to  argue  that  the  Church  is  distinct  from  the 
State,  anterior  to  the  State,  separable  from  the  State, 
and  is,  in  fact,  strongly  of  the  opinion  that  the  separa- 
tion would  be  a  good  thing.  "  Give  us  our  own  and 
let  us  go  !"  was  their  exclamation,  echoed  on  all 
sides.  Neither,  for  the  last  forty  years,  have  they 
swerved  from  their  principles ;  and  many  a  sound 
Dissenter  who  detests  Prelacy  as  much  as  Popery 
has  been  astonished  to  find  himself  in  strong  politi- 
cal alliance  with  men  whose  theology  he  detests, 
and  whose  office  and  work  he  vilipends. 

If  we  look  at  the  arreat  religious  and  intellectual 
movements  of  the  era  it  can  hardly  be  said  that 
they  have  derived  much  impulse  from  our  great 
dignitaries.  In  the  earlier  years  the  Oxford  move- 
ment predominated,  and  we  have  the  great   names  of 


10  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

Newman,  Pusey,  and  Keble,  not  to  mention  Ward, 
Maskell,  Palmer,  and  many  others  fortisque  fortisqiie 
(Jloanthus.  The  influence  of  Mr.  Keble  has  been, 
perhaps,  the  most  salutary  of  our  age.  It  is,  perhaps, 
a  singular  way  of  putting  it ;  but  there  is  hardly  any 
campaign  in  history,  with  its  expenditures  of  thousands 
of  lives  and  millions  of  treasure  all  so  rapidly  absorbed 
in  the  sands  of  time,  that  has  left  such  fruitful  and 
enduriuQ;  results.  When  all  other  forms  of  greatness 
pass  away,  literary  greatness  survives.  To  Mr.  Keble 
the  stateliest  monument  of  our  age  is  erected,  greater 
than  the  Wellinsfton  Memorial,  s^reater  than  the  Prince 
Consort  Memorial,  the  erection  of  one  more  stately 
Colleo^e,  to  rank  among  the  institutions  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  No  peer  or  prelate  ever  off"ered  Keble  any  pro- 
motion ;  he  was  never  asked  to  be  bishop,  but  he  will 
be  enshrined  in  grateful  hearts  long  after  the  mob  of 
dignitaries  has  been  forgotten.  Such  prelates  as 
Bishop  Blomfield  and  Bishop  Philpotts  were  remark- 
able men  in  their  way,  but  their  influence  is  pale  and 
thin  bv  the  side  of  such  a  man  as  Mr.  Keble. 

In  spite  of  all  disclaimers,  it  is  evident  that  there 
"was  some  kind  of  unconscious  fusion  and  understand- 
ing between  the  Tractarians  and  the  Ultramontanes. 
Lord  Houghton  speaks  of  the  extravagant  expectations 
of  the  Catholics  based  upon  the  Oxford  movement. 
He  says  of  Cardinal  Wiseman  :  "  With  some  of  the 
Tractarian  party  he  had  friendly  relations,  and  he  had 
been  one  of  the  first  of  the  authorities  of  his  Church 
to  approach  them  with  a  sympathetic  interest,  and  to 
attract  them  to  what  he  believed  the  only  safe  conclu- 
sion by  a  kindly  appreciation  of  their  doubts  and 
difiiculties."     It  is  interesting  to  compare  the  simul- 


THE    VICTORIAN    EEA    OF    THE    CHURCH.  11 

taneous  movement  wbicli  was  ofoing^  on  in  Eno-land 

Do  d 

with  that  in  France,  headed  by  such  men  as  Monta- 
lembert  and  Lamennais.  The  movement  for  a  revival  of 
Catholic  truth  in  France,  had  its  point  of  resemblance 
with  the  Oxford  movement,  only  England  was  in  pos- 
session of  that  Catholic  truth  which  has  well-nio:h  died 
out  in  France.  Montalembert  exaggerated  the  nature 
of  the  Anghcan  movement,  and  was  greatly  surprised 
that  so  few  joined  the  Roman  Ciiurch.  It  appears 
to  us  that  Keble  himself  stayed  in  our  Church 
simply  because  on  the  balance  of  probabilities  it 
appeared  to  him  that  it  might  be  safest  to  do  so. 
Butler's  argument  was  always  Keble's  favourite  mode 
of  reasoning,  as  we  see  in  his  memoirs  and  in  some  of 
his  poems.  In  the  fourth  of  his  "  Tracts  for  the 
Times,"  Keble  argues  that  adhesion  to  the  Apostolical 
Succession  is  the  safest  course.  His  question  was  not 
so  much  "  Which  is  the  best  Church  ?"  as,  "  Shall  I 
be  safe  where  I  am  ?" 

It  is  impossible  almost  for  the  gentlest  nature  to 
avoid  some  approach  to  the  odium  theologicum.  We 
find  even  Keble  writing,  "As  things  get  more  per- 
plexing, I  keep  saying  to  myself  it  ought  to  make  me 
more  charitable,  and  then  the  next  minute  I  go  away 
and  rail  at  those  unhappy  ....  without  mercy." 
We  suspect  we  may  supply  the  ellipse  by  the  words 
"  Protestants"  or  "  Recordites."  His  learned  and 
venerable  biographer  confesses  that  he  feared  for 
him  the  growth  of  a  controversial  spirit.  Great  as 
was  Mr.  Keble  as  a  poet,  most  thinking  men  will 
agree  with  the  Bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells  iu  declining 
to  guarantee  his  more  private  opinions.  Although 
Keble  stayed  in  the  Church  of  England  when  so  many 


12  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

of  his  frieuds  went  out,  it  would  seem  that  he  stayed 
by  a  very  insecure  tenure,  that  would  be  unsatisfying 
if  this  period  becomes  better  known,  as  modern 
to  most  men. 

As  time  passes  on,  as  the  inner  history  bios^raphical 
literature    increases,    we    are    able    to    see    how    the 
effect   and   character  of  the  movement  were  watched 
and    guaged    by    the    best     opinions    of    the    time. 
For  the  popular  prejudices  arrayed  against  it  we  care 
little.     It  is  one  of   the  misfortunes  of  Protestantism 
that  it  has  always  been  so  easy  to  enlist  a  mob-cry  in 
its    favour.      There    were   ignorant   Protestants    who 
actually  chalked  upon  the  walls,  "  No  forgiveness  of 
sins  1"  "  No  Virgin  Mary  !"  exhibiting  a  Protestantism 
that  was  simply  Atheism.     There  were,  however,  acute 
and  religious  minds  that  could  do   full  justice  to  the 
good  effected  by  the  Tractarian  movement,  but  at  the 
same   time    could    estimate    and    criticise   its    effects. 
Take,   for  instance,  the  language  of  Sara   Coleridge, 
the  daughter  of  that  great  genius  and  thinker,  whose 
mantle  had  in  no  small  degree  fallen  upon  her.     Her 
admiration  for  Newman  is  great,  but  she  clearly  indi- 
cates   what    she    considers    party    spirit    and    errors. 
Now,   when   I   speak  of  leaguing  together,  of  course 
I    do   not   mean   that  Mr.   Newman   and    his  brother 
divines  exact  pledges  from  one  another,  like  men  on 
the  hustings,  but  I  do  believe  that  there  is  a  tacit  but 
efficient  general  compact  among  them  all.     Like  the 
Evangelicals  whom  they  so  often  condemn  on  this  very 
point,   they    use    a    characteristic    phraseology;    they 
have   their  badges  and   party  marks;   they  lay  great 
stress  on  trifling  external  matters  ;  they  have  a  stock 
of  aro-uments  and  topics  in  common.     No  sooner  has 


THE    VICTORIAN   ERA   OP    THE    CHURCH.  13 

Newman  blown  the  Gospel  blast,  than  it  is  repeated 
by  Pusey,  and  Pusey  is  re-echoed  from  Leeds.  Keble 
privately  persuades  Froude,  Froude  shouts  the  doc- 
trines of  Keble  to  Newman,  and  Newman  publishes 
them  as  'Fronde's  Remains.'  Now  it  seems  to  me 
that,  under  these  circumstances,  Truth  has  not  quite 
a  fair  chance.  "  The  truth  is,"  she  writes  to  her  friend, 
Mr.  Aubrey  de  Yere,  "  you  may  talk  as  you  will  about 
your  highness,  but  you  are  not  very  high  according  to 
the  Tract  standard,  which  places  height  in  this — ex- 
altation of  the  outward  in  reference  to  religion,  with  a 
proportionate  depression  of  the  acts  of  the  intelHgent 
will  in  the  individual  mind.  Not  but  they  would  like 
reason  well  enough,  if  she  declared  in  their  favour, 
but  they  hate  her  as  the  angry  king  did  the  prophet, 
because  he  always  prophesies  against  and  not  for 
them — that  is,  against  their  priest-exalting  system." 

Newman  left  the  Church,  left  it  with  language  of 
scathing  eloquence  and  reproach,  which  might  well 
cause  the  rulers  of  the  Church  to  inquire  carefully, 
what  measure  of  justice  his  passionate  lamentations 
may  contain.*  The  Bishops,  as  a  rule,  have  not  been 
the   originators  of  any  great  movement,  and,  histori- 

*  "  O,  mother  of  saints  !  0,  school  of  the  wise !  O  nurse  of  the 
heroic  !  of  whom  went  forth,  in  whom  have  dwelt,  memorable  names 
of  old,  to  spread  the  truth  abroad,  or  to  cherish  and  illustrate  it  at 
home !  0,  thou,  from  whom  surrounding  nations  lit  their  lamps  !  0, 
Yirgin  of  Israel !  wherefore  dost  thou  now  sit  on  the  ground  and  keep 
silence,  like  one  of  the  foolish  women  who  were  without  oil  at  the 
coming  of  the  Bridegroom  ?  Where  is  now  the  ruler  in  Sion,  and  the 
doctor  in  the  Temple,  and  the  ascetic  on  Carmel,  and  the  herald  in  the 
wilderness,  and  the  preacher  in  the  market-place?  Where  are  thy 
"  effectual  fervent  prayers,'"  offered  in  secret,  and  thy  alms  and  good 
works  coming  up  as  a  memorial  before  God?  How  is  it,  O,  once  holy 
place,  that  '  the  land  mourneth,  for  the  corn  is  wasted,  the  new  wine 


14  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

cally  speaking,  liave  looked  coldly  upon  enthusiasm. 
If  this  has  saved  us,  as  indubitably  it  has,  from  some 
errors  of  fervid  natures,  it  has  also  to  a  considerable 
dt'Ofree  chilled  the  warmth  of  reliofious  life. 

Yv^hat  may  be  called  the  Low  Church  or  Evangelical 
party  has  gone  through  no  such  phases  as  the  High 
Church  party  in  its  partial  development  first  into 
Tractarianism  and  then  into  Ritualism,  or  as  the  old 
Liberal  element,  first  into  the  Broad  Church  and  then 
into  Rationalism.  As  a  party  it  first  took  its  rise 
about  the  first  year  of  the  present  century,  perhaps 
the  darkest  and  unhappiest  year  for  England  that  the 
present  century  has  witnessed,  when  a  small  number 
of  clergymen,  with  still  fewer  laymen,  met  together  to 
concert  plans  which  should  arouse  the  religious  life  of 
the  country  and  scatter  the  Scriptures  broad-cast  upon 
the    world.      There    never   has    been    a   period  since 

is  dried  up,  the  oil  languisheth.  .  .  .  Because  joy  is  withered  away 
from  the  sons  of  men  ?'  Alas  for  the  day  !  .  .  .  how  do  the  beasts 
groan  !  the  herds  of  cattle  are  perplexed,  because  they  have  no  pas- 
tures, yea,  the  flocks  of  sheep  are  made  desolate.  "  Lebanon  is  ashamed 
and  hewn  down ;  Sharon  is  like  a  wilderness,  and  Bashan  and  Carmel 
shake  off  their  fruits. 

*-'  0,  my  mother,  whence  is  this  unto  thee,  that  thou  has  good 
things  poured  upon  thee,  and  canst  not  keep  them,  and  bearest  children, 
yet  darest  not  own  them  ?  Why  hast  thou  not  the  skill  to  own  their 
services,  nor  the  heart  to  rejoice  in  their  love  ?  How  is  it  that  what- 
ever is  generous  in  purpose,  and  tender  or  deep  in  devotion,  thy 
flower  and  thy  promise,  falls  from  thy  bosom,  and  finds  no  home 
within  thine  arms  ?  Who  hath  put  this  note  upon  thee,  to  have  '  a 
miscarrying  womb,  and  dry  breasts,'  to  be  strange  to  thine  own  flesh, 
and  thine  eye  cruel  towards  thy  little  ones.  Thine  own  ofi'spriug,  the 
fruit  of  thy  womb,  wiio  love  thee  and  wou'd  toil  for  thee,  thou  dost 
gaze  upon  with  fear,  as  though  a  portent,  or  thou  dost  loathe  as  an 
offence ;  at  best  thou  dost  but  endure,  as  if  they  had  no  claim  but  on 
thy  patience,  self-possession  and  vigilance,  to  be  rid  of  them  as  easily 
as   thou  mayest.     Thou  makest  them  '  stand  all  the  day  idle,'  as  the 


THE    VICTORIAN   ERA    OF    THE    CHURCH.  15 

Encrland  was  Eao^land,  since  the  time  when  the  lisrlit  of 
religion  first  permeated  our  islands,  that  an  Evangeli- 
cal element  has  been  wanting.  Just  as  the  political 
Liberal  party  is  not  supposed  to  monopolize  the  real 
liberality  of  the  country,  so  it  is  not  to  be  supposed 
that  the  theological  Evangelical  absorbs  and  concen- 
trates the  primitive,  Catholic  Gospel.  The  word, 
however,  serves  as  a  useful  label,  however  we  may 
regret  the  necessity  for  such  labels,  to  designate  a 
body  of  men,  an  order  of  opinions,  a  method  of  work- 
ing. It  may  be  said  of  this  school,  that  with  some 
exceptions,  ignoring  or  hardly  laying  due  stress  on  the 
intellectual  and  aesthetic  sides  of  religion,  it  has 
addressed  itself  in  the  most  direct  and  practical  way 
to  the  hearts  and  consciences  of  men,  dealt  plainly  and 
strongly  with  the  temptations  and  difficulties  of  life, 
and  urged  upon  the  natural  man  the  childlike  recep- 
tion of  supernatural  truth. 

very  condition  of  thy  bearing  with  them;  or  thou  biddest  them  be 
gone,  where  they  will  be  more  welcome;  or  thou  sellest  them  for 
nought  to  the  stranger  that  passes  by.  And  what  wilt  thou  do  in  the 
end  thereof?  .... 

"And,  0,  my  brethren,  O,  kind  and  affectionate  hearts,  O,  loving 
friends,  should  you  know  anyone  whose  lot  it  has  been,  by  writing  or 
by  word  of  mouth,  in  some  degree  to  help  you  thus  to  act ;  if  he  has 
ever  told  you  ivhat  you  knew  about  yourselves,  or  what  you  did  not  hnoxo  ; 
has  read  to  you  your  tvants  or  feelings,  and  comforted  you  by  the  very 
reading ;  has  made  you  feel  that  there  iv as  a  higher  life  than  this  daily 
one,  «nd  a  brighter  tvorld  than  that  you  see ;  or  encouraged  yvu,  or  sobered 
you,  or  opened  a  way  to  the  inquiry,  or  soothed  the  perplexed;  if  what  he 
he  has  said  or  done  has  ever  made  you  take  interest  in  him,  and  feel 
well  inclined  towards  him ;  remember  such  a  one  in  time  to  come, 
though  you  hear  him  not,  and  pray  for  him,  that  in  all  thing  he  may 
know  (Jod's  will,  and  at  all  times  he  may  be  ready  to  fulfil  it."  We 
have  added  Newman's  striking  personal  reference  because  it  has  given 
an  admirable  description  of  the  work  of  a  good  pastor  or  a  good  bishop. 


IG  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

The  cliief  position  of  this  party  is  its  Protes- 
tantism, meaning  by  Protestantism  not  that  mere 
negative  and  primitive  idea  which  those  who 
disclaim  Protestantism  love  to  attribute  to  it,  but 
the  great  body  of  religious  truth  defined  by  the 
Reformers  of  the  sixteenth  century  in  articles  and  in 
formularies.  For  a  long  time  the  party  had  almost  a 
missionary  character  ;  it  was  regarded  with  suspicion 
and  dislike  by  the  easy  churclimanship  of  the  old 
school.  It  is  touching  and  amusing  to  see  how  the 
grave  old  clique  of  Evangelicals  congratulated  one 
another  when  some  Bishop  could  be  got  to  be  vice- 
president  of  some  of  their  great  societies,  not  reflect- 
ing that  the  society  did  honour  to  the  Bishop  as  much 
as  the  Bishop  to  the  society.  In  time  the  Evangelical 
party  could  count  a  large  quota  of  prelates  among  its 
members,  it  rose  to  influence  and  power,  and  at  the 
present  time  is  perhaps  the  largest  element  in  the 
religious  life  of  the  nation.  At  the  same  time,  men 
who  are  Evangelical  in  spirit  are  becoming  increasingly 
slow  to  call  themselves  Evangelical  in  party.  It 
mio^ht  have  been  true  at  the  commencement  of  the 
present  century,  but  it  has  ceased  to  be  true  now,  that 
men  of  this  party  are  mainly  the  depositaries  and 
teachers  of  Gospel  truth.  Whatever  is  simply  party 
name  and  yjarty  spirit  is  bad,  and  increasingly  eschewed 
by  earnest  men.  Such  men  will  rejoice  if  by  any 
teachers,  or  in  any  way,  Christ  is  preached.  If  the 
Low  Church  party  has  not  undergone  the  violent  and 
marked  alterations  of  other  religious  bodies,  it  has 
manifested  some  silent  and  remarkable  changes. 
While  their  principles  have  triumphed,  their  adherents 
have  diminished.     Those  who  would  once  have  called 


THE   VICTORIAN    ERA    OP    THE    CHURCH.  17 

tliemselvos  Evangelical,  now  call  themselves  Moderate 
Churclimeu.     Moreover,  the  whole  level  of  the  party, 
as  a  party,  has  materially  risen.     Just  as  the  London 
of  the  present  day  is  built  upon  London  after  London 
that  has  passed  away,  and  is  many  feet  higher  than 
the  primitive  '*  city  of  ships"  conquered  by  Julius  ;  so, 
while  the  whole  nation  has  been  rising  by  the  purify- 
ing,   elevating    influence   of  feeling,    thought,   music, 
literature,  the  Evangelical  party  has  been  rising  in- 
sensibly and   simultaneously.     Many  things  are  now 
accepted  almost  without  question  which  might  have 
been  abhorrent  to  such   men  as   Cecil  and  Newton. 
Still  the  party  has  been  ever  true  to  its  fundamental 
principle.     It  has   always  looked  upon    questions    of 
ritual  with   a  view  to  their  relation   to  questions  of 
dogma.     Rites    and   ceremonies    were    the    outworks 
and    bastions    of    the     heart     of     the    citadel.      In 
some     remote     districts     there     may    be     ignorant, 
prejudiced    people    who     are     frightened     away   from 
churches  by  preaching  in  the  surplice,  chanting  the 
psalms,  and  by  reading  the  Offertory  sentences.     But 
Evangelicals  increasingly  regard  this  as   of  little  ac- 
count,  except,   as  through   particular   circumstances, 
they  are  related  to  questions  of  doctrines.     Most  of 
them  would  probably  agree  with    Mr.   Gladstone  on 
Ritualism,  if  by  Ritualism  is  simply  meant  the  beauty 
and  order  of  Church  services.     Btit  they  are  adaman- 
tine in  resistance,  when  the  whole  sio-nificance  of  the 
rite  depends  on  the  doctrine  which  the  rite  is  supposed 
to  teach. 

From  a  variety  of  circumstances,  just  as  Belgium 
was  once  the  cock-pit  of  Europe,  so  the  Church 
of  England    has    come    to    be   the    great    arena    of 

VOL.  i./>'-^  0 


18  OTJR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

theological  conflicts.    It  is  indeed  good  foi'  the  Church 
and  for  the  world  that  in   the  balance  of  forces  there 
should  be  a  party  that  stands  firmly  on  the  old  lines  of 
the  Reformation.     The  lines  of  the  great  Evangelical 
party  are  not  drawn  so  rigidly  as  they  were  aforetime. 
There  is  a  growing   disposition  to  look  rather  at  what 
a  man  is  and  does  than  at  any  personal  or  party  body. 
Many  men,   who  in  other  days  would  fairly  take  their 
places  in  the  ranks   of  the  so-called  Evangelicals,  are 
intensely  Evangelical  in  the  best  sense,  while  standing 
fairly  aloof  both  from  the  name  and  spirit  of  party.     It 
may  be  fairly  urged  on  their  behalf,  as  a  body,  that  they 
not  only  contend  earnestly  for  purity  of  faith,  but  that 
they  are  eminently  zealous  for  good  works.     They  may 
not  have  daily  services,   nor  weekly  nor  daily  celebra- 
tions, but  in   the  thorough  organisation  and  working 
of  parishes  their  work  is  admirable.   In  large  parishes, 
where  there  are  two   or   three  daily  services,  the  ten- 
dency is  that  parochial   house-to-house  visitation  gets 
overlooked.       Their    teaching    uniformly    is    earnest, 
simple,    practical.     In    the    whole    field   of  missions, 
whether  home  missions,   continental  missions,  or  mis-  ? 
sions  to  the  heathen  or  the  Jew,  their  activity  and  zeal 
are  intense.  According  to  their  last  Report,  the  Church 
Missionary  Society  raised   more  than  a  quarter  of  a 
million.     The  other  great  Missionary  Society  of  the 
Church  would  not  be  far  from  half  that  amount.    That 
list  of  good  works  of  every  kind,  and  designed  to  meet 
every  sort  of  evil  is  immense.     There  is  a  percentage  to 
be  deducted  for  a  certain  amount  of  mistake  and  mis- 
management.      Sometimes    interested    cliques     have 
sought  to  shape  and  direct  a  party  management,  and 
sometimes  committees,  in  their  zeal  for  cash  receipts, 
have  overlooked  the  weightier  matters  of  justice  and 


THE    VICTORIAN    EEA    OF    TUB    CHURCH.  19 

mercy ;  but  the  list  is  truly  imposing,  of  all  the  great 
objects  that  are  aimed  at,  aud  in  a  considerable  mea- 
sure achieved  by  the  great  Evangelical  party.  Evan- 
gelicalism is  often  sneered  at,  and  Exeter  Hall  has 
passed  into  a  by-word  and  a  proverb,  but  any  one  who 
will  honestly  endeavour  clearl}^  to  understand  the  one, 
and  accurately  to  judge  the  results  associated  with  the 
other,  will  obtain  a  view  of  the  greatest  machinery  and 
the  highest  results  known  in  the  Church. 

In  contrasting  these  men  with  "  Broad"  and  "  High," 
we  come  to  a  different  class  of  mind  and  to  a  different 
order  of  activities.  They  have  not  that  poetic  heart, 
those  deep  gifts  of  the  elevated  imagination,  the  pierc- 
ing intellect  that  characterise  such  men  as  Keble  and 
Newman.  It  will  probably  be  argued  that,  as  a  rule, 
they  have  scarcely  possessed  the  culture,  refinement, 
breadth  that  have  characterised  some  of  the  men  who 
have  been  conveniently  described  as  Broad  Church- 
men. But  in  the  intellectual  gifts  of  oratory  they 
have  probably  left  Broad  Church  and  High  Church 
equally  behind,  although  considerable  attempts  have 
been  made  at  the  present  day  to  restore  the  balance. 
Exeter  Hall  is  almost  a  phrase  of  contempt,  and  St. 
James's  Hall  is  fast  becoming  a  synon3^m  with  many. 
Still  some  of  the  best-spoken  eloquence  of  the  age  has 
been  heard  at  Exeter  Hall.  Lord  Macaulay  spoke  of 
"  Exeter  Hall  setting  up  its  bray,"  which  was  vevj 
ungracious  of  Lord  Macaulay,  as  his  first  London  ex- 
periment in  oratory  was  to  set  up  a  bray  of  his  own 
on  the  Slavery  question.  The  old  giants  of  the  Strand 
are  well-nigh  extinct,  and  the  new  giants  coming  on 
are  by  no  means  so  gigantic.  The  time  when  Exeter 
Hall  was  at  its  palmiest  was  when  such  men  as  Stowell 

c  2 


.20  OUK    BISHOPS    AXD    DEANS. 

and  McNeile  poured  forth  a  flood  of  eloquence,  wbich 
is  now  a  tradition  with  their  followers.  The  Hall 
would  be  besieged,  for  hours  before  the  business  of  the 
societies  began,  and  those  who  attended  simply  as  an 
intellectual  enjoyment,  and  desiring  to  understand  the 
possibilities  of  elocution,  admitted  that  the  rapt  out- 
pouring of  oratory  surpassed  the  most  sanguine  ex- 
pectations. We  have  astonished  some  of  our  greatest 
critics  in  oratory  by  pointing  to  some  of  the  noblest 
passages  that  may  be  found  in  the  eloquence  of  Low 
Church  clergymen.  In  every  direction  earnest  Evan- 
gelical preaching  was  characterised  by  a  force  and 
directness  that  had  little  prevailed  in  other  instances. 
Henry  Melvill  was,  after  the  two  eminent  names  we 
have  given,  the  third  great  orator  of  the  Evangelical 
school,  although,  unlike  the  others,  he  had  a  constitu- 
tional avoidance  of  platform  speaking,  and  concentrated 
his  great  powers  in  sermon-making.  Vigorous  ex- 
hortation was  the  characteristic  of  this  school,  and  it 
was  seconded  generally  by  vigorous  spiritual  life.  It 
was  popularly  said  that  their  energies  were  directed 
too  much  to  the  heathen  abroad,  and  that  they  did 
very  little  for  the  heathen  at  home.  This  is,  however, 
altogether  a  popular  fallacy.  It  is  found  by  experience 
that  the  people  who  do  nothing  for  work  abroad  are 
those  who  do  nothing  for  the  heathen  at  home.  It  is 
the  impulse  of  a  great  idea,  such  as  the  Evangelisation 
of  the  whole  world,  that  seems  to  lift  people  out  of  the 
ordinary  groove  of  life,  and  elicits,  almost  more  than 
any  other  impulse,  the  dormant  energies  and  fervour 
of  a  Church. 

For  a  long  time  the   High  Church  appeared  to  have 
abdicated  any  great   pulpit  efforts.      The  institution 


THE    YICTOraAN   ERA    OF    THE    CUURCH.  21 

seemed  to  have  been  somewhat  discredited  among 
its  leaders.  The  idea  was  that  a  sermon  should  be 
made  brief,  dry,  essaical,  moral  or  mystieal.  "  You 
must  not  preach  about  doctrine,"  said  an  elder  in  the 
ministry  to  a  younger  brother ;  "  you  should  give  us 
a  nice  little  essay  about  patience  or  something  of  that 
sort."  Dr.  Pusey's  sermons  often  resembled  the  style 
of  the  more  mystical  portions  of  St.  Augustine,  though 
with  nothing  of  that  impressive  liveliness  and  eloquence 
that  belonged  to  St.  Augustine  himself.  They  seemed 
to  set  the  fashion  all  through  the  country.  Young 
curates  of  the  Tractarian  type  adhered  to  one 
quarter  of  an  hour,  and  were  as  "  churchy"  in  their 
style  as  might  be.  The  idea  was  to  avoid  everything 
that  looked  like  popular  preaching,  and  we  are  bound 
to  say  that  the  idea  was  extremely  well  carried  out. 
Of  recent  years,  however,  a  change  came  over  the 
spirit  of  the  dream.  Both  the  High  and  the  Broad 
Church  have  become  alive  to  the  intense  importance 
of  preaching,  and  have  cultivated  it  with  extreme 
assiduity.  The  orators  in  the  High  Church  party  pro- 
bably now  take  the  van   in  this   direction.*     We  have 

*  Indeed  the  High  Church  pi^eachers  now  combine  with  their  dis- 
tinctive doctrine  some  of  the  elements  that  have  made  preaching  popular 
among  the  Wesleyans,  and  even  among  the  Eanters.  The  old  plan  of 
crying  in  the  pulpit  is  now  almost  obsolete.  "We  have  heard  of  one 
gentleman  who  by  dexterously  turning  off  the  gas  at  an  exciting  portion 
of  his  sermon  contrived  to  make  a  sensation.  Another,  by  gently 
fainting  away  in  the  course  of  his  remarks,  has  eai^ned  a  very  high 
degree  of  temporary  success.  The  modern  system  of  Missions  gives  an 
opportunity  of  exhibiting  the  most  varied  resources  and  the  highest 
eloquence  of  the  party.  The  eccentricities  of  oratory,  which  historically 
have  wrought  so  much,  have  been  used.  "  He  loves  you,  my  pretty 
dear,  He  loves  you,"  coming  from  the  venei'able  lips  of  the  late  Mr. 
Aitkin  was  doubtless  a  touch  of  nature  that  went  at  once  to  the  hearts 
of  a  youthful  auditory.     Those  who  are  acquainted  with  the  Mission 


22  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

by  UDiversal  consent  no  more  eloquent  preacher  than 
the  avowed  High  Churchman. 

This  preaching,  which  is  the  great  function  of  the 
working  Church,  that  once  in  breadth  and  energy  was 
well-nigh  monopolised  by  the  EvangeHcals,  has  now 
been  vehemently  taken  up  both  by  the  High  Church- 
man and  the  Ritualist,  the  Left  and  the  Mountain.  In 
the  same  way  the  Evangelical  party  led  to  the  deve- 
lopment and  improvement  in  Hymnology  ;  the  High 
Church  long  contended  for  Sternhold  and  Hopkins,  and 
is  DOW  parallel  with,  if  it  has  not  outstripped,  the  other 
side.  The  main  burden  of  Missions  for  many  years 
lay  on  the  Evangelicals,  but  now  the  great  High  Church 
Society,  resuscitated  into  vigorous  life,  bears  a  noble 
rivalry,  in  which  it  is  not  left  so  very  far  behind. 
Similarly  when  any  new  cause  is  brought  before  the 
public,  its  merits  are  earliest  appreciated  by  the  vigour 
and  zeal  of  the  Low  Church.  The  "  Hiarh"  is  some- 
what  languid  and  suspicious  at  first,  but  if  the  cause 
is  good  it  is  generally  taken  up,  though  probably  under 
a  new  name  and  different  organisation. 

In  speaking  of  the  Broad  Church,  there  was  one  lay 
influence  which  was  of  paramount  importance.  We 
need  hardly  say  that  this  was  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge. 
Some  persons  go  so  far  as,  not  without  good  grounds, 
to  speak  of  "  the  great  Coleridge  era."  How  many, 
both  lay  and  cleric,  trace  up  their  religious  and  intel- 
lectual ancestry  to  him  ?  He  was  the  leading  inter- 
preter between  the  mind  of  England  and  the  mind  of 
Germany.     From    time  to    time   we    meet    men   with 

work  are  aware  that  there  is  now  a  sensational  style  of  pulpit  eloquence 
within  the  Church  of  England,  compared  with  which  all  former  styles 
are  tame  and  old-fashioned. 


THE    VICTORIAN    EKA    OF    THE    CHURCH.  23 

whom  it  is  the  happiest  recollectioa  that  they  attended 
now  and  then  one  of  Coleridge's  soirees,  that  they  were 
privileged  to  listen  to  him  in  his  chamber  at  High- 
irate,  or  sometimes  listened  in  London  dining-rooms 
to  what  seemed  to  the  uninitiated  unintelligible  and 
interminable  jargon.  A  small  London  surgeon  gave 
him  the  effectual  aid  and  countenance  which  peer  and 
millionaire  might  have  been  immortalised  by  bestow- 
ing. One  of  the  most  enhghtened  of  his  disciples 
was  Julius  Hai'e,  the  frankest  and  ablest  of  the  ex- 
ponents of  the  origines  of  the  so-called  Broad  Church. 
It  is  remarkable  that  with  Bunsen  and  Hare,  as  with 
Luther  before  them,  it  was  the  actual  personal  know- 
ledo^e  of  Eome  which  made  them  revolt  from  Romanism. 
By  far  among  the  most  eminent  men  who  laid  the 
foundation  of  what  may  be  called  Liberal  Theology 
in  Eno^land  were  Dr.  Arnold  and  Archdeacon  Hare. 
The  influence  of  Coleridge  was  chiefly  felt  at  Cam- 
bridge, and  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  Coleridge 
acted  on  the  mind  of  Cambridge  much  as  Oriel  acted 
on  the  mind  of  Oxford.  Hare's  description  of  Cole- 
ridge might  be  paralleled  with  the  description  which 
Alcibiades  gives  of  the  eloquence  of  Socrates  : — "At  the 
sweet  sound  of  that  musical  voice  men  seemed  to  feel 
their  souls  teem  and  burst  as  beneath  the  breath  of 
Spring,  while  the  life-giving  words  of  the  poet-philoso- 
pher flowed  over  them."  Hare  dedicated  his  great  work, 
which  has  been  a  help,  consolation,  and  turning-point 
in  many  lives,  "  to  the  honoured  memory  of  Samuel 
Taylor  Coleridge,  who,  through  dark  and  winding 
paths  of  speculation,  was  led  to  the  light,  in  order 
that  others,  by  his  guidance,  might  reach  that  light 
without  passing  through  the  darkness,"  and  described 


24  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

himself  as  one  of  the  many  pupils  who  had,  by  his 
writings,  been  helped  to  discern  the  sacred  concord 
and  unity  of  human  and  divine  truth.  Side  by  side 
with  Coleridge  he  placed  the  benign  influence  of  AVil- 
liam  Wordsworth,  who,  while  many  of  our  contem- 
porary stars  are  paling,  is  probably  now  only  on  the 
threshold  of  the  vast  influence  he  will  wield  over  the 
better  English  mind. 

If  we  take  Hare  and  Arnold  as  the  leading  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Broad  Church  school,  it  is  certainly 
to  be  said  that  these  men  stand  out  in  marked  contra- 
distinction to  many  of  those  who  claim  to  be  his  fol- 
lowers. Arnold  was  a  man  of  singularly  earnest,  fair- 
minded,  and  Catholic  nature  ;  he  was  saturated  with 
the  literature  of  Germany,  but  his  Germanism  is  in 
reality  quite  free  from  the  taint  that  might  alarm  the 
orthodox.  He  was  learned,  he  was  eloquent,  and  the 
intensity  of  his  hatred  of  moral  evil  was  a  central 
flame  to  give  heat  and  light  to  those  around  him. 
Canon  Liddon  thinks  that  the  Latitudinarianism  of 
Arnold  might  have  progressed  further,  and  speaks  of 
'  the  germs  of  that  riper  unbelief  from  which  the  gifted 
Head-Master  of  Rugby  was  saved  by  an  early  death.' 
But  a  great  leader  of  the  Evangelical  party,  Edward 
Bickersteth,  takes  a  kinder,  milder  view  : — "  He  did  not 
wax  worse  and  worse,  but  better  and  better,  and  his 
last  days  were  his  best  days."  The  Broad  Church 
has  produced  many  eminent  men,  but  its  latest  and 
most  extreme  phase  has  shown  a  party  disloyal  to  the 
Church  of  England,  and  that  which  is  infinitely  greater 
— the  Church  of  Christ. 

I    would    venture,    indeed,    to    take    the    life    of 
Juhus    Hare    as    one    of    an   eminently    typical   and 


THE    VICTORIAN    P:RA    OP    THE    CnURCH,  25 

representative  character,  cue  that  was  Cathohc  with- 
out being  Ultramontane,  Broad  without  degenerating 
into    Latitudinarianism.     His    life,    whether   in   col- 
leofe-rooms   or  in  the  retirement  of  his  Sussex  rec- 
tory,  was  emphatically  the  hfe  of  the  student  and  the 
thinker,  but  of  late  years  quite  a  broad  flare  of  light  has 
been  thrown  upon  his  quiet  oratory.*     He  was  the  last 
Hare  of  Hurstmonceaux,  of  that  ancient  family  who  had 
for   centuries  inhabited'  the  ancient  place  whose  ivied 
ruins  are  regularly  visited  by  tourists  from  Brighton 
and  St.  Leonard's.     Many  men's  writings  are  greater 
than  themselves,  but  Hare  was  greater  than  his  writings. 
Above  all,  in  these  heated   days   of  controversy,  his 
example  had  an  ethical  and  religious  value  of  its  own. 
It  was  impossible  to  move  Hare  from  his  attitude  of 
perfect  fairness  and  Catholicity.     The  dwelling-house 
of  his  soul  had  each  window  unbarred  and  free,  and 
was  everywhere   swept  by  thie  clear  sunlight  and  the 
living  breeze.     By  the  structure  of  his  intellectual  and 
moral  nature  he  seemed  to  go  a  certain  way  with  each 
party,  and  to  be  coloured  by  its  influence.     But  there 
was  no  place  for  vulgar  party  in  his  mind.     When  he 
appears  to  be  taking  the  more  advanced  Liberal  side, 
he  presently  falls  back  on  the  most  constitutional  lines 
of    orthodoxv.      In    his    teachino;    he    is    alike    most 
Catholic,  most  Evangelical.     He  had  the  most  earnest 
sympathies  with  such  a  man  as  Henry  Venn  Elliott  of 
Brighton,  with  such  men  as  his  own  kinsman,  Arthur 
Stanley.     The  contemporary   who   most   perpetuated 
the  influence   of  Coleridge,   and  his   own  tastes   and 

*  By  Dean  Stanley  ("Quarterly  Review,"  July,  18C8) ;  Professor 
Plumptre  (Memoir  prefixed  to  "  Guesses  at  Truth) ;  Mr.  Augustus 
J.  C.  Hare  ("  Memoir  of  a  Quiet  Life.") 


26  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

feelings  was  Bishop  Tbirlwall,  while  through  his  curate 
Sterliug  he  had  alliance,  though  he  would  have  little 
sympathy  with  the  most  advanced  school  of  Liberal 
theology. 

Great  indeed  was  the  shock  when  it  became  known 
to  him  that  Archdeacon  Manning  was  about  to  go  over 
to  the  Church  of  Rome.  It  seemed  to  help  to  shatter 
his  failing  health.  Thus  he  wrote  to  his  clergy,  and 
some  such  words  have  been  often  sorrowfully  re- 
echoed on  similar  occasions,  how  "  we  have  to 
mourn  over  the  defection  and  desertion  of  one 
whom  w'e  have  long  been  accustomed  to  honour, 
to  reverence,  and  to  love — of  one  who,  for  the  last 
ten  years,  has  taken  a  leading  part  in  every  measure 
adopted  for  the  good  of  the  diocese;  of  one  to  whose 
eloquence  we  have  so  often  listened  with  delight, 
sanctified  by  the  holy  purposes  that  eloquence  was  ever 
used  to  promote.  I  can  only  wonder  at  the  inscrutable 
dispensation  by  which  such  a  man  has  been  allowed  to 
fall  under  so  withering,  soul-deadeuiug  a  spell."  A 
few  years  afterwards  he  passed  away.  ^Yith  eyes 
raised  to  Heaven,  and  with  a  look  of  indescribable 
brightness,  his  last  words  were  "  Upwards,  upwards  !" 
He  verified  one  of  his  own  guesses,  guesses  that  so 
often  guessed  right.  "  Children  always  turn  to  the 
light.     Oh  that  grown-up  men  would  do  likewise  !" 

Then  there  are  words  worth  recording  of  that  great 
and  good  man,  Julius  Hare,  to  his  coadjutor,  Arch- 
deacon Manning,  which  have  since  acquired  an  un- 
happy significance.  "  Unity,  the  unity  of  the  Church, 
is  of  all  things  the  dearest  to  your  heart,  at  least  only 
subordioate  to,  or  rather  co-ordinate  with  truth,  with- 
out which  you  well  know  all  unity  must  be  fallacious. 


THE    VICTOKIAN    ERA    OV    THE    CHURCH. 


27 


If  I  may,  without  presumption,  apply  words  which 
were  spoken  of  wiser  and  holier  men,  may  the  survivor 
of  us  be  enabled  to  say,  as  Archbishop  Bramhall  said 
of  himself  and  Usher,  who  in  like  manner  differed  from 
him  on  sundry  points  of  opinion  and  feeling  : — '  I 
praise  God  we  were  like  two  candles  in  the  Levitical 
temple,  looking  one  toward  another,  and  both  toward 
the  stem.  We  had  no  contention  among  us,  but  who 
should  hate  contention  most,  and  pursue  the  peace  of 
the  Church  with  swiftest  paces.'  " 

In  John  Frederick  Denison  Maurice  we  had  the 
pupil  of  Coleridge,  the  ally  of  Julius  Hare,  a  leader 
of  Liberalism,  and  one  of  the  most  kindly  and  accom- 
plished of  English  thinkers.  Mr.  Maurice  was  both  a 
philosopher  and  a  theologian,  and  in  an  unusual  degree 
he  gave  a  philosophical  colouring  to  his  theology,  and 
a  theological  tone  to  his  philosophy.  He  was  in  his 
youth  a  member  of  that  remarkable  society  of  young 
men  at  Cambridge,  known  as  the  "  Apostles,"  who 
have  encouraged  high  thinking  in  England,  perhaps 
to  a  higher  degree  than  any  similar  association  that 
can  be  named.  He  had  been  litterateur,  novelist, 
scholar,  but,  most  of  all,  he  was  a  philosopher.  Mr. 
Maurice  had  also  family  affinities  with  some  of  the 
most  remarkable  writers  of  the  day.  He  had  not  that 
patristic  learning  or  familiarity  with  German  exegesis 
that  enabled  such  men  as  Trench  and  Alford  so  pro- 
minently to  set  their  mark  on  the  clerical  mind  ;  but 
Mr.  Maurice  seems  to  have  been  superior  to  both  these 
eminent  men  in  philosophical  culture  and  in  breadth 
of  intellect.  His  distinctive  principles  were  only  few, 
but  he  surveyed  the  whole  world  of  thought  in  their 
illustration,  and  he  was  sometimes  almost  lost  in  the 


28  OUR   BISHOPS    AInD    DEANS. 

illimitable  fields  over  which  he  waodered.     His  mind 
was   essentially   of  the  Socratic  cast ;  Plato-like,  he 
would  deliffhtin  the  dialoo^ues  of  Search  and  Negation  ; 
_and  the  intellectual  process  of  inquiry  was  as  welcome 
as  any  of  its  results.     He  was  one  of  those  who  were 
brought  within  the  living  influence  of  Coleridge,  and 
in  a  transmuted  form  transmitted  the  great  philoso- 
pher's esoteric  teaching  to  a  new  public.     Mr.  Maurice 
had  an  extraordinary  power  of  concentrating  abstract 
thought  on  contemporary  history.     We   have  heard 
him   spoken   of,   in  the   '48    times,  as    the    Christian 
Socialist,  and  he  would  not  then  have  disdained  the 
title  of  Communist,  if  permitted  to  give  his  own  defi- 
nition  of  the  term.     His  best    sympathies,   his  best 
energies  were  with  working  men,  nor  would  he  greatly 
care  for  speculations  which  were  untranslatable  into 
action.     His  nature  vibrated  to  every  wave  of  current 
history,  as  he  was  consumed  by  the  love  of  Truth  and 
Freedom.     Mr.  Maurice   gathered   round  him  a  band 
of  earnest  and   attached    disciples.     His  friends  often 
loved  him  with  a  passionate  enthusiasm,  and  looked 
upon  "the  Prophet"  as  an  ancient  school  of  Prophets 
would  look  on  the  mighty  Prophet  of  that  time.     The 
preachership  of  Lincoln's  Inn,  one  of  the  great  prizes 
of  the  Church,  was  at  one  time  occupied  by  a  rhetorical 
nonentity,  while  the  humbler  post  of  chaplain  belonged 
to  the   ardent  philosopher  who  often  drew  together 
the   best  minds  of  London.     How  many  of  us   there 
are  who  recollect  those  afternoons  of  long  ago,  how 
we   saw  the   light  through  the  illuminated  windows, 
touching,  as  with  a  glory,  the  noble  face  and  brow  of 
the  preacher ;   we  used  to  hang  on  his  rich  tremulous 


THE    VICTORIAN   ERA    OF   THE    CHURCH.  29 

eloquent  accents,  which   has  left  on  so  many  an   in- 
effaceable impression. 

Mr.  Maurice  was  in  those  days  the  centre  and  focus 
of  wide  spiritual  and  intellectual  interests.     His  con- 
flict with  Principal   Jelf,  on   the  import  of   the  word 
eternal,  lost   him    his   chair   at    Kins^'s    Collecre,    but 
pei'haps  deepened  and  extended  his  popularity.  Never- 
theless,   when    the    First    Commissioner    of    Works 
transferred  him  to  Vere   Chapel,  he  did   not  seem  to 
retain  the  same  hold  on  a  more  mixed  assemblage  which 
he  did  on  the  more  select  audiences  of  Lincoln's  Inn. 
It  is   a    comment    on   the  popular   distaste  for    high 
thinkino^,  that  one  Summer  morning,  when   we  were 
there,  about  thirteen  people  were  counted  fast  asleep. 
Subsequently  Mr.   Maurice  surrendered  this  position, 
and  fixed  his  abode  at   Cambridsfe.     In  earlv  life  he 
had  been   a    Cambrids^e   man,   but   had    mio^rated    to 
Oxford,  partly  from  circumstances  of  his  history,  and 
partly,    perhaps,    because    he    had    like    tastes    and 
sympathies  with  the   Oxford  course    and    the    corre- 
sponding type  of  raind.     His  first  University,  however, 
claimed  her  alumnus,  and  he  reflected  immense  lustre 
on  the  philosophical  chair  which  he  was  called  to  fill, 
in  which  he  succeeded  perhaps  a  sounder  thinker,  the 
late  Professor  Grote,  and  is  succeeded  by  a  writer  so 
clear  and  sincere  as  Mr.  Birks. 

Mr.  Maurice  himself  was  a  writer  of  the  chiaro- 
scuro order.  In  fact,  he  had  two  styles :  one 
eminently  transparent,  the  other  involved  and  obscure. 
When  he  had  to  present  philosophy  in  historical  forms, 
he  was  remarkable  for  clearness  and  precision.  His 
four  volumes  on  the  "  History  of  Philosophy,"  are 
perhaps    his    most    useful    and    permanent    writings. 


30  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

On  philosophic-religious  subjects,  invested  with  some 
degree  of  mysticism,  some  degree  of  metaphysics,  it 
was  often  extremely  hard  to  detect  his  real  point  of 
view.  We  have  gone  through  some  of  his  writings, 
pencil  in  hand,  and  could  only  very  rarely,  as  lighting 
upon  a  definite  opinion,  underline  a  passage  or  turn 
down  a  page.  The  thought  was  often  so  vague  and 
subtle  as  to  elude  fixity,  and  there  are  various  interest- 
ing subjects  on  which  we  should  be  glad  to  be  assured 
what  Mr.  Maurice's  real  opinions  were.  The  intellect 
was  splendid  and  lucid,  but  perhaps  not  without  an 
alloy  of  what  was  crotchety.  We  confess  that  for 
ourselves  obscurity  of  style  generally  augurs  obscurity 
of  thought. 

Mr.  Maurice's  wonderful  influence  was  to  a  great 
extent  a  personal  influence;  none  of  his  writings  have 
the  simplicity,  charm,  and  tenderness  of  his  conversa- 
tion. The  eagerness  with  which  he  sought  to  promote 
practical,  intelligible  ends  was  fully  understood  by  the 
working  classes,  who  might  be  incompetent  to  follow 
the  drift  of  his  teaching.  He  threw  himself  with 
peculiar  energy  into  the  cause  of  woman's  education. 
In  the  progress  of  our  days,  his  eff'orts  to  procure  the 
highest  intellectual  training  for  woman  will  always  be 
gratefully  recollected.  He  also  gave  some  of  his  best 
teaching  to  working  men's  colleges,  calling  all  the 
philosophy  of  history  to  throw  light  on  the  political 
question  which  might  aff"ect  their  condition  and  pro- 
spects. He  was  one  of  those  public  men — assuredly 
not  too  man}^ — who  threw  all  their  wealth  of  sym- 
pathy and  intellect  into  the  side  of  those  who  were 
overweighted  in  the  conflicts  of  life. 


THE    VICTORIAN   EK'A    OF    THE    CHURCH.  31 

As    the    High     Church     has    pai'tly    passed    into 
RituaHsra,  so  the  Broad  Church   has  in  part  lapsed 
iuto    RationaUsm.      There    has   been    a    considerable 
advance  among  the  '*  Liberals"   from   the  views   even 
of   Mr.    Maurice,    and    of    Robertson,    of   Brighton. 
Mr.  Froude   says,   "  the   clergyman   of  the  nineteenth 
century   subscribes  to  the  thirty-nine  Articles  with  a 
smile  as  might  have  been  worn  by   Samson  when  his 
Philistine   mistress   bound  his    arms    with    the   cords 
and  withes."     This   may  have  been  true  of    that  dis- 
tinguished historian  when  he  took   Deacon's   orders, 
and  of  a  small  body  of  other  clergy  ;  but  it  is  certainly 
not  true  of  the  mass  of  the  English   clergy.     There 
are  some  who  may  be   said  to  possess  revolutionary 
views  in  theology ;  but  their  small  though  intellectual 
and    energetic    party  seem    constantly  to    be    under- 
going a  process  of  elimination.     Now  that  Archbishop 
Tait  has  carried  his   proposals  for  cheap   and  speedy 
justice  in  cases  of  errors  of  ritual,  it  might  be  plausibly 
uro:ed    that   there    should  be    some    extension    of  it 
for   the   purpose   of  putting    down   errors   in   dogma. 
There  is  a  large  amount  of  passive  unbelief  outside 
the   Church,  which  is    not  unrepresented   within   the 
limits  of  the   Church   itself.     Theological   philosophy, 
or  rather  anti-theological  philosophy  is  a  subject  that 
turns  up  every  now  and  then.     The   Times  headed  a 
review    some     time     ago    of     a    publication    of    the 
Duke    of    Somerset's,    with    the    title    "Fashionable 
Scepticism."  Every  now  and  then  scepticism  becomes 
exceedingly  fashionable,    especially    when   demi-semi- 
sceptical  books    are  issued   by  a   bishop,  or  a   work 
directly    negativing   Christianity,    by   a    duke ;    Lord 


32  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Russell  too  is  ready  to  propose  a    Reform    Bill    for 
theology,  and  might  be  ready  to  do  as  much  for    the 
heavenly     bodies     themselves.       Such     a    work     as 
"  Essays  and   Reviews,"    or   "  Ecce  Homo"   has    an 
immense  run ;  the  circulation  rivals   that  of  the  last 
sensational  novel ;  a   man  is  thought   a  barbarian  if 
he  has   not   read   it;    edition  after  edition  is  issued 
with  starthng  rapidity.     Then    the  rage   dies   off  as 
suddenly  as  it  came  on ;  the  copies  he  as  lumber  on 
the  shelves  ;  they  are   cheapened   to  the  last  degree, 
they  are  exported,  they  are  burnt  up  as   manure.     In 
the    meantime   the     steady    sale    of    sound   religious 
works  is  never  diminished,  and  more  publications  are 
issued  in   theology   than  in   any  other  department  of 
literature.     Now  what  are    we    to    say    to    books    of 
this  class,  which  are  to  administer  the  coup  de  grace  to 
Christianity,  as  Lord   Bolingbroke  and  various  other 
persons  of  quality  or  no  quahty  have   attempted  to 
do  in   other  days.     It  is  simply  an  error,  constantly 
refuted   by  facts,   that   theology  is  going  down,  and 
must  be  rejected  by  all  persons   of  sense  and  educa- 
tion.    Strangely  enough  this  opinion  seems  sometimes 
to  be  held   within  the  clerical  order  itself.     A  great 
deal  of  this  infidehty  both  in  the  Church  and  the  world 
is  more  apparent  than  real.     There  are  a  few  earnest, 
intelligent  unbelievers,  but  their  words  are  echoed  by 
those   who  hardly  understand  them,    by  those   who 
seek  a  cheap   reputation   for  earnestness  and  ability, 
through  trading  on  the  efforts  of  earnest  and  abler  men. 
We  question   if  many  of  those  who  parade  at  second 
hand  the  conclusions   of  Dr.  Darwin  and  Mr.   Huxley, 
could  pass  the  most  elementary  paper  examinations  on 
what  those   conclusions   really  are,    or  the  scientific 


THE    VICTOEIAN    ERA    OF   THE    CHURCH.  33 

evidences    on    wliich    thej    are   based.      Still   in   the 
fashionable   scepticism  of  these  times,  there  are  those 
of  the  clergy  who   have   a  full  share.     There  is  one 
clerical    acquaintance    who     revives    the    heresy    of 
Hymengeas  and  Philetus  in  saying  that  the  Resurrec- 
tion is  passed  already,  and  another  who  places  Isaiah 
on  a  parallel  with   Merlin.     There   are  those  whose 
opinions   may  be   called  Yoyseyite  though  they  have 
never  been  ejected  like  Mr.  Yoysey.    These  individuals 
have    not   been   prosecuted,  are  unlikely  to   be  pro- 
secuted, had  better  not  be  prosecuted.     But  such  men 
have  no   moral  or  legal    standpoint  in    the   Church. 
The  number  of  them   is,  we    have  every    reason   to 
believe,  extremely   small.     Even  some  of  these  may 
be  accredited  with  motives  which,  however  mistaken, 
are  different  from  the  coarse,  base  motives  of  merely 
personal    aims.      Some  may   imagine    tha^    they   are 
serving  great  political  ends,  by  indicating  the  extreme 
limits  of  freedom  within  the   church.     No  one  who  is 
acquainted  with  some  clerical  societies,  and  with  the 
tone  of  conversation  in  some  circles  can  be  doubtful 
of  the  considerable  infidelity  that  exists,  in  variously 
modified  forms,  in  ordinary  society,  not  altogether  ex- 
cluding the  clerical.    These  may  of  course  go  altogether 
beyond  the  limits  of  the  devout  Liberal  clergy. 

These  Liberal  clergy,  to  a  considerable  degree, 
abdicate  the  formal  notion  of  a  sermon.  Often  there 
is  no  text.  One  of  them  announces,  for  instance, 
the  wreck  of  the  Northfleet  for  his  subject,  and 
steps  at  once  m  medias  res ;  another,  who  might  be 
called  the  Corypheeas  of  this  set,  gives  a  set  of  lec- 
tures on  English  poets,  such  as  Blake,  the  child-man, 
or  discusses   Shelley  or   Byron.     Another  "  convert, 

VOL.  I.  D 


34  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

pervert,  and  revert"  discourses  concerning  Prince 
Bismarck.  Indeed,  as  we  glance  down  the  columns 
of  the  Times  that  advertises  the  sustenance  of  the 
Sunday,  we  are  tempted  to  suppose  that  the  religious 
mind  of  London  is  thoroughly  athirst  for  novelties  of 
religion,  and  expects  that  the  subjects  of  the  pulpit 
should  be  placed  on  the  same  level  with  those  of  the 
lecture-room  and  the  discussion  forum.  We  are  re- 
called, however,  to  the  right  bearings  of  the  case 
when  we  recollect  the  hundreds  of  churches  with 
overflowing  congregations,  where  the  clergy  do  not 
rack  their  brains  for  sensational  topics,  and  their 
flocks  find  enduring  sustenance  in  the  word  of  Life. 
We  have  turned  away  from  St.  George's  Hall,  nearly 
empty,  where  the  men  of  science  have  been  endea- 
vouring to  feed  the  people  with  science,  to  some 
larger  and  well-thronged  edifice,  where  the  attempt 
has  been  "  to  preach  simple  Christ  to  simple  man." 
Either  the  merely  sensational  or  the  merely  scientific 
element  is  altogether  out  of  place  in  the  pulpit. 
That  clergyman  is  more  or  less  discredited  who 
obviously  desires  to  turn  his  church  into  what  is 
famiharly  known  as  "  a  preaching  shop."  It  is  in- 
variably recognised  that  "  praying's  the  end  of  preach- 
ing." Religion  died  out  in  France  amid  a  blaze  of 
popular  preaching,  and  the  servant  of  Christ,  however 
the  people  may  clamour  for  stones,  will  seek  to  give 
them  bread.  As  a  rule  we  find  amid  our  great  digni- 
taries points  of  stability  that  withstand  the  unset- 
tledness  of  the  times,  but  we  have  at  least  one  or 
two  of  them  whose  discourses  always  seem  to  wear 
the  ad  populum  air,  or  who  seem  to  desire  to  make 
themselves  tribunes  of  the  people. 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OP   THE    CHURCH.  35 

The  latest  and  most  remarkable  of  Ecclesiastical  de- 
velopments is  that  of  Ritualism.  What  is  very  remark- 
able in  the  history  of  Ritualism  is  its  sudden  growth- 
The  causes  and  history  of  the  phenomenon  have  never 
yet  been  explored  and  explained.  All  at  once,  in  more 
than  a  hundred  churches,  there  suddenly  appeared 
coloured  vestments  ;  candles  lighted  during  the  Com- 
munion in  the  morning,  and  during  the  Magnificat  in 
the  afternoon  ;  a  new  liturgy  interpolated  into  that 
established  bylaw;  prostration,  genuflexion,  elevations 
never  before  seen  ;  the  transformation  of  the  worship 
of  the  Church  of  England  into  that  of  the  Church  of 
Rome  so  exact  as  to  deceive  Roman  Catholics  them- 
selves in  the  momentary  belief  that  they  were  in  their 
own  places  of  worship.  We  might  add  that  some  of 
the  cultivated  Hindoos  now  in  London  mip:ht  readilv 
beheve  that  they  were  in  a  Buddhist  Temple. 

When  we  wish  to  define  and  describe  this  latest  de- 
velopment of  our  times  we  go  to  the  language  of  one 
of  the  most  thoughtful  of  our  prelates. 

"  Ritualism,"  says  Bishop  Ellicott,  "  was  probably  at 
first  only  sensational  and  aesthetic.  It  arose,  appa- 
rently, from  more  than  one  imperfectly-defined  source, 
but  perhaps  mainly  from  a  desire  to  do  outward  honour 
and  reverence  to  Almighty  God  in  our  services,  and 
to  raise  public  prayer  and  praise  into  worship  and  de- 
votion. At  first  it  met  with  but  little  direct  sympathy. 
The  elder  and  leading  members  of  the  High  Church 
party  not  only  gave  it  no  encouragement,  but  even  to 
some  extent  discountenanced  it.  If  my  memory  serves 
me  rightly,  a  dignitary  of  the  Church,  who  is  now  one 
of   the    most    enthusiastic    supporters    of    it,    wrote 

D  2 


36  OUR   BISHOPS  AND    DEANS. 

publicly,  at  the  time  I  am  alludiDg  to,  in  anything  but 
terms  of  approval.  Deiinite  doctrine,  however,  in 
reference  to  the  Lord's  presence  in  the  Holy  Eucharist, 
was  soon  associated  with  the  outward  and  aesthetic  ; 
and  then,  gradually,  many  respected  names  in  the 
Church  connected  with  the  Oxford  school,  directly  or 
by  sympathies,  either  joined  the  movement  or  gave  it 
their  tacit  support.  Combined  with  this  influence, 
arising  from  Eucharistic  teaching,  there  was  and  had 
silently  existed  for  some  little  time  in  the  Church  a 
deep  desire  for  union,  as  far  as  possible,  with  the 
sundered  Churches  of  the  East  and  the  West,  and  with 
it  a  natural  readiness  to  conform  more  and  more  with 
usages  which  were  common  to  these  Churches,  and  to 
exhibit  the  inward  desire  by  outward  manifestation. 
This  I  ventured  to  put  forward  in  a  sermon  preached, 
and  which  I  have  lived  to  see,  sadly  verified  in  many 
particulars.  There  was  one  sentence  which  perhaps 
I  may  be  excused  for  reproducing,  as  it  illustrates 
seriously  enough  the  present  aspects  of  the  movement. 
I  stated  my  persuasion  that  there  was  then  develop- 
ing '  a  clear  desire  to  supplement  the  Prayer-book,  to 
rehabilitate  the  principles  of  the  Reformation,  and  to 
modify  to  some  extent  that  ever-recurrent  reference  to 
the  personal  and  subjective  faith  of  the  individual 
Christian,  which  was  the  principle  that  our  forefathers 
in  Christ  most  solemnly  vindicated  for  us,  which  they 
illustrated  by  their  lives  and  their  teaching,  and  which 
they  sealed  with  their  blood.'  Such  was  what  then 
seemed  to  be  the  future  of  Ritualism — a  future  which 
the  recent  petition  to  Convocation  in  favour  of  strange 
supplements  to  the  Prayer-book  and  of  licensed  con- 
fessors shows  to   have   already  come,  and   to   be  fast 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OP    THE    CHURCH.  37 

passing  into  still  more  serious  developments.  The 
present,  indeed,  involves  more  than  the  desire  merely 
to  rehabilitate  the  principles  of  the  Reformation.  The 
desire  now  is  plainly  to  reverse  them.  Associations 
have  been  silently  formed,  and  combinations  fostered. 
What  is,  or  rather  has  been  called,  the  Eitualistic 
movement,  has  now  passed  into  a  distinctly  coimter- 
E-eforraation  movement,  and  will,  whenever  sufficiently 
sustained  by  numbers,  and  perfected  in  organiza- 
tion, reveal  its  ultimate  aims  with  clearness  and  pre- 
cision." 

We  have  taken  the  opinion  of  a  Bishop  concerning 
Ritualists.  It  will  be  interesting  to  compare  the 
opinions  of  Ritualists  about  bishops.  "  The  chief  execu- 
tive officers  of  the  Establishment  have  either  forfeited, 
or  fail  to  secure,  the  confidence  of  those  over  whom, 
without  any  expressed  choice  being  permitted,  they 
are  placed.  This  fact  is  sorrowfully  owned  by  those 
•who  believe  in  the  office,  but  not  in  the  person,  of  a 
bishop ;  is  avowed  by  those  who  think  highly  of  the 
person  and  little  of  the  office ;  is  perceived  by  those 
who  hold  neither  in  estimation.  Catholics,  Low 
Churchmen,  and  Erastians  agree  in  this,  that  as 
bishops  of  the  Church,  the  chief  executive  officers  of 
the  Establishment  have  lost  their  influence  with  those 
immediately  in  subordination  to  them.  Such  loss  is 
real.  In  whatever  way  the  fact  may  be  accounted  for 
by  those  who  either  possess  an  interest  in  standing 
well  with  bishops  in  general,  or  whose  views  and  line 
of  action  accord  with  the  wishes  and  opinions  of  some 
particular  bishop,  and  however  much  it  may  seem  be- 
coming in  an  episcopal  charge  to  deny  the  situation,  or 
admitting  its  truth  to  explain  it  away — yet  it  is  a  fact 


38  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

that  an  almost  impassable  gulf  severs  the  episcopate 
from  those  whom  it  terms  the  '  inferior'  clergy."  Many 
hard  things  have  been  said  against  bishops  in  the  pre- 
sent age,  but  none  harder  and  oftener  than  by  the  Ritu- 
alistic clergy,  who  combine  a  belief  in  the  divine  right 
of  bishops  with  a  very  human  practice  of  scolding 
them.  It  has  so  happened  that  the  famous  legal  de- 
cision, which  was  supposed  to  rule  questions  of  Ritual, 
was  given  in  an  undefended  case^  and  is  understood  to 
have  been  seriously  impugned  by  great  lawyers.  This 
has  prevented  the  law  from  being  binding  on  the 
consciences  of  many,  and  the  result  was  a  practical 
insubordination  to  bishops,  which  caused  them  to  fly 
to  Parliament  for  power  to  put  the  laws  into  execution. 
A  certain  violence  often  has  been  characteristic  of  the 
school  that  contains  so  many  high-minded,  able,  and 
earnest  men.  Exaggerated  feeling  and  language  are 
unfortunately  characteristic  of  this  school.  One  writer 
tells  people  "  that  documents,  hidden  from  the  public 
eye  for  centuries  in  the  archives  of  London,  Venice, 
and  Simancas  are  now  rapidly  being  printed,  and  every 
fresh  find  establishes  more  clearlv  the  utter  scoun- 
drelism  of  the  Reformers."  To  such  language  only 
a  frank,  full  denial  can  be  given  ;  so  far  as  these  docu- 
ments are  made  known  to  us  in  the  passages  of  such 
writers  as  Mr.  Froude  and  Mr.  Moiley,  the  accusation 
is  utterly  unsubstantiated.  It  reminds  us  of  the  cruel 
slander  against  his  missionary  brethren  made  by  the 
same  writer.  Of  course,  we  are  not  surprised  to  hear 
that  Edward  the  Sixth  was  a  "  tis^er  cub,"  and  that 
Cranmer  was  arrested  in  his  wicked  career  by  Divine 
vengeance,  and  that  he  will  not  speak  of  the  depths  of 
infamy  into  which  he  descended.     This  intrusion  of 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA   OP    THE    CHURCH.  39 

passion  and  controversy  into  the  domain  of  history  is 
much  to  be  deplored.* 

Ou  the  controversial  history  of  these  days  we  do 
not  dwell.  We  deal  with  such  controversies  on  the 
literary  and  historical,  and  not  on  the  polemical  side. 
All  through  the  reign  there  have  been  a  series  of  con- 
troversies— the  Tractarian  controversy,  the  Hampden 
controversy,  the  Gorham  controversy,  the  ^'  Essays 
and  Reviews"  controversy,  the  Colenso  controversy, 
the  Bennett  Judgment  controversy,  the  Purchas  Judg- 
ment controversy.  Just  as  all  London  omnibuses  are 
known  by  the  names  of  public-houses — those  public- 
houses  whose  evil  architecture  caused  Mr.  Ruskin  to 
leave  Denmark  Hill  in  despair — so  the  progress  of 
Church  is  defined  from  stage  to  stage  by  those  bitter 
waters  of  strife.  We  may  now  sum  up  the  general 
results  of  all  these  controversies,  and  say  that,  on  tlie 
one  hand,  the  Church  of  England  is  considerably 
widened  and  liberalised,  and  that,  on  the  other  hand, 
her  limits  have  been  accurately  defined.  It  has  been 
well  said  that  our  Church  should  have  all  the  compre- 
hension, all  the  elasticity  which,  in  the  language  of  the 
Ordination  service,  "  the  will  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
and  the  order  of  this  realm"  will  permit.  But  there 
has  always  been  an  optimist  view  that  all  these  con- 
troversies ended  in  the  happiest  way  possible,    that 

*  A  clergymen  of  this  party  was  walking  with  a  friend  through  a 
great  manufacturing  town.  As  they  passed  a  large  and  ugly  building, 
"How  frightful,"  said  his  friend,  "that  St.  Matthew's  Church  is!" 
"  Church  !"  exclaimed  the  other,  "  is  it  a  church  ?  I  always  took  h  for 
a  Dissenting  chapel,  and  treated  it  as  such.  I  hope  I  may  be  par- 
doned." "  What  do  you  mean  ?"  inquired  his  friend  hy  treating  it  as 
such!"'  "Why,"  replied  the  first,  "whenever  I  pass  a  Dissenting 
chapel  I  cross  myself,  spit  upon  the  ground,  and  say  get  thee  behind  me, 
Satan.     This  gentleman  subsequently  joined  the  Church  of  Kome. 


40  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Bishop  Phillpots  came  to  understand  and  like  Mr. 
Gorham,  and  that  the  late  Bishop  of  Salisbury,  on  the 
whole.,  preferred  Mr,  Wilson  to  most  men.  The  most 
perfect  kindness  and  courtesy  may  exist,  and  the 
culture  of  such  a  disposition  is  always  to  be  sedulously 
attended  to,  side  by  side  with  a  deep-rooted  moral 
disapprobation.  Despite  occasional  exceptions,  such 
as  we  have  indicated,  it  is  increasingly  felt  that  undue 
differences  of  opinion  should  never  be  met  with  the 
language  that  ought  to  be  reserved  for  the  condemna- 
tion of  moral  evil.  In  the  present  day  controversial 
weapons  are  of  keener  temper  and  should  be  used 
courteously  and  sparingly.  We  echo  the  aspiration  of 
a  German  divine  that  as  the  Catholic  Church  has 
passed,  as  it  were,  through  the  Petrineand  Pauline 
stage,  so  we  may  be  entering  a  Johannsean  period  of 
comprehension  and  love. 

It  v/ill  be  seen  from  this  rapid  survey  of  our  great 
ecclesiastical  parties  that  many  of  the  real  leaders  of 
the  Church  are  those  men  who  have  never  been  dig- 
nified by  stall  or  mitre.  Looking  at  the  past  records 
of  Episcopacy,  it  is  to  be  seen  that  often  the  merely 
"  safe  men"  of  the  Church  have  been  promoted,  while 
such  men  as  Keble  and  Maurice  have  been  overlooked. 
This  is  but  a  sample  of  what  constantly  happens 
throughout  the  Church.  Laudatur  et  alget  describes 
the  lot  of  many  of  her  most  learned  and  meritorious 
sons.  Constantly  we  find  men,  through  birth,  or  con- 
nexion, or  accident  preferred  to  rich  preferments, 
though  destitute  of  ability,  learning,  and  spiritual 
earnestness,  while  saints  and  scholars  have  been 
allowed  to  become  grey-haired  on  country  charges, 
and  have  been  held  in  contempt  by  a  world — "  of  whom 
it  was  not  worthy." 


THE    VIOTORTAN    ERA    OP    THE    CnURCH.  41 

Our  bishops  and  deans  might,  in  the  exercise  of 
their  patronage  have  sufficed  to  sweep  away  such  a 
reproach,  but  they  have  not  done  so.  The  crying 
necessity  of  our  times  is  a  sweeping  Ecclesiastical  Re- 
form Bill,  and  unless  reform  is  adopted  we  shall  have 
Revolution  or  Destruction.  We  honestly  believe  that 
episcopal  and  cathedral  patronage  has  been  adminis- 
tered at  least  as  well  as  any  other  kind  of  patronage 
— although  there  is  at  times  a  tacit  exchange  of  good 
offices  between  episcopal  and  court  appointments — 
better  probably  than  that  of  the  Lord  Chancellor  or 
the  Prime  Minister.  But  this  has  not  been  from  any 
plan  or  principle,  but  from  sheer  accident  or  the  excel- 
lence of  individual  character.  Private  patronage  may 
present  insoluble  difficulties,  but  public  patronage,  the 
patronage  of  Government  and  certain  corporate  bodies, 
might  be  settled,  mutatis  mutandis,  in  a  mode  analo- 
gous to  that  in  which  the  civil  patronage  of  the 
country  is  administered.  The  question  arises  respect- 
ing our  prelates,  Quis  ciistodiet  ijjsos  custodes.  The 
most  pressing  reforms  are  those  which  relate  to  the 
Episcopal  bench  itself,  and  refers  mainly  to  the  Epis- 
copate and  the  subdivision  of  dioceses. 

The  great  necessity  is  the  christianising,  purifying, 
elevating  the  masses  of  the  people.  The  union  be- 
tween Church  and  State  exists,  not  that  the  Church 
maybe  political,  but  that  the  State  should  be  religious. 
If  Episcopacy  be  really  for  the  good  of  the  Church  and 
land,  it  is  a  primal  necessity  that  it  should  exist  in  its 
simplest,  most  vital,  most  energising  shape.  Episco- 
pacy is  not  a  direct  ordinance  of  the  scripture  of  truth. 
It  is,  however,  the  outcome  of  apostolic,  or  at  least 
of  subapostolic  times.     In  an  inconceivably  short  time 


42  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

it  spread  over  the  whole  of  Christendom.  There  was 
a  consensus  in  its  favour  of  all  the  primitive  Churches. 
A  constant  tradition  has  assigned  it  to  the  Apostles 
and  to  the  Master.  The  very  notion  of  Episcopacy,  the 
fatherly  oversight  of  each  presbyter,  and  the  "  care  of 
all  the  churches,"  is  one  that  is  essential  to  good  order 
and  commends  itself  to  every  intelUgent  mind.  The 
question  is  whether  our  modern  system  is  conterminous 
with  the  line  of  genuine  primitive  Episcopacy,  whether 
our  modern  facts  are  consistent  with  the  original  ideas, 
and  whether  any  real  effectual  personal  oversight  can 
be  exercised  within  such  wide  geographical  areas,  and 
under  circumstances  of  social  distinction  and  political 
consideration.  There  have  been  Bishops  who  have 
habitually  absented  themselves  from  the  House  of 
Lords,  and  if  the  spiritual  and  temporal  functions 
came  into  collision  it  is  as  clear  as  daylight  that  the 
temporal  ought  to  go. 

Bishops,  as  a  rule,  though  with  some  remarkable 
exceptions,  are  hardly  in  favour  of  any  subdivision  of 
dioceses,  or  in  favour  of  anything  that  would  detract 
from  power,  prestige,  and  patronage.  We  know  of 
one  Bishop  who  honourably  said  that  he  did  not  care 
to  give  up  a  large  county  that  might  easily  have 
been  detached  from  his  overgrown  diocese,  because 
it  would  take  from  him  a  valuable  part  of  his  patron- 
age. For  the  same  reason  they  retain  a  patronage 
of  some  seventy  thousand  a  year  for  diocesan  officials 
who  live  on  these  pickings  and  pluckings  of  the 
clergy.  Archbishop  Tait,  when  Bishop  of  London, 
said  that  he  did  not  find  that  the  cares  of  that  over- 
grown diocese  were  at  all  too  much  for  him.  It  all 
depended   on   what   amount    of  the   cares   he   might 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OF    THE    CHURCH.  43 

tliiok  fit  to  devolve  on  himself.  If  it  was  only  a 
certain  number  of  State  duties,  attendances  at  Court, 
clerical  levees,  filling  up  preferments,  or  triennial 
charges,  ordinations  and  confirmations,  the  pro- 
gramme could  be  soon  arranged,  and  the  conditions 
easily  fulfilled.  We  can  only  wonder  that  any  one 
with  a  living  idea  of  the  true  theory  of  Episcopacy, 
could  think  that  he  could  fully  discharge  the  work 
of  a  real  father  in  God  over  the  multitudes  of  clers^v 
in   the  diocese  of  London. 

The  question  of  the  increase  of  the  Episcopate  has 
been  very  anxiously  debated  among  the  Bishops 
themselves.  Bishop  Wordsworth  has  pressed  for 
it  very  strongly.  He  quoted  the  words  of  his  own 
predecessor,  "  If  I  were  to  desire  to  visit  every  parish 
in  my  diocese,  and  if  I  were  to  desire  to  spend  a 
Sunday  in  each  parish,  it  would  take  fifteen  years  to 
make  the  circuit,"  and  stated  that  that  state  of  things 
was  substantially  unaltered.  But  while  Dr.  Words- 
worth was  in  favour  of  a  large  increase  of  the  Epis- 
copate, he  thought  the  Bishops  should  retain  their 
large  incomes  and  their  large  houses.  The  predecessor 
alluded  to,  the  present  Bishop  of  London,  was  not 
at  all  in  favour  of  a  large  increase  of  the  Episcopate. 
He  would  like  a  moderate  increase,  but  he  thoug-ht 
that  twenty  or  thirty  would  be  "  an  extravagant 
demand."  Yet  Cranmer  asked  for  twenty  when  the 
population  of  the  country  was  hardly  one-fifth  what  it 
is  at  present.  Dr.  Jackson,  with  great  good  sense, 
hit  the  exact  point.  If  we  had  palaces  and  incomes 
only  for  our  own  sakes,  he  argued,  let  them  go  for 
heaven's  sake.  "  One  thing  is  perfectly  clear  that 
two  classes   of  Bishops — a  rich   Bishop  and  a   poor 


44  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

Bishop,  a  Bishop  who  is  a  member  of  the  legislature, 
and  a  Bishop  who  is  not — could  not  long  exist  to- 
gether." Now  this  is  the  key  to  the  whole  problem. 
The  question  is  whether  the  Bishop  can  be  so  per- 
fectly certain.  Could  not  the  present  Bishops  remain 
with  their  seats  in  Parliament,  albeit  with  abridged 
incomes,  and  another  set  of  Bishops  exist  with  smaller 
incomes  and  without  seats  ?  Would  the  difficulty  be 
lessened  if  the  Bishop  of  what  would  then  be  the 
Old  Foundation  should  always  be  selected  from  the 
Bishops  of  the  New  Foundation,  just  as  Archbishops 
are  now  almost  invariably  selected  from  the  Bishops  ? 
But  if  there  is  no  half-way  house  as  Dr.  Jackson  in- 
sists, then  if  the  theory  of  Episcopacy  be  really  worth 
anything,  if  it  be  a  desirable  thing  in  the  interests  of 
the  Christian  Church  that  Bishops  be  multiplied, 
let  house  and  land,  let  coin  and  peerage  go,  so  that 
the  spiritual  interests  of  the  Church  of  Christ  are 
advanced.  We  should  then  be  abandoning  the 
medigeval  and  baronial,  and  reverting  to  the  primitive 
system  of  the  Catholic  Church. 

Those  who  want  new  bishoprics  with  large  incomes 
and  are  unwilling  that  the  present  large  incomes  should 
be  diminished,  have  devised  various  expedients  for 
raising  funds.  It  was  suggested  in  several  quarters 
that  pious  laymen  might  befriend  the  Episcopal 
order  and  endow  bishoprics.  Something  like  an 
order  of  Mendicant  Bishops  was  suggested.  Now  if 
there  are  any  laymen  prepared  to  advance  large  sums 
of  money  for  Church  purposes,  let  them  be  entreated 
to  weigh  carefully  other  claims  that  might  be  brought 
before  their  notice  before  they  exhaust  their  elee- 
mosynary  powers    in    favour    of    bishops.      We  will 


THE    VICTORIAN    ERA    OF   THE    CHURCH.  45 

engage  to  say  that  there  are  to  every  diocese,  although 
their  Bishops  may  not  know  much  about  them,  hard- 
working and  learned  men  to  whom  a  measure  of  help 
miglit  be  offered  with  much  more  judgment  and 
generosity.  No  one  can  think  of  the  vast  amount 
of  clerical  poverty  and  unhappiuess ;  no  one  can 
carefully  watch  the  struggling  life  of  so  many 
excellent  institutions,  and  hear  with  any  patience 
the  suggestion  that  large  sums  of  money  might 
be  devoted  to  the  creation  of  further  English 
Bishoprics.  Another  proposition  much  dwelt  on 
in  Convocation  was  the  recommendation  of  the 
Cathedral  Commissioners  that  in  certain  cases  the 
office  of  Bishop  of  the  diocese  and  Dean  of  the  Cathe- 
dral should  be  confined  in  one  person.  The  late 
Bishop  of  Winchester  was  apparently  in  favour  of 
this  proposition,  but  as  one  Bishop  after  another  rose 
to  fling  cold  water  on  the  suggestion,  his  courage 
failed,  and  he  eventually  asked  leave  to  withdraw  his 
motion.  The  Bishop  of  London  did  not  see,  "  sup- 
posing that  Deans  were  useful  anywhere,"  how  their 
duties  could  be  transferred  to  the  Bishop.  The 
Bishop  of  Salisbury  "  delighted  with  his  whole  heart 
and  soul"  in  cathedral  music,  and  would  not  have 
the  strength  of  a  Cathedral  Establishment  diuiinished 
by  a  single  person.  The  Bishop  of  Bath  and  Wells 
had  made  himself  merry  with  some  returns  of  Rural 
Deans  who  had  expressed  a  desire  for  the  increase  of 
the  Episcopate.  To  the  question  whether  it  was 
desirable  that  there  should  be  an  addition  of  new 
bishops,  the  answer  of  one  was  that  if  the  new 
bishops  were  to  be  like  the   present  bishops,  it  was 


46  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

very  undesirable  that  tliere  should  be  any  more.  To 
the  next  question  how  they  should  be  appointed,  the 
answer  was  that  the  new  bishops  should  be  as  unlike 
as  possible  to  the  old  ones ;  and  that  for  the  Crown 
to  appoint  the  new  bishops  would  be  most  undesi- 
rable. On  the  whole  it  was  fully  agreed  that  it  would 
never  do  to  touch  the  Deaneries. 

Then  the  Bishop  of  Norwich  uprose  with  the  most 
daring  proposition  of  all,  that  the  Bishops  should 
touch  and  tax  themselves.  "  We  believe,"  went  the 
terms  of  his  resolution,  "  that  by  a  moderate  reduc- 
tion of  Episcopal  incomes,  considerable  help  would  be 
afforded  towards  providing  endowments  of  new  Sees  ; 
and  the  want  of  such  Sees  is  so  urgent  as  to  warrant 
such  a  reduction."  The  resolution  was  manfully 
seconded  by  the  Bishop  of  Lichfield.  But  there  arose 
a  chorus  of  objections,  and  in  less  than  half  a  column 
of  the  Guardian  the  motion  was  satisfactorily  disposed 
of  in  the  negative.  The  Bishop  of  Llandaff  went  into 
details.  "  If  from  the  commencement  of  my  Episco- 
pate I  had  been  put  in  a  small  house  in  the  town  of 
Cardiff  at  which  I  lived,  not  with  these  housemaids  as 
Archdeacon  Allen  supposes,  for  I  at  least  have  not  got 
them,  but  with  one  housemaid  and  with  onefootboy,  and 
everything  in  proportion  to  a  small  house  in  the  town 
of  Cardiff,  I  think  I  should  very  well  have  been  able  to 
give  a  fair  proportion  of  my  income,  supposing  it  had 
been  £1000  instead  of  £4200  a  year."  Here  the  ex- 
cellent Bishop  just  hinted  at  that  sublime  sort  of 
self-abnegation  which  would  so  raise  the  Episcopal 
character.  If  St.  Paul  was  content  for  the  sake  of  a 
high  purpose  to  work  with  his  own  hands,  might  not 


THE    VIOTOEIAN   ERA   OP   THE    CHURCH.  47 

a  successor  of  St.  Paul  condescend  to  a  small  house 
with  one  housemaid  and  one  foot-boy.  But  the 
Bishop  says  that  if  lie  is  expected  to  "  receive  his 
clergy,"  &c.,  he  could  not  do  with  a  less  income.  It 
was  at  Llandaff  that  a  publican  applied  for  a  spirit 
licence  on  the  ground  that  candidates  for  Holy  Orders 
lodged  with  him  at  the  time  of  ordination.  The 
example  has  not  spread  to  Llandaff  of  a  Bishop 
entertaining  the  candidates  at  his  own  house.  Other 
Bishops  followed  on  the  same  side  though  not  with 
the  same  particularity  of  detail.  The  Bishop  of 
Norwich  replied,  manfully  maintaining  his  principles. 
It  was  his  wish  "  to  express  an  opinion  that  though 
the  incomes  of  our  Sees  have  been  reduced  from  what 
they  were,  and  are  not  at  all  more  than  adequate  to 
meet  the  present  demands  upon  them,  still  the  wants 
of  the  Church  for  increased  Sees  are  so  great  as  to 
warrant  further  reduction,"  The  Bishop  was  not, 
however,  willing  to  divide  unless  he  received  general 
support,  which  was  not  at  all  likely.  Finding  the 
self-denying  ordinance  unpopular,  the  motion  was 
"  by  leave  of  the  house"  withdrawn.  So  the  Bishops 
having  looked  at  the  subject  of  the  increase  of  their 
order  all  round,  returned  a  sublime  non  possumus. 

In  spite  of  the  fion  possumus,  however,  we  feel  sure 
that  the  day  cannot  be  remote  when  we  shall  have  a 
large  increase  of  the  Episcopate  by  the  subdivision  of 
dioceses.  The  new  Convocation  that  has  met  simul- 
taneously with  the  new  Parliament  will,  we  feel  as- 
sured, take  vigorous  steps  in  this  direction.  Although 
there  is  no  hope  of  a  large,  well-defined  scheme  for 
the  restoration  of  the  Episcopate  corresponding  with 
its  true  ideal  and  the  necessities  of  the  country,  we  may 


48  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

well  believe  that  some  move  will  be  made  in  the  rijyht 
direction.  Very  probably  Lichfield  will  be  divided  into 
three  dioceses  of  its  three  counties.  St.  Albau's  might 
be  carved  as  a  diocese  out  of  Rochester,  Westminster 
out  of  London,  and  the  long-contemplated  division  of 
the  see  of  Exeter  may  take  place  at  last.  It  might  be 
suggested  that  in  double  dioceses,  such  as  Gloucester 
and  Bristol,  Bath  and  Wells,  there  should  be  separate 
bishoprics,  and  a  large  income  would  be  secured,  very 
little  short  of  the  present  incomes,  if  the  ofl&ce  of  Dean 
could  be  held  simultaneously  with  that  of  bishop.  To 
those  who  doubt  might  be  commended  the  words  of 
Bishop  Bedell.  His  own  words  in  his  letters  to  Dr.  Des- 
potine  to  satisfy  him  in  the  thing  were  these  :  "  That  the 
example  of  holding  two  bishoprics  ivas  not  canonical,  hut 
justifying  the  holding  of  many  benefices  by  one  person  ; 
that  it  was  an  unrea.sonable  thing  of  him  to  seek  to  re- 
form heapers  of  benefices,  being  himself  faulty  in  having 
tivo  bishopries  ;  that  he  ivas  sensible  of  his  own  disability 
to  discharge  the  office  of  a  bishop  to  two  churches,  yea 
even  to  one.  And  whereas  it  was  objected  by  the 
doctor  that  by  parting  with  one  of  his  bishoprics  he 
should  shorten  his  means,  his  answer  was,  that  still  he 
should  have  enough  to  live  on,  and  leave  his  children  more 
than  was  left  him ;  and  Domini  est  terra  et  plenitiLdo 
eiusT  The  protest  against  moneyed  prelates  comes 
everywhere.  The  President  of  the  Congress  of  Old 
Catholics  at  Cologne  said,  "  they  did  not  want  a 
Churcli  prince,  a  Roman  grandee,  but  a  shepherd  and 
overseer.  Once  a  high-minded  dignitary  said  to  me, 
*  what  is  a  Bishop  in  the  eyes  of  the  people  ?'  He  is 
a  very  great  man  who  has  a  few  thousand  florins  to 
spend,  and  who  goes  to  town  with  six  horses  and  ten 


THE    VICTORIAN   ERA    OP    THE    CHURCH.  49 

servants.  Siicli  a  Bishop  tliey  did  not  require/'  .  In 
America  Episcopacy  is  a  living  institution  in  constant 
alliance  with  our  own  Church,  to  whom  it  is  indebted 
for  its  origin;  and  our  Colonial  Empire  shows  how 
easily  our  Episcopacy  adapts  itself  to  the  modified 
circumstances  of  the  present  time.  It  has  unhappily 
been  the  reproach  of  the  Church  of  England  that  it 
has  conciliated  to  itself  so  much  of  the  cost  and  world- 
liness  of  the  world.  Dolliuger  says  that  in  England 
the  Church  is  the  Church  only  of  a  fragment  of  the 
nation,  of  the  rich,  cultivated,  and  fashionable  classes 
— the  religion  of  departments,  of  gentility,  of  clerical 
reserve.  In  its  stiff  and  narrow  organization,  and  all 
want  of  pastoral  elasticity,  it  feels  itself  powerless 
against  the  masses. 

We  read  such  language  with  shame  and  regret, 
acknowledging  that  there  is  a  real  element  of  truth, 
but  at  the  same  time  believing  that  in  a  large  measure 
such  a  reproach  is  being  swept  away.  The  message 
to  the  Apostles  was  "  Preach  to  the  people  the  words 
of  this  life,"  and  wdiatever  may  be  said  of  Sectarian 
bodies  the  existence  of  a  National  Church  can  only  be 
justified  by  its  seeking  the  Evangelization  of  the  masses 
of  the  population.  Every  one  who  watches  the  broad 
current  of  church  life  must  be  convinced  of  its  intense 
activity  and  fruitfulness,  in  word  and  deed,  of  its  in- 
tense anxiety  to  do  its  duty  in  this  generation  ;  and,  so 
far  as  may  be,  to  overtake  the  neglect  of  past  genera- 
tions ;  but  in  order  to  do  this  in  the  most  vigorous  and 
perfect  way  it  may  be  necessary  to  review  and  revive 
the  functions  of  its  organization,  and  to  aim  at  a  re- 
casting of  its  present  Episcopal  system. 

VOL.  I.  E 


50 


CHAPTER    IL 

ON    THE    GENERAL    COURSE    AND    HISTORY    OP   EPISCOPACY, 
ESPECIALLY    IN   ENGLAND. 

THE  history  of  Episcopacy  occupies  a  very  iinportaDt 
chapter  in  the  History  of  England,  we  might  say 
in  the  general  history  of  Europe.  The  Bishops  have 
helped  to  provoke  some  of  the  great  crises  of  our 
history ;  their  names  are  for  ever  associated  with 
great  civic  troubles,  and  none  have  been  more  deeply 
troubled  than  themselves.  It  is  historically  true  that 
at  such  a  season  their  Christian  patience  and  modera- 
tion are  most  conspicuous,  and  they  never  show  better 
than  when  under  a  cloud.  They  have  been,  as  it  were, 
the  stormy  petrels  of  the  political  waters  ;  when  they 
appear  conspicuously,  the  vision  is  ominous  of  trouble; 
or,  to  adopt  another  ornithological  image,  we  are  some- 
times reminded  of  Landseer's  picture  of  the  swannery 
attacked  by  sea-eagles,  when  we  recollect  how  the 
lawned  prelates  have  again  and  again  been  fiercely 
attacked  by  crowds  that  were  not  sane,  and  crowns 
that  were  not  just. 

Into  the  theological  arguments  respecting  the  posi- 
tion of  bishops,  it  is  not  our  intention  to  enter.  They 
will  be  found  in  all  the  great  text- books  of  Anglican 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  51 

theology.  As  loyal  Churclimen  we  feel  satisfied  with, 
the  Divine  basis  of  the  threefold  orders  of  bishops, 
priests,  and  deacons.  Speaking  more  accurately,  a 
bishop  is  not  ordained,  but  consecrated  to  his  office, 
chosen  a  priest  among  priests,  for  the  discharge  of 
high  governmental  functions  in  the  Church.  Any 
supposed  grace  of  orders  relates  to  their  functions,  and 
not  to  their  persons  and  characters.  I  am  especially 
anxious  that  in  some  unavoidable  criticism  on  the 
office-bearers  I  may  carefully  keep  in  view  the  reve- 
rence due  to  the  office.  Here  the  Master  Himself 
pointed  out  a  distinction.  He  taught  that  the  Scribes 
and  Pharisees  possessed  functions  that  were  entitled 
to  reverence  and  obedience.  "  The  Scribes  and 
Pharisees  sit  in  Moses'  seat.  All  that  they  bid  you, 
observe  and  do."  But  this  high  honour  given  to  the 
office  did  not  save  the  office-holders  from  the  most 
awful  censures.  We  write  with  reverence  for  the 
divine  office,  but  with,  freedom  of  the  very  human  cha- 
racter of  the  office-holders. 

When  we  have  asserted  the  doctrine  of  Episcopacy, 
the  inquiry  arises  to  what  does  this  Episcopacy  really 
amount  ?  In  the  earliest  chapter  of  ecclesiastical 
history,  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  the  word  occurs, 
and  in  no  sense  that  is  analogous  with  the  modern 
sense.  It  is  sometimes  urged  that  the  Episcopate  is 
an  extension  of  the  Apostolate.  But  the  idea  of  the 
Episcopate  is  localized  authority;  that  of  the  Aposto- 
late is  evidence  to  the  human  history  of  Christ.  In 
an  analogical  way,  and  in  a  very  limited  and  restricted 
sense,  this  may  be  courteously  admitted,  and  it  is  only 
by  a  violent  handling  of  the  sacred  text  that  the  theory 
can   now  be  pressed  any   further.     St.   Jerome  says, 

E   2 


£2  ODR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

*'  The  Bishops  should  know  that  they  are  superior  to 
Presbyters  rather  by  custom  than  by  any  ministry  of  our 
Lord's  ordinance,  and  they  ou_^ht  to  govern  the  Church 
in  common."  The  late  Dean  Alford  was  a  divine  of 
great  good  sense  and  fairness,  on  whose  judgment 
most  readers  would  feel  disposed  to  place  very  con- 
siderable reliance,  says*  : — "  The  Apostolic  office 
terminated  with  the  Apostohc  times,  and  by  its  very 
nature  admitted  not  of  continuance ;  the  Episcopal 
office,  in  its  ordinary  sense,  sprung  up  after  the 
Apostolic  times,  and  the  two  are  entirely  distinct. 
The  confusion  of  the  two  belongs  to  that  unsafe  and 
slippery  ground  in  church  matters,  the  only  logical 
refuge  from  which  is  the  traditional  system  of  Rome. 
He  shows  that  in  the  Acts  the  elders  or  presbyters 
received  the  title  of  bishops  or  overseers,  and  is  angry 
that  a  commentator,  contrarv  to  the  sacred  text,  should 
endeavour  to  draw  a  distinction  between  them."  So 
early  did  interested  and  disingenuous  interpretation 
begin  to  cloud  the  light  which  Scripture  might  have 
thrown  on  ecclesiastical  questions.  Our  version  has 
hardly  dealt  fairly  in  this  case  with  the  sacred 
text,  in  rendering  I'TtisyJi'Trovr  verse  28,  '  overseers,' 
whereas  it  ought  there,  as  in  all  other  places,  to  have 
been  Bishops,  that  the  fact  of  elders  and  bishops 
having  been  originally  and  apostolically  synonymous 
might  be  apparent  to  the  ordinary  English  reader, 
which  now  it  is  not.  The  question  has  now  been 
exhaustively  discussed   and    settled   in     Germany  by 

*  Acts  xiii  2  V.  and  xx  18  v.  In  support  of  his  view  Alford  says, 
"  See  the  remarkable  testimonies  cited  by  Gieseler  i.  p.  115  note,  from 
Jerome  on  Tit.  i.  7  v.,  and  Aug.  Epist.  cxxxii,  and  Hieron,  33,  vol.  ii, 
p.  290. 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOrACY.  53 

such  a  man  as  Roth,  and  in  our  own  country  by  such 
writers  as  Dean  Alford  and  Canon  Lightfoot. 

Ifc  may  be  taken  therefore  as  absolutely  true,  as  a 
matter  on  which  no  honest  divine  could  cast  a  doubt, 
that   the   same   church   officer   is    called    indifferently 
Presbyter  and  Bishop.     The  word  "  Bishop"  or  "  over- 
seer"    (l'^((TKO'7rog) ,     was     a    well-known    title    among 
the   Greeks,    signifying   "  a    commissioner,"    or    "  in- 
spector."    It  is  a  word  used  by  Aristophanes.     It  is  a 
word  frequently  employed  in  the  Septuagint  version  of 
the  Old  Testament,  in  almost  identical  senses.     In  the 
New  Testament   we   have  the  word    "  presbyter"   or 
"  elder,"  the  root  of  the  notion  being  the  distinction 
of  old  age,  as  in  the  Gerousia  of  Sparta,  the  Senate  of 
Rome,    the   Signoria    of   Florence,    the   Alderman    of 
England.       In  the   Apostle's  time    "  presbyter"   and 
"  bishop"   are  used   as   exchangeable   terms,  and    no 
sacerdotal  meaning   attached   to  either  term.       They 
were   the  servants  and  officials  who  represented  the 
priesthood  of  all  Christian  men.     Episcopacy,  as  dis- 
tinct from  presbytery,  does  not  belong  to  the  region 
of  the  New  Testament,  but  to  an  early  and  obscure 
chapter  of  ecclesiastical  history.     The  earliest  traces 
of    an   institution   which    afterwards    overspread  the 
whole  face  of  Christendom,  are  scanty  and  indistinct. 
The  patristic  argument  in    favour  of  Episcopacy,  to 
say  the   truth,  does   not   amount  to  very  much.     By 
skilful  manipulation  we    may  often    read    a    modern 
sense  into  an  ancient  writer,  when  that   sense  would 
not  be  naturally  suggested  to  those  to  whose  eyes  or 
ears   such   language  would  be  first  addressed.     Few 
literary  controversies  have    been  so    pertinacious    as 
that  respecting  the  genuineness  of  the  Ignatian  Epistles, 


54  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

and  tlie  secret  of  this  literary  litio-ation  has  been  the 
Iguatian  view  respecting  Episcopacy.  A  recent  writer* 
has  carefully  brought  together  all  the  passages  rightly 
or  wrongly  attributed  to  Ignatius  on  this  subject,  that 
the  highest  possible  view  of  Episcopacy  may  be  fairly 
stated.  The  interest  and  importance  attaching  to  St. 
Ignatius  was  so  strong — throug^h  the  touchino:  tradi- 
tion  that  he  was  the  little  child  whom  the  Saviour  took 
np  in  his  arms,  and  the  undoubted  acts  of  the  martyr- 
dom— that  his  statement  might  almost  be  considered 
final  on  any  subject  of  primitive  practice.  But  nothing 
that  Ignatius  says  amounts  to  more  than  the  state- 
ment that  the  Bishop  is  the  chairman  of  the  Presby- 
tery or  Council  of  Presbyters.  The  famous  Epistles 
really  say  nothing  to  which  Usher  and  Hall  might  not 
have  subscribed  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  famous 
Smectynmnus  confederacy  on  the  other.  His  idea 
seems  to  have  been  that  the  present  Episcopal  sympa- 
thies, by  giving  a  distinct  headship  to  each  church, 
would  be  a  help  to  the  maintenance  of  Christian  unity. 
He  says  nothing  in  favour  of  autocratic  and  irrespon- 
sible prelacy.  His  sentiment  echoes  that  language  of 
St.  Peter  which  we  have  so  often  to  recall  when  read- 
ing prelatical  history,  that  men  ought  not  to  be 
"  lords"  over  Christ's  heritage. 

This  is  how  the  case  lies,  accepting  the  authenticity 
of  the  famous  letters.  But  there  is  a  very  grave 
suspicion  that  these  passages  are  interpolations  made 
in  the  interests  of  Episcopacy.  "We  are  aware,  as  a 
simple  matter  of  fact,"  writes  Mr.  Mossman,  "  that 
there  is  nothing  in  the  way  of  forgery  or  falsification, 

*  "  History   of  the  Catholic   Churcli   to   the   Middle  of  the    Second 
Century."     By  T.  W.  Mossman,  B.A.     1873. 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  55 

which  some  writers,  both  ancient  and  modern,  would 
shrink  from  in  support  of  his  darhng  institution, 
thinking  the  while  that,  by  thus  acting,  this  were 
doing  God  service."  Many  patristic  passages  in 
favour  of  Episcopacy  are  of  no  greater  worth  than  the 
forged  Decretals  of  Isidore,  The  Tiibingen  school 
would  reject  the  whole  of  the  Epistles,  but  the  proba- 
bility is  that  they  are  genuine  enough  except  for 
forged  interpolations  in  the  Episcopal  interests.  One 
great  argument  in  the  earliest  Church  history  that  the 
"  seven  angels"  are  seven  Bishops,  is  of  doubtful 
weight,  and  even  if  so,  the  seven  "  Bishops"  of  locali- 
ties in  close  neighbourhood  is  something:  altoo;ether 
different  to  our  vast  territorial  prelacies. 

Episcopacy  appears,  then,  to  have  gradually  grown 
up  in  a  providential    order,  and  in  the  course  of  the 
development  and  evolution  of  the    Church.     In    the 
Jewish  branch  of  the  Christian  Church  we  may  recog- 
nise the  Bishop  in  St.  James,  who  presided  over  the 
mother-church  of  Jerusalem.     But  it  is  not  till  past 
the  era  of  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  that  we  find 
anything  of  the  kind  in  the  Gentile  Church.     Perhaps 
that  very  event  evidenced  the  necessity,  and  brought 
forward   the   constitution    of    another    order   in    the 
organization   of  the   Church.     For  many  years  after 
that  dread  event,  the  Church  annals  were  confused, 
but  when  the  darkness  lifted  a  little  we  find   traces  of 
Episcopacy  which  henceforth   multiply  upon   us.     In 
the  "  Shepherd  of  Hermes"  we  find  a  passage  well 
worthy  of  Episcopal  attention,   where  he  speaks    of 
"  hospitable  bishops,   who  at  all   times   received  the 
servants    of   God    into    their   houses    cheerfully,    and 
without  hypocrisy,"  where  the  word  begins  to  hold  its 


66  OUR   EISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 


5  J 

5 


latter  sio^iiification.  "  The  sequence  of  bishops 
writes  Tertullian,  "  traced  back  to  its  origin,  will  be 
found  to  rest  on  the  authority  of  John.  There  is  no 
reason  to  doubt  that  he  acted  as  Bishop  of  Ephesus, 
and  went  about  establishing  other  Bishops,  thus  con- 
solidating churches,  and  appointing  depositaries  of 
truth.  But  before  the  time  of  St.  John,  very  late  in 
the  first  century,  there  is  no  trustworthy  trace  of 
Episcopacy  in  the  -Gentile  Churches.  Canon  Light- 
foot,  in  his  remarkable  Essay  on  the  Christian  Ministry, 
distinctly  argues  thus  : — 

"  While  the  Episcopal  office  thus  existed  in  the 
mother-church  of  Jerusalem  from  very  early  days,  at 
least  in  a  rudimentary  form,  the  New  Testament 
presents  no  distinct  traces  of  such  organization  in  the 
Gentile  congregations."  Again :  "  It  is  the  con- 
ception of  a  later  age  which  represents  Timothy  as 
Bishop  of  Ephesus  and  Titus  as  Bishop  of  Crete.  ^St. 
Paul's  own  language  implies  that  the  position  'they 
held  was  temporary."  Once  more :  "As  late, 
therefore,  as  the  year  a.d.  70,  no  distinct  signs  of 
Episcopal  government  have  hitherto  appeared  in 
Gentile  Christendom."  Again  :  "  To  the  dissen- 
sions of  Jew  and  Gentile  converts,  and  to  the 
disputes  of  Gnostic  false  teachers,  the  development 
of  Episcopacy  may  be  mainly  ascribed."  "  In  this 
way,  during  the  historical  blank  which  extends  over 
half  a  century  after  the  fall  of  Jerusalem,  Episcopacy 
was  matured,  and  the  Catholic  Church  consoli- 
dated." 

He  holds  that  the  Episcopate  was  formed,  not  out 
of  the  Apostolic  order  by  localization,  but  out  of  the 
presbyteral   by  churches,  and   the    title,  which    was 


ON   THE    HISTOGY    OF    EPlSCOrACY.  57 

originally  common  to  all,  came  at  length  to  be  appro- 
priated to  the  chief  of  them.  According  to  him, 
Episcopacy  was  a  new  idea,  which  took  root  and  re- 
ceived a  rapid  development,  but  was  an  institution 
variously  developed  in  different  localities.  Even  at  a 
comparatively  late  date  the  Bishop  is  spoken  of  as  a 
Presbyter.  A  Bishop  is  a  Presbyter,  though  a  Pres- 
byter is  not  a  Bishop  in  the  secondary  sense  which 
the  word  Bishop  came  to  bear.  Even  in  the  time  of 
Popes  and  Councils,  a  Bishop  would  address  Pres- 
byters as  "  fellow-Presbyters."  And  the  Bishop  is 
exhorted  to  give  the  utmost  heed  to  his  Presbj/tery. 
They  are  a  spiritual  coronal,  a  divine  council,  the 
chords  to  the  lyre. 

Many  persons,  however,  would  be  dissatisfied  with 
the  theme  of  the  lateral  development  of  Episcopacy 
from  the  Presbytery,  and  rest  simply  on  the  Apos- 
tolical Succession.  The  answer  is,  that  in  one  case 
we  are  on  safe  historical  ground,  we  have  an  induc- 
tion of  facts  ;  in  the  other  case  we  have  a  theory  which 
forms  no  part  of  the  original  deposit  of  facts,  is  no 
matter  of  revelation.  On  the  other  hand  the  arguments 
and  evidence  for  Episcopacy  dating  from  the  college  of 
Apostles,  are  exceedingly  strong,  and  are  of  the  highest 
degree  of  probability.  The  question  is  virtually  this, 
whether  the  Ministry  should  emanate  from  the  mass 
of  the  people,  or  be  regarded  as  an  office  emanating 
from  the  Master.  It  is  the  tradition  of  the  Church 
that  during  the  Forty  Days  in  which  Christ  spoke  of 
the  things  concerning  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  that 
system  of  Church  order  was  indicated  which  would  be 
in  accordance  with  the  Divine  mind.  Those  nearest 
to  the  age  of  the  Apostles  recognize  the  Apostolical 


58  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

Succession.  The  question  is  whether  people  may 
elect  themselves  into  a  Ministry,  be  elected  from  those 
who  will  be  beneath  them,  or  if  they  must  be  appointed 
by  authority  from  some  constituted  powers  above. 
The  one  is  the  theory  of  Episcopacy,  of  the  Latin, 
Greek,  and  Anglican  Churches  ;  the  other  is  the  theory 
of  Presbyterianism  and  various  forms  of  Dissent.  It 
may  be  possible  for  us  to  give  a  clear  unwavering 
adhesion  to  the  doctrine  of  Episcopacy,  that  is  to  say, 
to  be  satisfied  that  the  Church,  having  authority,  did 
claim  this  form  of  government,  or  directly  derived  it 
from  her  Head.  It  is  another  question  how  far 
Modern  Episcopacy  represents  the  Primitive  Epis- 
copacy. Even  when  we  have  satisfactorily  established 
that  doctrine,  we  must  be  very  careful  not  to  attach 
to  it  too  great  a  degree  of  importance,  or  to  draw  from 
it  unsafe  results.  It  is  simply  outrageous  to  hear 
persons  denounce  non-Episcopal  churches  as  heretical. 
'No  one  could  forbid  baptism,  as  we  read  in  the  sacred 
text,  where  the  Spirit  had  been  received,  and  none 
can  deny  the  validity  of  any  Ministry,  where  the  gifts, 
and  grace,  and  fruits'  of  the  Divine  life  are  to  be  wit- 
nessed. 

To  eo  back  to  old  Engflish  divinitv  this  is  the  view 
which  is  expressed  by  the  famous  Dean  Field,  in  his 
great  work  on  the  Church.  Of  him  old  Fuller  quaintly 
said,  "  whose  memory  smelleth  like  a  Field  the  Lord 
hath  blessed,"  and  James  the  First  said,  "  This  is  a 
Field  for  the  Lord  to  dwell  here."  The  king  passed 
him  by  for  promotion,  however,  and  when  he  heard  of 
his  death  said,  "  I  should  have  done  more  for  that 
man  !"  Field's  views  are  mainly  given  in  the  twenty- 
seventh  chapter  of  the   fifth  book  of  his  great  work. 


ON    THE    ITTSTORY    OP    EPISCOPACY.  59 

As  tlie  friend  of  Richard  Hooker  and  Sir  Henry  Savile 
he  probably  represented  the  views  of  the  more  learned 
and  thono-htful  divines  of  his  time.     Field  controverts 
the  high  views  of  Episcopacy  set  forth  by  the  Romanist 
Bellarmine.     He  regards  it  as  a  convenient  arrange- 
ment of  Church  government.     "  The  Apostles,  in  set- 
thng  the  state  of  their  churches,  did  so  constitute  in 
them  many  Presbyters  with  power  to  teach,  instruct, 
and  direct  the  people  of  God ;  that  yet  they  appointed 
one  only   to  be  chief  pastor  of  this  place,   ordaining 
that  the  rest  should  be  but  his  assistants,  not  presum- 
ing to  do  anything  without  him ;    so  that  though  they 
were  all  equal  in  the  power  of  order,  yet  were  the  rest 
inferior-rated  men  in  the  government  of  the  Church, 
whereof  he  was  Pastor;  and  they  but  his  assistants 
only.     The    dumb    beasts,   saith   Hierome,   and  wilde 
heards    have    their     leaders,  which    they    follow ;  the 
bees  have  their  king ;   the  crows  flee  after  one  another 
like  an  alphabet  of  letters.    There  is  but  one  Emperor, 
one  judge  of  a  province.     Rome  newly  built  could  not 
endure  two  brethren  to  be   kings  together,  and  there- 
fore was  dedicated  a  parricide.     Esau  and  Jacob  were 
at  war  in  the  womb  of  Rebecca ;   every   Church  hath 
her  own  Bishop,  her  own  Arch-Presbyter,   her  own 
chief  Deacon  ;   and  all  ecclesiastical  order  consisteth 
herein  that  some  do  rule  and  direct  the  rest.     In  the 
ship  there  is  one  that  directeth  the  helm.     In  a  house 
or  family  there  is  but  one  master.     And  to  conclude, 
in  an  armie,  if  it  be  never  so  great,  yet  the  direction 
of  one  general  is  expected.     We  make  not  the  power 
of  bishops    to   be  princely,  as   Bellarmine  doth,   but 
fatherly :   so  that  as  the  Presbyters    may  do  nothing 
without  the  Bishop,  so  he  may  do  nothing  in  matters 


60  QUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

of  greatest  moment  and  consequence  without  tbeir 
presence  and  advice,  whereupon  the  Council  of 
Carthage  voideth  all  sentences  of  Bishops,  which  the 
presence  of  their  clergy  confirmeth  not.  Touching  the 
pre-eminence  of  Bishops  above  Presbyters  there  is 
some  difference  among  school  divines  ;  for  the  best 
learned  of  them  are  of  opinion  that  Bishops  are  not 
greater  than  Presbyters  in  the  power  of  consecration 
and  order,  but  only  in  the  exercise  of  it ;  and  the 
power  of  jurisdiction,  seeing  Presbyters  may  preach 
and  minister  the  greatest  of  all  Sacrament,  by  virtue 
of  their  consecration  and  order,  as  well  as  Bishops  .... 
For  the  avoyding  of  the  peril  of  schism  it  was  or- 
dained that  one  should  be  chosen  who  should  be  named 
a  Bishop,  to  whom  the  rest  should  obey,  and  to  whom 
it  was  reserved  to  give  orders,  and  to  do  some  such 
other  things,  as  none  but  Bishops  do."* 

Very  soon  the  Episcopacy  is  found  to  be  dominant 
throughout  the  whole  Christian  Church,  sometimes  in 
eccentric,  abnormal,  and  exaggerated  forms.  Eccle- 
siastical history  is  full  of  errors  of  government  as 
well  as    errors  in   doctrine.     In    the    earlier   ages  of 

*  The  late  Dean  Goode  ("  Doctrine  of  the  Church  of  England  on 
Non-Episcopal  Ordination")  has  shown  that  the  views  of  the  modern 
extreme  school  were  not  held  by  the  chief  divines  of  the  Church  of 
England,  even  by  those  known  as  "  High  Churchmen."  And  he  quotes, 
in  proof,  the  language  i7iter  alios  of  Bishops  Abbey  (1660),  Pilkington 
(1563),  Jewell,  Archbishop  Whitgift,  Whitaker  (Reg.  Prof,  of  Div. 
Cambridge),  Hooker,  Hadrian  Saravia  (quoted  however  by  Keble  as 
maintaining  the  opposite),  Bishop  Cooper  (1589),  Dr.  Richard  Cosin 
(Dean  of  the  Arches,  1584),  Bishop  Cosin,  Archbishops  Bramhall,  Ban- 
croft, and  Usher,  and  Bishops  Hall,  Davenant,  Morton,  and  Tomline. 
Dean  Goode's  successor  in  the  Deanery  of  Ripon,  Dr.  McNeile,  has 
much  reason  on  his  side  when  he  claims  that  the  largest  measure  of 
obedience  to  Bishops  is  rendered  by  Evangelical  clergymen,  although 
they  do  not  hold  "  High"  doctrine  about  Episcopacy. 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOrACY.  Gl 

Christianity  there  is  no  land,  no  period  where  the 
Episcopal  form  of  government  does  not  prevail, 
whether  we  look  at  Western  or  Oriental  civilization. 
When  we  look  at  Palestine  and  its  neighbourhood, 
Egypt,  Syria,  Africa,  Asia  Minor,  Italy,  EvangeHcal 
Episcopacy  is  the  accepted  form  of  Church  govern- 
ment. The  institution  marks  a  definite  stage  in  the 
progress  and  development  of  the  Church.  Very  soon, 
as  might  be  expected  from  human  frailty,  the  tares 
are  springing  up  among  the  wheat,  and  the  institution 
becomes  vitiated  by  the  love  of  pride,  and  pomp,  and 
power.  Before  long  Episcopacy  becomes  interwoven 
into  the  web  of  temporalities  and  royalties.  It  is  re- 
markable that  in  Rome,  where  all  the  elements  of 
evil  eventually  culminated,  Clement,  whom  universal 
tradition  strongly  affirms  to  have  been  Bishop,  never 
alludes  to  the  existence  of  any  bishopric  at  Rome, 
where  he  was  writing ;  or  at  Corinth,  whither  he  was 
writing.  In  some  such  sort  of  way  did  tlie  territorial 
jurisdiction  of  Bishops  grow  up.  Guizot  shows  that 
during  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries  the  right  lay  with 
the  people  to  elect  the  Bishops,  and  it  was  only  after 
the  conquest  of  Caul  by  the  Franks  that  the  kings 
frequently  nominated  them.  For  the  first  three 
hundred  years,  according  to  King,  the  clergy  and 
laity  jointly  elected  the  Bishops.  Even  in  our  own 
Church  of  the  Future  the  question  of  the  appointment 
of  Bishops  must  arise.  Practically  the  present  system 
may  have  worked  as  well  or  better  than  any  other 
system  that  could  be  devised.  But  doubtless  we  have 
had  profligate,  worldly,  unbelieving  statesmen  appoint- 
ing Bishops  again  and  again  ;  and  this  incongruity 
may  come  to  the  point  that  the  bitterest  enemy  of  the 


62  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Churcli  may  nevertheless  appoint  its  prelates.  The 
Old  Catholic  movement  has  given  us  the  example  of 
the  true  method,  and  of  primitive  practice.  Bishop 
Reinkens  was  chosen  by  lay  as  well  as  clerical  votes ; 
the  draft  of  the  constitution  was  drawn  up  the  same 
way,  and  the  constitution  of  the  Church  provided  for 
the  due  mixture  of  orders  in  synods  and  committees. 
In  the  olden  days  Bishops  were  much  more  of  a  spiritual 
than  of  a  temporal  function.  In  the  book  "  On  the 
Glory  of  Regality,"  which  Mr.  Buckle  quotes  in  his 
Common-place  Book,  the  author  says  :  "  On  the  whole 
it  appears  that,  whatever  may  have  been  the  usage  of 
later  reigns,  the  doing  of  homage  by  Bishops  was  not 
a  practice  of  antiquity."  Only  very  gradually  was  pre- 
lacy brought  into  connection  with  royalty,  and  that 
alliance  sprang  up  between  the  two  which  has  so  very 
rarely  wavered,  and  which  has,  at  times,  assumed  such 
a  secular  character.  It  is,  however,  the  tendency  of 
the  Church,  as  it  is  the  tendency  of  the  human  form, 
to  revert  to  the  primitive  type.  Episcopacy  is  only  a 
means  which  has  from  age  to  age  vindicated  its  use- 
fulness,  and  should  be  remodelled  after  its  primitive 
type;  if,  as  in  the  bishopric  of  Rome,  it  should  come 
between  the  individual  life  and  the  one  great  Shepherd 
and  Bishop  of  souls. 

The  author  of  that  quaint  learned  book  "  The 
Broad  Stone  of  Honour,"  has  collected  some  very 
touching  and  graphic  notices  of  some  phases  of 
Episcopacy.  He  says  :  "  Nor  can  we  omit  mention  of 
that  beautiful  system  of  degree  which  gave  rise  to 
such  humility  in  the  higher  ranks,  and  to  such  faith- 
ful submission  to  the  lower,"  a  system  of  degrees, 
however,    which   has    often    exhibited    arrogance    on 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF   EPISCOPACY.  63 

the  one  side  and  servility  on  the  other.  In  the  Council 
of  Carthage  (4  Can.  84)  we  read,  "  Ut  ejriscojnts, 
quoUbet  loco  sedenSy  stare  presbijtei'um  non  patiatur." 
When  Francis  Castello  said  to  St.  Antoninus,  Arch- 
bishop of  Florence,  whose  secretary  he  was,  "  Bishops 
were  to  be  pitied,  if  they  were  to  be  eternally  engaged 
as  he  was."  The  saint  replied,  "  To  enjoy  interior 
peace  we  must  always  reserve  in  our  hearts,  amidst 
all  affairs,  as  it  were,  a  secret  closet,  where  we  are 
to  keep  retired  within  ourselves,  and  where  no  busi- 
o£  the  world  can  ever  enter."  Kenelm  r)igby  goes  on 
to  speak  of  the  virtuous  actions  of  good  Bishops. 
"  Think  what  a  spirit  St.  Nilamon  had,  who  died  with 
terror  as  they  bore  him  to  an  Episcopal  throne.  What 
simplicity  in  St.  Charles  Borromeo  and  Cardinal  Ximenes 
to  visit  their  diocese  on  foot  without  attendants,  and 
in  the  Great  Cardinal  of  Lorraine  to  be  constant  in 
ardently  catechising  the  most  simple  of  his  diocese." 
He  is  particularly  struck  with  the  virtues  of  one  Don 
Bartholomew  de  Martyribus,  "  What  an  edifying 
spectacle  to  see  him  resist,  till  he  was  forced  under 
pain  of  excommunication  to  accept  the  Archiepiscopal 
throne  of  Brazes,  when  he  walked  to  Lisbon  to  pay 
his  respects  to  the  Queen  ;  to  see  him  full  of  sorrow 
and  shame  when  shown  the  magnificent  palace  pro- 
vided for  him,  inhabiting  one  room  with  bare  walls, 
a  deal  table,  and  a  mattress ;  eating  of  but  one  dish, 
giving  the  rest  to  the  poor ;  rising  at  three  in  the 
morning  to  study  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  the 
Fathers  till  eight;  visiting  his  diocese  in  the  depth  of 
winter  mounted  on  a  mule  ;  falling  at  the  feet  of  a 
great  lord,  beseeching  him  to  repent,  choosing  rather 
to  sleep  in  a  cabin  with  his  people,  than  in   the  prin- 


64 


OUR   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 


cipal  Louse  of  the  village  called  the  Castle;  his  re- 
peated and  at  length  successful  efforts  to  resign  his 
mitre ;  his  visiting  the  neighbouring  villages  on  foot 
to  teach  the  children  their  catechism  and  to  relieve 
the  poor." 

We  pass  to  the  consideration  of  modern  Episcopacy 
since  those  days  of  the  Reformation  that  never  disturbed 
its  continuity.    When  Prelacy  emerged  into  the  wider, 
healthier  air  of  Protestantism,  it  became  exposed  to 
very  free  handling,  and   the  adverse  movement   was 
quickened    as    the    Church    of   England    became    less 
Calvinistic    and    decidedly   more    Arminian.      Martin 
Marprelate  makes  his  ominous  appearance.  He  brought 
forward  the  controversy   respecting    the    theory   and 
practice  of  Episcopacy  more  clearly  than  ever  before. 
It  was   never  known   who   the   original  Martin  ]\Iar- 
prelate  was.     He  had  a  secret  press  which  was  set  up 
in  one  place  after  another  in   England,  until  it  was 
eventually  seized.     Martin   spoke  very  highly  of  his 
own    position.      "  I    have    been    entertained    at    the 
court,  every  man  talks  of  my  worship.     Many  would 
gladly  receive  my  books  if  they  could  tell  where  to 
find  them."     He  was  a  great  scourge  to  the  prelates  ; 
he  was  especially  severe  on  the  famous  Bishop  Aylrner. 
This  unfortunate  Aylmer    had    once    in   his  youthful 
days   written   a  book  in   which   he   had   spoken  very 
sharply  of  Bishops.     It  is  thus  that  the  future  Bishop 
spoke  of   the  Episcopate :  "  Howl  and  wail,    not  for 
the  danger  you  stand  in  of  losing  your  Bishoprics  and 
benefices,    your    pomp    and    your    pride,  your    riches 
and    wealth,    but    that  hell  hath    opened    his    mouth 
wide  and  gapeth    to  swallow  you   .   .   .   Come   down, 
you  Bishops,  from   your  thousands  and  content  you 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF   EPISCOPACY.  65 

wifcli  your  hundreds ;  let  your  diet  be  priesfc-like  and 
not  prince-like."  Those  prelates  must  have  been 
delic^bted  to  have  unearthed  such  lansruas-e  from  a 
Bishop  of  London.  For  once  the  aspiration  was 
satisfied,  "  Oh  that  mine  enemy  had  written  a  book  !" 
"  Hear,  Brother  London,"  he  exclaims  in  glee,  "  I 
think  you  would  have  spent  three  of  the  best  elms 
which  you  had  cut  down  at  Fulham,  and  three  pence 
half  penie  besides  that  I  had  never  met  with  your 
book."  There  are  as  odd  stories  about  this  Bishop 
Aylmer  as  about  any  Bishop  of  Clogher  or  Derry. 
He  is  said  to  have  cut  down  the  elms  at  Fulham  to 
the  extent  of  £6000,  an  enormous  sum  in  those  days. 
He  ordained  his  blind  gate-keeper,  and  gave  him  the 
hving  of  Paddington,  as  a  means  of  providing  for 
him.  The  Bishop  had  a  son-in-law,  a  drunken  worth- 
less clergyman,  and  on  the  plan  of  adjusting  diffe- 
rences in  a  saw-pit,  the  Bishop  closeted  himself  with 
his  son-in-law,  and  taking  a  good  stout  cudgel  gave 
him  a  hearty  thrashing.  Some  valuable  cloth  had 
been  stolen  from  some  dyers  in  Thames  Street.  It 
was  on  the  Bishop's  lands,  and  the  unfortunate 
thieves  before  tliey  were  executed  had  admitted  the 
identity  of  the  cloth.  The  owners  applied  for  it,  but 
the  Bishop  refused  to  surrender  it  except  on  satisfac- 
tory proof  of  ownership.  In  the  opinion  of  his  Lord- 
ship the  proof  was  never  sufficiently  satisfactory. 
"  The  Bishop,"  says  Martin,  "  knew  as  well  as  the 
owners  to  what  good  uses  it  could  be  put.  It  is  very 
good  blue  and  so  would  serve  well  for  the  liveries  of 
his  men  ;  and  it  was  very  good  green,  fit  to  make 
cushions  and  coverings  for  tables.  Brother  London," 
he  continues,    "  you  were  best  make    restitution,  it 

VOL.  I.  F 


66  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

is  plague,  theft,  and  horrible  oppression.  Bonner 
would  have  blushed  to  have  been  taken  in  the  light  of 
it." 

The  Martin  Marprelate  Tracts  have  been  attributed 
to  Penry,  whose  unrighteous  execution  is  so  great  a 
blot  upon  Queen  Elizabeth  or  rather  upon  Whitgift. 
Penry' s  great  desire  was  that  the  Gospel  should  be 
preached  among  his  Welsh  countrymen.  He  objected, 
not  without  reason,  to  Bishops  as  being  utter  failures 
in  Wales,  and  certainly  Wales  is  the  district  where 
the  least  can  be  said  for  Episcopacy. 

It  is  extremely  interesting  to  find  Lord  Bacon  taking 
part  in  these  questions  about  the  Bishops.  Bacon 
was  a  man  who  thought  deeply  on  religious  matters, 
although  it  is  to  be  feared  that  his  life  was  hardly  in 
harmony  with  his  opinions.  He  approved  of  Epis- 
copacy, but  he  did  not  hesitate  to  blame  the  Bishops. 
He  did  not  sympathise  with  the  Puritans,  but  at  the 
same  time  he  told  the  Bishops  that  their  conduct 
towards  the  Puritans  could  not  be  justified.  He 
wished  the  word  "  priest"  to  be  laid  aside.  It  was, 
indeed,  only  an  abbreviation  of  the  old  word  "  Pres- 
byter," but  it  was  a  word  that  might  be  confounded 
with  the  sacrificmg  priest  of  the  old  dispensation.  He 
was  of  opinion  that  the  Bishop  possessed  far  too  great 
a  superiority  over  the  rest  of  the  clergy.  "  There  be 
two  circumstances  in  the  administration  of  Bishops 
wherein  I  never  could  be  satisfied ;  the  one,  the  sole 
exercise  of  their  authority.  For  the  first,  the  Bishop 
giveth  orders  alone,  excommunicateth  alone,  judgeth 
alone.  This  seemeth  to  be  a  thing  almost  without 
example  in  good  government,  and  therefore  not  un- 
likely to  have  crept  in  in  the  degenerate  and  corrupt 


ON   THE    HISTORY    Or   EPISCOPACY.  G7 

times.  .  .  .  Surely  I  do  suppose  that  ah  initio  nonfult 
ita,  and  that  Deaus  and  Chapters  were  councils  aboub 
the  sees  and  chairs  of  Bishops  at  the  first ;  and  were 
unto    them  a    presbytery    or   consistory,    and   inter- 
meddled  not  only  in  the  disposing  of  their  revenues 
and  endowments,  but  much  more  in  jurisdiction  eccle- 
siastical.    But   it   is    probable    that    the    Deans    and 
Chapters  stick  close  to  the  Bishops  in  matters  of  profit 
and  the  world,  and  would  not  lose  their  hold,  but  in 
matters    of  jurisdiction    (which    they    accounted    but 
trouble  and  attendance)   they  suffered  the  Bishops  to 
encroach  and  usurp  ;  and  so  the  one  continueth  and 

the   other  is  lost We  see  many  shadows  still 

remaining,  as  that  the  Dean  and  Chapter,  pro  forma, 
chooseth  the  Bishop,  which  is  the  highest  point  of 
jurisdiction,  and  that  the  Bishop,  when  he  giveth 
orders,  if  there  be  any  ministers  casually  present, 
calleth  them  to  join  with  him  in  the  imposition  of 
hands  and  some  other  particulars." 

It  would  be  interesting  to  compare  the  era  of  the 
Elizabethan  with  that  of  the  Victorian  Bishops.  Such 
a  comparison  would  disclose  some  curious  points  both 
of  likeness  and  unlikeness ;  but,  on  the  whole,  the 
Victorian  Bishops  would  have  abundant  reason  for 
gratitude.  In  the  posthumous  works  of  the  late  Mr. 
Buckle  we  have  some  collections  of  facts  which  give 
much  information  on  the  subject.  His  collections  have 
the  drawback,  which  is  apparent  in  many  ways,  of  a 
strong  bias  against  the  Church  on  the  part  of  the 
collector.*     The  correspondence    of  Burleigh    shows 

*  Mr.  Buckle  writes  :  "My  ambition  seems  to  grow  more  insatiate 
than  ever,  and  it  is  perhaps  well  that  it  should,  as  it  is  my' sheet  anchor." 
Perhaps  he  regretted  at  Damascus  that  he  had  left  "  the  unknown  and 
invisible  future"  to  take  care  of  itself. 

E    2 


68  OTJE   BISHOPS    ATSD    DEANS. 

tbe  shortcomings  of  many  prelates,  and  sucli  a  candid 
writer  as  Bishop  Short  is  severe  upon  the  Bishops  of 
the  EHzabethan  period.  Queen  EHzabeth  seems 
systematically  to  have  sought  to  humble  both  spiritual 
and  temporal  peers.  Within  the  first  twelve  months 
of  her  reign  she  greatly  diminished  that  Episcopal 
power  which,  under  her  sister,  had  developed  into 
inordinate  proportions.  Her  hand  was  felt  so  heavily, 
that  even  Parker  said  :  "  It  is  our  misfortune  to  be 
singled  out  from  the  rest  of  mankind  for  infamy  and 
aversion."  Archbishop  after  Archbishop  complained 
grievously  of  the  treatment  each  had  received.  Parker, 
according  to  ancient  precedent,  used  to  fell  timber  in 
certain  woods.  Elizabeth  commenced  a  raid  against 
him  which  brought  him  to  subjection.  Archbishop 
Whitgift  says,  "  The  temporalty  sought  to  make  the 
clergy  beggars,  that  they  might  depend  upon  them." 
Archbishop  Sandys  says,  "  Our  estimation  is  little ; 
our  authority  is  less."  And  again,  "  We  are  become 
in  your  sight  and  used  as  if  we  were  the  refuse  and 
parings  of  the  world."  When  Archbishop  Grindail 
was  unwilling  to  suppress  the  "  Prophesyings,"  the 
Queen  imprisoned  him  in  the  house,  and  brought  him 
into  abject  submission.  So  too  the  Bishops.  The 
Bishop  of  Winchester  says  his  order  is  treated  with 
"  loathsome  contempt,  hatred,  and  disdain."  The 
Bishop  of  London  complained  "  that  the  authority  of 
the  Church  signified  little;  that  the  Bishops  them- 
selves were  sunk  and  lamentably  disvalued  by  the 
meanest  of  the  people."  The  Bishop  of  Ely  complains 
"  whether  it  was  not  troublesome  enough  that  Her 
Majesty's  priests  everywhere  were  despised  and  trodden 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OP    EPISCOPACY.  69 

upon,  and  were  esteemed   as   the  ofTscouring  of  the 
world." 

In  spite  of  such  language,  however,  we  find  the 
Bishops  employing  a  great  many  serving-raen,  and 
making  large  purchases  of  laud.  We  find,  however,  a 
Bishop  of  Carlisle  writing  to  Elizabeth's  minister, 
Lord  Shrewsbury,  "  I  profess  unto  your  honour,  before 
the  living  God,  that  when  my  year's  account  was  made 
at  Michaelmas  last,  my  expenses  did  surmount  the 
year's  revenues  of  my  bishopric  £600."  Some  other 
notes  may  be  added.  In  1574,  it  was  brought  as  a 
reproach  against  Grindall  that  he  was  called  Lord. 
He  replied  that,  however  the  title  of  lord  was  applied 
to  him  and  the  rest  of  the  Bishops,  he  was  not  lordly. 
In  1579,  one  of  the  Puritans  taunted  the  Bishop  of 
London  that  "  he  must  be  lorded,  as  it  please  your 
lordship,"  at  every  word.  Elizabeth  appears  too  much 
to  have  taken  a  hard,  dry,  secular  view  both  of 
"  bishops  and  curates."  She  thought  that  three 
preachers  were  quite  enough  for  any  county.  Towards 
the  Bishops  she  seems  to  have  entertained  feelings  of 
absolute  savagery.  The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
and  some  other  prelates  came  to  see  her  on  her  death- 
bed. "  Upon  the  sight  of  them  she  was  much  offended, 
cholerically  rating  them,  bidding  them  be  packing, 
seeing  she  was  no  Atheist."  Mr.  Buckle  characteris- 
tically explains  that  she  "  hated  them  for  their  med- 
dling inquisitorial  spirit,  for  their  selfishness,  for  their 
contracted  and  bigoted  minds."  He  goes  on  to  say  that 
at  the  time  of  Elizabeth  "  the  inordinate  pretensions 
of  the  Bishops  were  at  length  reduced  to  something 
like  a  rate  ot  reason.  But  the  process  was  slow  and 
onerous.     There  is  a  concentrated  energy  in  Ecclesi- 


70  OTJR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

astical  power,  which  renders  it  so  tenacious  of  life  that 
when  at  all  supported  by  public  opinion,  nothing  but 
the  most  resolute  conduct  of  the  civil  authority  will 
prevent  it  from  gradually  arrop^ating  to  itself  the  en- 
tire function  of  the  State."  Such  language  may  seem 
very  little  applicable  to  our  own  days,  but  Papacy  and 
Patriarchate  have  shown  to  what  a  diseased  height 
Episcopacy  may  extend,  and  the  writings  of  some  of 
the  greatest  saints  exhibit  to  what  servility,  even  in 
noble  natures,  it  may  give  rise. 

It  was  Bancroft's  famous  sermon  that,  in  this 
country,  first  claimed  an  Apostolic  character  for 
Episcopacy.  Laud  followed  Bancroft's  steps  to  some 
extent  in  the  theory  of  Episcopacy.  In  the  civil 
troubles  the  throne  supported  the  Bishops,  and  the 
Bishops  supported  the  throne.  There  is  reason  to 
believe  that  Charles  himself  did  not  hold  the  high 
Episcopal  views  which  were  prevalent  in  his  time,  and 
which  ever  rose  higher  and  higher,  as  the  fortunes  of 
the  Church  fell  lower  and  lower.  Politically  the  divine 
right  of  Kings,  and  the  divine  right  of  Bishops  ran 
together,  but  Charles  was  not  unwiUing  to  accept 
Usher's  scheme  for  a  Moderated  Episcopacy.  Accord- 
ing to  Usher's  scheme  of  Moderate  Episcopacy,  the 
Bishop  became  the  president  of  a  College  of  Pres- 
byters, differing  from  them  in  rank,  not  in  species 
(gradu  non  ordine),  and  would  act  in  ordination  or 
jurisdiction  by  their  concurrence. 

But  certainly  the  Bishops  never  fell  so  low  as  in  the 
time  of  Charles  the  First.  A  contemporary  writer 
says  :  "  All  are  for  the  creating  of  a  kind  of  presbytery, 
and  for  bringing  down  the  Bishops,  in  all  things 
spiritual  and  temporal,  so  low  as  can  be  done  with 


ON  THE  HISTORY  OF  EPISCOPACY.  71 

any  subsistence ;  but  tlieir  utter  abolition,  which  is  the 
only  aim  of  the  most  godly,  is  the  knot  of  the  question." 
It  should  be  mentioned,  however,  that  it  is  asserted  on 
the  other  hand,  that  the  major  part  of  the  Parliament- 
arians, and  even  of  the  Puritans,   was  in  favour    of 
moderated  Episcopacy.     Charles  the  First  was  ulti- 
mately willing  to  concede  the  scheme  of  a  Moderated 
Episcopacy.     One   of  the   earlier   acts    of  the    Long 
Parliament  was  to  carry  the  second   reading  of  a  bill 
for  the  abolition  of  Episcopacy.     A  whole  dozen  of  the 
Bishops  were  sent  to  the  Tower  at  once,  by  order  of 
the  Long  Parliament.     We  hear  a  great  deal  of  the 
seven  Bishops  who  were  committed  to  the  Tower  by 
James  the   Second,  but  we   hear  in  comparison  very 
little  of  the  twelve  Bishops  who  were  committed  there 
by  the  Parliament.     The  Lower  House  had  encouraged 
mob  passions  and  popular  outbreaks  against  them  to 
such  an  extent  that  the  Bishops  were  unable  to  attend. 
They  accordingly  protested  against  all  that  should  be 
done  in  the  Upper  House  during  their  absence.     "  A 
protest,"  says  Mr.   Hallam,  a  great  Chief  Justice  of 
history,   "  not  perhaps   entirely  well   expressed,    but 
abundantly  justifiable  in  its  arguments  by  the  plainest 
principles  of  law."     The  wliole  House  agreed  that  they 
should  be  charged  with  treason,  except  one  gentleman, 
who   said  he  thought  them  only  mad,  and  proposed 
that  they  should   be  sent  to   Bedlam  instead  of  the 
Tower.       They   were    not    even    admitted    to    bail. 
Ultimately,  through  the  Solemn  League  and  Covenant, 
Presbyterianism  became  for  several   years    the  esta- 
blished religion.     The  persecution  of  the  Bishops  was 
impartially  extended  to  the  clergy.     More  than  a  fifth 
suffered  ejection   from   their    benefices.      "  The   bio- 


72  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

graphical  collectioDS  furnish  a  pretty  copious  martyr- 
ology  of  men  the  most  distinguished  by  their  learning 
and  virtues  in  that  age.  The  remorseless  and  indis- 
criminate bigotry  of  Presbyterianism  might  boast  that 
it  had  heaped  disgrace  on  Walton,  and  driven  Lydiat 
to  beggary  ;  that  it  trampled  on  the  old  age  of  Hales, 
and  embittered  with  insult  the  dying  moments  of 
Chillingworth." 

Thus  Mr.  Hallam.  Take  the  eaxmple  of  ChilKng- 
worth.  One  winter  he  had  gone  down  to  Arundel 
Castle.  The  health  of  the  great  scholar  had  grown 
enfeebled,  and  few  men  had  suffered  more  than  he  had 
in  those  evil  days.  He  had  hoped  that  the  mild 
breezes  of  the  Sussex  downs  would  recruit  his  shat- 
tered strength,  and  that  he  might  continue  undis- 
turbed in  the  calmness  and  security  of  the  palace- 
fortress.  These  hopes  were  fallacious.  The  opera- 
tions of  war  were  suddenly  transferred  to  Arundel 
Castle.  The  place  was  given  up  to  the  Parliamentary 
forces.  Some  indulgence  appears  to  have  been  shown 
to  a  captive  so  illustrious  as  Chillingworth.  As  his 
health  was  so  feeble,  he  was  not  sent  up  to  London 
with  the  other  prisoners,  but  was  allowed  to  retire  to 
the  Bishop's  palace  at  Chichester.  In  this  dangerous 
state  of  health  a  worthy  man,  whose  zeal  unfortunately 
was  not  much  tempered  by  discretion,  sought  him  out, 
and  attempted  to  argue  with  him  on  those  various 
secondary  points  which  have  always  divided  the 
opinions  of  good  Christian  people.  But  the  great 
controversialist  felt  that  his  days  of  controversy  were 
numbered.  He  was  fast  going  to  his  home,  where  all 
controversy  will  be  lost  in  unclouded  light  and  love. 
"  I  pray  you  deal  charitably  with  me,"  he  said ;  "  for 


ON    THE    niSTOllY    OF    EriSCOPACY.  73 

I  myself  have  always  been  a  charitable  man."  But 
although  his  oppouent  states  "  that  he  ever  opposed 
him  in  a  friendly  and  charitable  way,"  there  appears 
reason  to  fear  that  the  closing  days  of  Chillingworth 
were  harassed,  and  perhaps  shortened,  by  the  rancour 
of  the  times.  Yet  the  last  notice  of  Chillingworth 
reminds  us  of  the  substantial  Christian  unity  which 
underlies  the  apparent  differences  of  Christian  men. 
The  day  before  ChiUingworth's  death  was  Sunday, 
and  his  opponent  desired  that  he  might  be  mentioned 
in  the  pubhc  prayers  of  the  day  ;  and  to  this  the  dying 
scholar  most  willingly  consented. 

The  great  Episcopal  controversy  of  the  time  was 
that  which  arose  between  Bishop  Hall  and  the  Smec- 
tymnians.  All  the  abstract  arguments  for  and  against 
Episcopacy  may  there  be  read  at  length.  Hall  appears 
to  have  shared  in  the  views  of  Bancroft  and  Laud  on 
the  subject  of  the  Episcopacy,  but  otherwise  he  was 
divided  from  such  men  by  a  whole  hemisphere  of 
thought.  Hall  was  very  angry  with  a  certain  Bishop 
of  Orkney,  who  had  renounced  his  Episcopal  office  and 
begged  pardon  for  ever  having  assumed  it.  He  was 
angry  with  all  Presbyterians  and  all  Independents,  for 
which  last  "  no  answer  was  fit  but  dark  lodgings  and 
hellebore."  Hall  admitted  that  in  the  New  Testament 
the  words  Bishop,  Presbyter  and  Deacon  were  promis- 
cuously used  ;  still  he  thought  he  had  a  case  both  from 
tradition  and  the  Scriptures.  This,  however,  was  a 
point  which,  although  admitted  by  a  few  tolerant  and 
large-hearted  Nonconformists,  has  always  been  hotly 
contested  by  the  great  body  of  Irreconcileables. 

Hall  was  answered  by  five  Presbyterian  divines,  the 
initials  of   whose    names    made  up  the   word  Smec- 


74  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEA^^S. 

tymnims.*  These  men  would  not  object  to  be  moderate 
Episcopalians,  but  they  would  not  admit  that  Episco- 
pacy was  a  Divine  Institution.  They  confidentl}'' 
asserted  the  negative  position — that  negative  which  it 
is  so  proverbially  hard  to  prove  ;  that  Liturgies  and 
Episcopacy  find  no  place  in  the  Apostolic  times.  If 
Hall  had  admitted,  they  argued,  that  Bishop  is  not 
discernible  from  Presbyter  in  the  New  Testament, 
how  could  he  argue  that  Bishops  existed  in  the 
Apostle's  times  ?  Where  were  their  dioceses  ?  where 
could  they  find  the  first  trace  of  parishes  ?  Does  not 
St.  Paul,  at  Miletus,  call  the  elders  of  Miletus  bishops; 
and  could  that  term  be  interpreted  in  the  modern 
sense  ?  The  whole  case  against  Episcopacy  is  fully 
and  powerfully  stated  in  this  work.  Bishop  Hall 
answered  by  "A  Defence  of  the  Humble  Remon- 
strances against  the  Frivolous  and  False  Exceptions 
of  Smectymnnus."  The  Smectymnians  answered 
Hall,  and  then  Hall  made  rejoinder  to  the  Smec- 
tymnians ;  and  at  this  stage  the  subject  appeared  to 
be  thoroughly  exhausted.  William  Byrne — he  of  the 
cropped  ears — resumed  it  in  1636,  in  his  treatise  "  The 
Worshipping  of  Timothy  or  Titus.  Timothy,"  he 
argued,  "  never  was  a  Bishop ;  if  so,  would  St.  Paul 
have  asked  him  '  to  carry  his  clothes-bag,  his  books 
and  parchments  after  him  ?'  "  He  was  a  very  young 
man.  The  Apostle  told  him  not  to  rebuke  an  elder, 
and  warned  him  against  his  susceptible  disposition  ;  he 
went  about  with  St.  Paul,  or  was  sent  about  by  him 
according  as  there  was  work  to  be  done. 

It  would  not  be  difficult  to  construct  a  biographical 

*  Stephen    Marshall,    Edmund   Calamy,  Thomas   Young,    Matthew 
Newman,  and  William  Spurston. 


ON  THE  HISTORY  OF  EPISCOPACY.  75 

history  of  the  Reformed  Clmrcli  of  England,  con- 
structed on  the  acknowledged  memoirs  of  its  prelates. 
This  is,  no  doubt,  the  most  human  and  intelligible  way 
of  writing  ecclesiastical  history,  and  insofar  as  this 
has  been  very  rarely  attempted,  the  most  profound 
and  interesting  of  any  kind  of  history  has  been  over- 
laid by  obscure  and  difficult  discussions,  and  has  had 
only  a  very  slight  degree  of  interest  for  general  readers. 
We  will  briefly  examine  a  very  few  biographies  in  a 
consecutive  series,  which  will  give  us  some  idea  of 
personal  character  and  of  public  interests.  We  shall 
examine  either  side  of  the  picture  with,  perfect  impar- 
tiality, believing  that  a  measure  of  good  is  to  be  gained 
even  from  the  imperfections  of  the  best  men. 

There  is    no   worthy,    to  adopt   a 
1565— le'^S  lamiliar   and  expressive  term,  among 

the  great  "  worthies"  of  his  age, 
whose  memory  shines  with  purer  and  serener  lustre 
than  Lancelot  Andre wes.  His  life  commanded  the 
special  reverence  of  Lord  Bacon,  and  his  death  has  been 
commemorated  by  the  early  muse  of  Milton.  Unfor- 
tunately neither  his  life  nor  his  writings  have  much 
chance  of  being  familiar  to  the  general  reader.  His 
writings  are  vigorous,  impressive,  and  learned  to  the 
highest  degree,  and  have  been  described  as  "  a  very 
library  to  young  divines,  and  an  oracle  to  consult  at, 
to  laureate  and  grave  divines."  They  still  form  a 
favourite  study  of  careful  and  diligent  theological 
scholars,  but  at  present  those  pages  can  be  scarcely 
popular  w^hich  abound  with  quaint  conceits  and  over- 
flow with  learned  quotations. 

In  the  year  1555,  the    terrible  time  of  the  Marian 


"?&  ,  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

persecution,  Lancelot  Andrewes  was  born  in  Thames 
Street,    London.     His    father    was   a  member  of  the 
Trinity  House,  and  owned  some  land  near  Chelmsford, 
which  subsequently  came  to  his  son.  A  worthy  grocer, 
sheriff  in  his  day,  had  some  time  back  founded  a  free 
school  at  Stepney,  for  the   education  of  sixty  children 
of  poor  parents,  and  had  attached  to  it  an  almshouse 
and  chapel.     Here  Mr.  Ward,  the  schoolmaster,  was 
struck  with  his  abilities,  and  persuaded  his  parents  to 
continue  his  studies,  and  fit  him  for  one  of  the  learned 
professions.    It  is  pleasing  to  hear  that  when  the  little 
boy  became  a  powerful  prelate,  he   took  care  of  the 
son  of  his  old  schoolmaster,   and  gave  him  promotion. 
He  afterwards  went  to  Merchant  Tailors'  School,  and 
in   due  time   to  Pembroke   College,  Cambridge.     He 
was  a  studious  young  man,  and  his  chief  exercise  and 
amusement  was  a  solitary  walk,   or  the  walking  com- 
pany of  some  friend   with  whom   he  might  discuss  his 
different   studies.     He   used,  as  he  himself  says,    to 
have  no  love  and  no  practice  in  ordinary  games  and 
recreations.     He  became  Fellow,  and  at  three  o'clock 
in  the  afternoons  of  Saturdays  and  Sundays,  the  hour 
of  catechising,  he  used  to  read  lectures   on  the  com- 
mandments.    Many   came  to    hear    him,     both    from 
other  colleges  and  from  the  country. 

We  next  find  him  travelling  with  the  Earl  of  Hun- 
tington, the  Lord  President  of  the  North.  He  at- 
tracted the  notice  of  Walsiugham,  the  Secretary  of 
State,  who  thought  it  would  be  a  great  pity  if  so 
much  learning  was  buried  in  a  country  place. 
Andrewes'  lot,  indeed,  proved  to  be  something  very 
different.  We  soon  find  him  vicar  of  St.  Giles,  Crip- 
plegate.     In  the  memorable  year  1588,  we  find  him 


ON   THE    UISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACy.  77 

preaching  at  the  Spital,  on  1  Tim.  vi.  17—19.  There 
is  something  rather  curious  about  these  Spital  ser- 
mons. They  were  preached  at  a  cross  in  the  church- 
yard of  tlie  Augustinian  Priory  in  Spital  Fields.  A. 
bishop,  a  dean,  and  a  doctor  in  divinity  preached  on 
the  Monday,  Tuesday,  and  Wednesday  of  Easter 
week.  The  Roman  controversy  was  very  strong  at 
this  time,  and  Andrewes  eloquently  vindicates  the 
Protestantism  of  this  day  from  the  accusations  of  the 
Romanists.  He  praises  the  UberaUty  of  the  city  of 
London,  and  makes  this  interesting  remark  :  "  I  will 
be  able  to  prove  that  learning,  in  the  foundation  of 
schools,  and  increase  of  revenues  within  colleges,  and 
the  poor  in  foundation  of  almshouses  and  increase  of 
perpetuities  to  them,  have  received  greater  help  with- 
in this  realm  in  these  forty  years  last  past,  since  the 
reforming  of  ours  from  the  errors  of  theirs,  than  it 
hath  in  any  realm  Christian,  not  only  within  the 
selfsame  forty  years,  but  also  than  it  hath  in  any 
forty  years  upward,  during  all  the  time  of  Popery  : 
which  I  speak  partly  of  my  own  knowledge,  and 
partly  by  sufficient  grave  information  on  this  behalf. 
This  may  be  said,  and  said  truly."  It  was  the  cus- 
tom of  Andrewes,  while  he  held  this  place  at  St. 
Paul's,  to  walk  on  stated  days  in  one  of  the  aisles  of 
the  cathedral,  that  he  might  give  spiritual  advice  and 
comfort  to  any  who  would  come  and  converse  with 
him.  His  obhgation  to  Walsingham  in  no  degree 
impaired  his  independence.  When  Sir  Francis,  from 
state  reasons,  wished  him  to  advocate  some  particu- 
lar views,  we  are  told  "  that  he  was  not  scared  with 
a  councillor's  frown,  or  blown  aside  with  his  breath, 
and  answered  him  plainly,  that  they   were  not  only 


78  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

against  his  learniDg,  but  against  his  conscience." 
On  Ash  Wednesday,  1590,  we  hear  of  his  first 
sermon  before  Queen  EUzabeth,  an  honour  and  a 
duty  which  henceforth  he  had  frequently  to  discharge. 
On  another  occasion,  in  preaching  before  the  Queen, 
he  set  before  her  the  pattern  of  the  Divine  govern- 
ment, the  gentleness  with  which  the  great  Shepherd 
of  Israel  led  his  flock.  His  labours  in  his  parish  and 
at  St.  Paul's  were  so  great  that  his  health  was 
seriously  affected.  His  friends  even  feared  for  his 
life.  His  charities  also  were  numerous  and  extensive  ; 
he  did  not  fail  to  attack  the  selfishness  of  the  age  and 
the  growing  luxury  in  dress,  living,  and  habitation. 
Some  of  these  sermons  were  preached  at  Whitehall. 
The  former  Chapel  was  burnt  down  ;  the  present  is 
the  old  banqueting  hall. 

In  1601,  he  was  made  Dean  of  Westminster.  He 
always  took  the  liveliest  interest  in  Westminster 
school.  We  have  an  interesting  mention  of  him  at 
this  time  in  that  famous  old  work,  Hacket's  "  Life  of 
Archbishop  Williams."  TVilliams  asked  Hacket  every- 
thing concerning  Andrewes.  "  I  told  him  how  strict 
that  excellent  man  was  to  charge  our  masters  that 
they  should  give  us  lessons  out  of  none  but  the  most 
classical  authors ;  that  he  did  often  supply  the  place 
both  of  the  head-master  and  usher  for  the  space  of  a 
whole  week  together,  and  gave  us  not  an  hour  of 
loitering:  time  from  mornins:  to  nig^ht :  how  he  caused 
our  exercises  in  prose  and  verse  to  be  brought  to  him. 
to  examine  our  style  and  proficiency;  that  he  never 
walked  to  Chiswick  for  his  recreation  without  a  brace 
of  this  young  fry  ;  and  in  that  way  having  leisure, 
had  a  singular  dexterity  to  fill  those  narrow  vessels 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  79 

with  a  funnel.  And,  winch  was  the  greatest  burden 
of  his  toil,  sometimes  thrice  in  a  week,  sometimes 
oftener,  he  sent  for  the  uppermost  scholars  to  his 
lodgings  at  night,  and  kept  them  with  him  from  eight 
till  eleven,  unfolding  to  them  the  best  rudiments  of 
the  Greek  tongue,  and  the  elements  of  the  Hebrew 
grammar ;  and  all  this  he  did  to  boys  without  any 
compulsion  of  correction,  nay,  I  never  heard  him 
utter  so  much  as  a  word  of  austerity  among  us."  He 
adds  that  this  good  and  great  prelate  was  the  first 
that  planted  him  in  his  tender  studies  and  watered 
them  continually  with  his  bounty,  and  on  Bishop 
Duppa's  monument  in  Westminster  Abbey,  it  is  stated 
that  he  learned  Hebrew  of  Lancelot  Andrewes,  at 
that  time  Dean.  If  any  deserving  scholar  was  not 
successful  in  obtaining  an  exhibition  to  the  Univer- 
sity, he  liberally  supported  him  there. 

It  is  noticeable  that  Andrewes  thrice  previously 
refused  a  bishopric,  and  afterwards  he  thrice  received 
a  bishopric ;  so  remarkable  was  his  promotion. 
Christian  IV.,  King  of  Denmark,  came  over  to  Eng- 
land to  visit  his  sister,  Queen  Anne,  and  Bishop 
Andrewes  preached  a  Latin  sermon  before  the  two 
sovereigns  at  Greenwich.  At  this  time  he  was  busy 
in  writing  his  great  book  against  Cardinal  Bellarmine, 
one  of  the  most  famous  controversial  works  in  exis- 
tence. We  have  Dudley  Carleton  mentioning  it  in 
one  of  his  letters.  "  The  Bishop  of  Chichester's 
book  is  now  in  the  press,  whereof  I  have  seen  part, 
and  it  is  a  worthy  work ;  only  the  brevity  breeds 
obscurity,  and  puts  the  reader  to  some  of  that  pains 
which  was  taken  by  the  writer."  This  great  work, 
the  "  Tortura  Torti,"  is  a  most  noble   defence  of  Pro- 


80  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

testantisra    against    the    misrepresentations    of    the 
Roman  Catholics. 

At  this  time  the  learned  Casaubon  came  over  to 
England,  after  the  assassination  of  Henry  IV.  of 
France,  to  whom  he  had  been  chaplain.  King  James, 
who,  with  all  his  faults,  was  a  true  patron  of  learning, 
invited  him  to  this  country.  This  great  scholar  had 
married  the  daughter  of  Henry  Stephens,  the  great 
printer.  He  was  delighted  to  form  a  friendship  with 
Andrewes,  and  in  his  letters  we  find  several  notices 
respecting  our  prelate,  Andrewes  lent  him  the  manu- 
script of  his  work,  and  Casaubon  was  greatly  de- 
lighted with  its  method  and  spirit.  One  pleasant 
summer  the  two  friends  took  an  excursion  into  the 
country.  The  Bishop  took  Casaubon  down  to  Cam- 
bridge. From  Cambridge  he  accompanied  Andrewes 
to  Ely,  to  which  diocese  the  Bishop  had  now  been 
translated.  They  attended  Divine  service  in  the 
cathedral  daily.  Very  early  in  the  morning  the 
Bishop  took  his  guest  out  and  showed  him  over  the 
place.  A  few  days  later  they  went  on  to  the  Bishop's 
residence  at  Downham  Market,  passing  through 
Wisbeach  on  the  way.  At  Wisbeach,  the  Mayor  and 
a  great  company  on  horseback  met  the  Bishop  on  his 
entry  into  the  town.  One  day,  we  are  told  that 
they  went  out  on  horseback  to  inspect  the  dykes. 
They  lost  their  way,  and,  to  add  to  the  misfortune, 
the  Bishop's  horse  threw  him,  fortunately  without 
any  harmful  results.  Next  day,  after  reading 
some  psalms  together,  as  was  their  custom,  they 
went  over  to  the  assizes,  where,  according  to  primi- 
tive custom  the  Bishop  presided.  A  visit  was  paid 
to  the  quarry  near  Ely,  and  they  rode  out  together 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  81 

to  see  the  country  in  the  ueigbbourbood.  Later  in 
the  season  they  went  down  to  Royston  to  see  the 
King.  Casaubon  relates  how  constantly  he  was  with 
Andrewes,  and  the  immense  use  which  the  great 
learning  and  the  great  kindness  of  Andrewes  proved 
to  him. 

In  1611,  the  present  version  of  the  Holy  Scriptures 
appeared.  Andrewes  was  one  of  the  translators. 
He  belonged  to  that  division  to  which  was  allotted 
the  translation  of  the  Old  Testament  from  Genesis  to 
the  end  of  the  Book  of  Kings.  Next  year  we  have 
another  curious  trace  of  bygone  manners.  Casaubon 
dined  at  Ely  House  on  Maundy  Thursday,  and  after 
dinner  the  feet  of  some  poor  men  were  washed. 
Going  down  into  the  country,  Andrewes  was  attacked 
with  an  aguish  fever  from  being  in  the  open  air  too 
late  in  the  evening.  An  old  biographer  speaks  thus 
ot  his  illness.  "  He  was  not  often  sick,  and  but  once 
till  his  last  illness  in  thirty  years  before  the  time 
he  died,  which  was  at  Downham,  in  the  Isle  of 
Ely,  the  air  of  that  place  not  agreeing  with  the 
constitution  of  his  body.  But  there  he  seemed  to  be 
prepared  for  his  dissolution,  saying  oftentimes  in 
that  sickness,  '  It  must  come  once,  and  why  not 
here  ?'  And  at  other  times,  before  or  since,  he 
would  say,  '  The  days  must  come,  when,  whether 
we  will  or  will  not,  we  shall  say  with  the  preacher, 
'  I  have  no  pleasure  in  them.'  "  When  he  recovered 
he  wrote  to  Casaubon,  inviting  him  to  come  with  his 
wife  and  revive  his  spirits,  and  exchange  the  great 
heat  of  the  metropolis  for  the  cooler  air  of  Downham. 
He  tells  him  to  see  on  his  way  the  renowned  fair  of 
Stourbridge,  and  what  would  be  a  more  potent  lure 

VOL.  I.  G 


82  OUR   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 

for  the  great  scholar,  tells  him  that  he  can  see  the 
Hebrew  copy  of  St.  Matthew.  Casaubon,  however, 
was  too  much  occupied  to  be  able  to  come.  But, 
though  the  Bishop  recovered,  his  friend,  the  amiable 
and  learned  Casaubon  became  the  victim  of  disease. 
Bishop  Andrewes  has  given  a  short  account  of  his 
last  days. 

The  Bishop  always  made  it  a  point  to  give  promo- 
tion to  deserving  men.  He  instructed  his  chaplain 
and  friends  to  inform  him  of  such  young  men  at  the 
University  as  stood  in  need  of  assistance.  Among 
others,  he  gave  a  stall  in  the  Cathedral  of  Ely  to  the 
learned  Boys.  "  At  the  vacancy  of  the  prebend,  he 
was  sent  for  to  London,"  says  his  biographer,  "  by 
Lancelot  Andrewes,  then  Lord  Bishop  of  Ely,  who 
bestowed  it  upon  him  unasked  for.  When  he  had 
given  him,  as  we  commonly  say,  joy  of  it  (which  was 
his  first  salutation  at  his  coming  to  him)  he  told  him 
'  that  he  did  bestow  it  freely  on  him  without  anyone 
moving  him  thereto  ;  though,'  said  he,  '  some  pick- 
thanks  will  be  saying  they  stood  your  friends  herein.' 
Which  prediction  proved  very  true." 

In  Izaak  Walton's  '*  Life  of  George  Herbert,"  we 
have  a  most  interesting  mention  of  Bishop  Andrewes 
in  connection  with  Herbert.  "  The  year  following, 
the  King  appointed  to  end  his  progress  at  Cambridge, 
and  to  stay  there  certain  days  ;  at  which  time  he  was 
attended  by  the  great  secretary  of  nature  and  all  learn- 
ing, Sir  Francis  Bacon  (Lord  Verulam)  and  by  the 
ever  memorable  and  learned  Dr.  Andrewes,  Bishop 
of  Winchester,  both  which  did  at  that  time  begin  a 
desired  friendship  with  our  Orator  (Herbert).  And 
for  the  learned  Bishop  it  is  observable  that  at  that 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF   EPISCOPACY.  83 

time  there  fell  to  be  a  modest  debate  betwixt  them 
two  about  predestination  and  sanctity  of  life ;  of  both 
which  the  Orator  did  not  long  after  send  the  Bishop 
some  safe  and  useful  aphorisms,  in  a  long  letter 
written  in  Greek ;  which  letter  was  so  remarkable  for 
the  language  and  reason  of  it  that,  after  the  reading 
it,  the  Bishop  put  it  into  his  bosom,  and  did  often 
show  it  to  many  scholars,  both  of  this  and  foreign 
nations,  but  did  always  return  it  back  to  the  place 
where  he  first  lodged  it,  and  continued  it  so  near  his 
heart  till  the  last  day  of  his  life." 

Andrewes  was  now  admitted  a  member  of  the 
King's  Privy  Council.  For  politics,  however,  he  had 
no  taste  and  always  withdrew,  as  much  as  possible, 
from  all  state  affairs.  He  would  come  to  the  council 
table,  and  ask,  *'  Is  there  anything  to  be  done  to-day 
for  the  Church  ?"  If  the  reply  was  in  the  affirmative, 
he  stayed  ;  if  in  the  negative,  he  went  away.  Subse- 
quently he  was  promoted  to  the  see  of  Winchester. 
It  seemed  also  not  unlikely  that  he  might  execute  the 
functions  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  For  a  sad 
accident  had  befallen  Dr.  Abbott,  the  worthy  Arch- 
bishop. While  on  a  visit  to  Lord  Zouch,  he  unwit- 
tingly wounded  one  of  the  keepers.  The  wound  was 
only  a  slight  flesh  wound,  but  the  poor  man,  being 
under  the  care  of  an  unskilful  surgeon,  died  next  day. 
So  many  friends  gathered  around  him,  that  the  Arch- 
bishop was  considered  a  happy  man  in  his  unhappi- 
ness.  Nevertheless  it  became  a  serious  question 
whether  Abbott,  by  this  casual  homicide,  had  not 
subjected  himself  to  serious  disabilities.  There  were 
some  persons  who  were  desirous  of  making  this  an 
occasion  for  deposing  Abbott,  and  making  Andrewes 

G  2 


84  OUE   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 

archbishop  in  his  stead.  To  this,  however,  Anclrewes 
himself  would  be  no  party.  There  had  been  a  serious 
misunderstanding  between  himself  and  the  Archbishop, 
and  it  might  have  been  expected  that  he  would  have 
taken  an  unfavourable  view  of  the  case.  He,  however, 
showed  himself  the  Primate's  firmest  friend,  and  man- 
fully opposed  such  a  project.  A  commission  was  ap- 
pointed to  examine  into  the  matter,  and  Andrewes 
brought  them  over  to  a  favourable  decision.  King 
James  was  delio^hted  with  this.  He  told  the  Arch- 
bishop  to  regard  Andrewes  as  the  sole  person  to  whom 
he  owed  his  escape  from  deprivation. 

Andrewes  was  indeed  inflexibly  just.  He  chose 
rather  to  suffer  great  legal  expenses  than  perform 
any  official  act  of  which  his  conscience  did  not  ap- 
prove. He  was  always  careful  to  maintain  a  most 
noble  hospitality.  He  dined  at  noon,  and  gave  his 
mornings  to  prayer  and  study.  He  was  a  great  hus- 
bander  of  time.  '  He  doubted  they  were  no  true 
scholars  that  came  to  speak  with  him  before  noon.' 
In  the  afternoon  he  would  sit  for  some  hours  con- 
versing with  his  friends,  or  transacting  the  business 
of  his  diocese.  He  then  retired  to  his  study,  where 
he  staved  till  bed-time,  unless  some  friend  took  him 
off  to  supper,  which  with  him  was  always  a  frugal 
meal. 

In  the  year  1600  the  great  Hooker  died,  and  he 
keenly  felt  his  death.  We  find  him  writing  to  Dr. 
Parry. 

"  I  cannot  choose  but  write,  though  you  do 
not ;  I  never  failed  since  I  last  saw  you,  but  daily 
prayed  for  him  till  the  very  instant  you  sent  me  this 
heavy  news.      Alas  for  our  great  loss  !  and  when  I 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  85 

say  ours,  though  I  mean  yours  and  mine,  yet  much 
more  the  common ;  the  less  sense  they  have  of  so 
great  damage,  the  more  sad  we  need  to  bewail  them 
ourselves,  who  know  his  works  and  his  worth  to  be 
such  as  behind  him  he  hath  not  that  I  know  left  any 
near  him.  .  .  .  Mr.  Cranmer  is  away,  happy  in  that  he 
should  gain  a  week  or  two  before  he  knew  of  it. 
Almighty  God  comfort  us  over  him,  whose  taking  away 
I  trust  I  shall  no  longer  live  than  with  grief  remember ; 
therefore  with  grief,  because  with  inward  and  most 
just  honour  I  ever  honoured  him  since  I  knew  him. 
Your  assured,  poor  loving  friend, 

"  L.  Andrewes." 
On  March  27,  1625,  while  the  sermon  was  being 
preached  at  Whitehall,  news  came  that  James  I.  was 
dead.  The  King,  in  his  last  illness,  had  desired  the 
presence  of  Andrewes,  but  the  Bishop  through  illness 
was  unable  to  be  with  him.  The  character  of  the  new 
monarch  had  of  late  been  a  subject  of  much  solicitude 
to  Andrewes  and  other  far-sighted  men.  King  James 
had  permitted  his  son  Charles  to  make  a  romantic  and 
profitless  journey  into  Spain,  with  the  view  of  marry- 
ing the  Infanta.  Such  a  Eoman  Catholic  alliance 
would  in  the  last  des^ree  be  distasteful  to  the  kino^- 
dom,  and  might  possibly  result  in  the  perversion  of 
the  king.  Andrewes,  m  prophetic  spirit,  said  that  he 
should  be  in  the  grave,  but  others  would  live  to  see 
the  day  when  there  would  be  a  question  of  the  king's 
life  and  crown.  Hitherto  the  influence  of  Andrewes 
at  court  had  been  most  beneficent.  His  gravity  so 
awed  King  James  that  in  his  presence  he  refrained 
from  that  mirth  and  license  to  which  he  was  so  prone. 
That   influence    was   now  ended.     New  councils  and 


86  OUE   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 

new  councillors  took  their  place  around  the  youthful 
sovereign.  It  was  the  Bishop's  earnest  wish  and  advice 
that  no  innovation  should  be  attempted,  and  no  contro- 
versies stirred.  This  did  not  suit  the  restless  spirit  of 
Laud,  and  Andrewes  found  himself  superseded.  The 
year  of  Charles's  accession,  as  had  been  the  case  with 
his  father,  was  a  year  of  plague,  in  which  one-third 
of  the  inhabitants  of  London  died.  Andrewes  was 
now  well  stricken  in  years,  and  his  health  was  break- 
ing up.     He  died  in  the  September  of  1625. 

One   of  the  most  cheerful  Bishops 

Bishop  Corbet.  -n-  i  /-<     i  n 

1 ''^2— 1635        °^    record    was    Bishop    Oorbet,    of 

Oxford,  of  whom  some  anecdotes 
are  told  not  very  much  in  accordance  with  the  Epis- 
copal character,  but  we  venture  to  hope  that  they  do 
him  an  injustice.  Aubrey's  stories,  from  the  Ash- 
molean  Museum,  are  well  known,  especially  those 
about  his  friends  Dr.  Stubbins  and  Dr.  Lushington. 
"  Dr.  Stubbins  was  one  of  his  cronies  ;  he  was  a  jolly 
fat  doctor,  and  a  very  good  housekeeper.  As  Dr. 
Corbet  and  he  were  riding  in  Love  Lane,  in  wet 
weather  (it  is  an  extraordinary  deepe  dirty  lane)  the 

coach  fell,  and  Corbet  said  that  Dr.  S was  up  to 

the  elbows  in  mud,  and  he  was  up  to  the  elbows  in 
Stubbins.  His  chaplaine.  Dr.  Lushington,  was  a  very 
learned  and  ingenious  man,  and  they  loved  one 
another.  The  Bishop  would  sometimes  take  the  key 
of  the  wine-cellar,  and  he  and  his  chaplain  would  go 
and  lock  themselves  in  and  be  merry ;  the  first  he 
layes  down  his  Episcopal  hood :  *  There  layes  the 
doctors  ;'  then  he  puts  off  his  gowne,  '  There  lays  the 


ON   THE    HISTOIIY    OF   EPISCOPACY.  87 

Bishop ;'  then  'twas,  '  Here's  to  thee,  Corbet ;'  '  Here's 
to  thee,  Lushington.'  "  This  story  has  a  somewhat 
scandalous  look,  to  speak  in  the  mildest  way,  but  we 
may  trust  that  there  is  some  exaggeration.  Corbet 
was  not  a  bad  man,  despite  his  exuberant  animal 
spirits.  Aubrey  had  heard  that  "  he  had  an  admirable, 
grave,  and  venerable  aspect."  Old  Fuller,  who  is  not 
given  to  compliments,  says  that  "  he  was  of  a  courteous 
carriage,  and  no  destructive  nature  to  any  who  offended 
him,  counting  himself  plentifully  repaired  with  a  jest 
upon  him.  He  used  to  give  away  large  sums  to  needy 
clergymen."  In  a  charity  sermon  of  his  there  is  a 
very  just  observation  :  *'  For  the  king  or  for  poor  as 
you  are  rated  you  must  give  and  pay.  It  is  not  so  in 
benevolence.  Here  charity  rates  herself;  her  gift  is 
arbitrary,  and  her  law  is  the  conscience.  He  that 
stays  till  I  persuade  him  gives  not  all  his  own  money ; 
I  give  half  that  have  procured  it.  He  that  comes 
persuaded  gives  his  own,  but  takes  off  more  than 
he  brought."  The  brass  in  Norwich  Cathedral 
says  : — 

"  Ecclesise  Cathedralis  Christi  Oxoniensis 
Primum  Alumuus,  deinde  Decauus,  exinde 
Episcopus,  illinc  hac  translatus  et 
Hinc  in  ccelum." 

Corbet  was  the  most  poetical  of  contemporary 
Bishops,  and  his  poetry  is  familiar  to  the  lovers  of  the 
literature  of  the  seventeenth  century.  One  of  them, 
the  *'  Iter  Boreale,"  written  in  imitation  of  Horace,  a 
journey  from  Oxford  to  Worcestershire,  has  some 
curious  touches  of  the  ecclesiastical  times.  They  rode 
thirty  miles  before  dinner,  and  twelve  after,  to  the 
house  of  a  cottage  tenant.     His  wife 


88  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

"  Pleased  as  well,  but  yet,  her  husband  better 
A  hasty  fellow  and  a  good  bone-setter. 
Now  whether  it  were  providence  or  lucke. 
Whether  the  keepers  or  the  stealers  bucke 
There  wee  had  venison  ;  such  as  Yirgill  slew 
When  he  would  feast  -iEneas  and  his  crew." 

They  proceeded  to  Daventry,  which  was  both  market 
day  and  lecture  day.  A  sergeant  with  mace  chal- 
lenged one  of  the  two  clergymen  to  deliver  a 
lecture. 

"  The  sermon  pleased,  and  when  we  were  to  dine 
AVe  all  had  preachers'  wages,  thanks  and  wine." 

They  proceeded  to  Lutterworth  with  the  pious  design 
of  finding  out  all  they  could  about  WyclifFe,  the  morn- 
ing star  of  the  Reformation. 

"  Yet  for  the  church  sake,  turne  and  light  we  must  * 

Hoping  to  see  one  dramme  of  Wickliffe  dust ; 
But  we  found  none  :  for  underneath  the  pole 
Noe  more  rests  of  his  body  than  his  soule. 
Abused  martyr !  how  hast  thou  been  torne 
By  two  wilde  factions  !  first  the  Papists  burne 
Thy  bones  for  hate ;  the  Puritans  in  zeale 
They  sell  thy  marble  and  thy  brasse  they  steale." 

The  parson  of  the  place  guided  them  on  to  Leicester. 
Here  Corbet  protested  that  they  were  cheated  in  their 
reckoning,  and  hoped  that  they  will  not  be  thought  to 
have  drunk  all  the  liquor  they  paid  for.  "  Sure  your 
theft  is  scandalous  to  us."  At  Nottingham  they 
stayed  at  an  inn  where  the  Archbishop  of  York  had 
stopped,  and  if  they  objected  to  anything,  the  Arch- 
bishop was  thrown  in  their  faces. 

"  Hee  was  objected  to  us  when  wee  call 

Or  dislike  ought,  'my  lord's  grace'  answers  all : 
'  He  was  contented  with  this  bed,  this  dyet,' 
That  keepes  our  discontented  stomackes  quiet." 


ON    THE    HISTORY   OF   EPISCOPACY.  89 

They  got  on  to  Newark,  where  they  were  mightily 
pleased  with  their  reception.  The  landlord  was  more 
desirous  of  praise  than  protest,  and  the  Puritans  would 
"let  the  organ  play"  if  the  visitors  would  tarry.  From 
Newark  they  could  discern  Belvoir  and  Lincoln,  but 
their  horses  were  tired  and  their  money  was  running 
short.  Resuming  their  journey,  they  lost  their  way, 
but  a  chance  guide  conducted  them  to  Loughborough. 
Next  day  they  again  lost  their  way  in  Chorly  Forest, 
but  they  encounter  a  keeper,  who  brings  them  to 
Bosworth  Field.  Thence  to  Warwick  and  Guy's  Cliff, 
and  Kenilworth  Castle.  At  Warwick  Castle  they  were 
received  by  Sir  Fulke  Greville. 

"  With  him  there  was  a  prelate*  by  his  place 
Archdeacon  to  the  byshopp,  by  his  face 
A  greater  man  ;  for  that  did  countei'feit 
Lord  Abbot  of  some  convent  standing  yet, 
A  corpulent  relique. 

For  us,  let  him  enjoy  all  that  God  sends. 
Plenty  of  flesh,  of  livings  and  of  friends." 

From  AVarwick  they  went  on  to  Flore,  being  just 
able  to  make  the  ends  meet — those  non-elastic  ends 
which  have  often  such  difficulty  in  meeting.  Thence 
to  Banbury,  where  they  found  that  their  inn  was  a 
scene  of  sad  desecration. 

"  The  Puritan,  the  Anabaptist,  Brownist, 
Like  a  grand  sallet:  Tinkers,  what  a  town  ist !" 

From  Banbury  they  get  back  to  Oxford,  but  with  their 
resources  exhausted, 

"  Just  with  so  much  ore 
As  Rawleigh  from  his  voyage  and  no  more." 

*  The  prelate  in  question  was  an  archdeacon.  The  word  had  not 
attained  its  more  limited  signification. 


90  OUE   BISHOPS  AND   DEANS. 

It  should  be  added  of  Corbet's  poems  that  they  were 
written  before  he  attained  the  Episcopate,  and  were 
never  intended  for  pubhcation. 

The  life   of  Bishop  Hall  has  always 
Joseph  Hall.  ti     i  r 

i(s74_i656        ^       deservedly  been   a  lavourite  one 

araons^  the  readers  of  relig'ious  bio- 
graphy.     His  voluminous  works    are    repeatedly   re- 
published in  various  forms.     The  authorities  for  the 
bishop's  life  mainly  consist  of  two  autobiographical 
tracts  published  after  his   death.     The  one  of  these  is 
entitled  "  Observations  of  some  Specialties  of  Divine 
Providence  in  the  Life  of  Joseph  Hall,  Bishop  of  Nor- 
wich ;"  the  other  '•'  Hard  Measure,"  being  an  account 
of  his  sufferings  at  the  unhappy  period  of  the  breaking 
out  of  the  Civil  Wars.     Some  further  particulars  are 
to  be  gleaned  from  an  examination  of  his  writings,  and 
from   contemporary  history.     It  is  thus  that  Bishop 
Hall   records  his  reasons  for  writing  about  himself. 
"  Not  out  of  a  vain  affectation  of  my  own  glory,  which 
I  know  how  little  it  can  avail  me  when  I  am  gone 
hence,  but  out  of  a  sincere  desire  to  give  glory  to  my 
God,   whose  wonderful  providences  I   have  noted  in 
all  my  ways,  have  I  recorded   some  remarkable  pas- 
sages of  my  fore-past  life.   What  I  have  done  is  worthy 
of  nothing  but  silence  and  forgetfulness ;    but  what 
God  hath   done  for  us  is  worthy  of  everlasting  and 
thankful  memory." 

Joseph  Hall  was  born  July  1,  1574,  at  Briston  Park, 
Ashby-de-la-Zouch,  Leicestershire.  He  tells  us  that 
his  father  held  an  ofiSce  under  the  Earl  of  Huntingdon, 
president  of  the  North,  and  had  the  government  of 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OF    EPISCOPACY.  91 

the  market  town  of  Ashby,  the  chief  seat  of  the  earl- 
dom. With  especial  love  and  gratitude  he  speaks  of 
his  mother  Winifred,  a  person  "  of  rare  sanctity"  and 
"saint -like  hfe  and  death."  Not  a  day  passed  in 
which  she  did  not  learn  for  herself  and  teach  her  child 
religious  truth. 

From  the  first  it  had  been  the  desire  of  his  worthy 
parents  that  he  should  be  devoted  to  the  sacred  call- 
ing. For  this  purpose  Joseph  Hall  was  sent  to  the 
public  school  at  Ashby,  where,  he  said,  that  he  "  spent 
some  years  not  indiligently  under  the  ferule  of  such 
masters  as  the  place  afforded."  When  he  was  grow- 
ing up  in  years,  the  means  whereby  he  should  be  ad- 
mitted into  the  ministry,  became  an  object  of  anxious 
consideration.  It  so  happened  that  an  elder  brother 
of  his  made  a  visit  to  Mr.  Nathaniel  Gilby,  a  fellow  of 
Emmanuel  College,  Cambridge,  a  gentleman,  who  was 
a  near  relation  to  the  good  minister  whom  we  have 
already  mentioned.  This  gentleman  greatly  interested 
himself  in  his  visitor's  younger  brother,  being  a  fel- 
low-townsman, and  had  had  opportunities  to  form 
a  good  opinion  respecting  Joseph  Hall's  abilities. 
They  both  thought  it  a  thousand  pities  he  should  enter 
the  Church  in  an  obscure  and  indirect  way,  and  not 
enjoy  the  great  advantages  that  could  be  obtained  by 
a  residence  in  the  University.  The  elder  brother, 
witnessing  the  halls,  libraries,  and  chapels  of  Cam- 
bridge, its  pleasant  gardens  and  waters,  its  learned 
leisure,  and  great  renown,  was  "  won  to  a  great  love 
and  reverence  of  an  academical  life."  Upon  his  return 
home,  this  good  and  loving  brother,  even  upon  his 
knees,  begged  his  father  not  to  deprive  his  brother  of 
a  university  education,  as  had  been   the  intention,  and 


92 


OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 


besought  bira  to  sell  part  of  the  land  which  he  would 
in  course  of  nature  inherit,  rather  than  his  brother 
should  be  deprived  of  such  an  excellent  opening.  His 
father  accordingly  sent  him  to  Cambridge,  where  he 
continued  for  two  years.  The  expense,  however,  was 
still  too  much  for  his  father,  "  whose  not  very  large 
cistern  was  to  feed  many  pipes  besides  his."  A  gentle- 
man of  Derby  who  had  married  his  aunt,  seeing  how 
low-spirited  he  was  at  this  alteration  of  life,  gene- 
rously offered  to  defray  one-half  of  his  expenses  at  the 
University  till  he  should  be  master  of  arts,  "  which  he 
no  less  really  and  lovingly  performed."  Very  joyfully 
did  Joseph  Hall  return  to  his  beloved  college,  and  con- 
tinued there  for  some  years  in  the  pleasant  paths  of  a 
learned  and  religious  life. 

When  he  was  twenty-three  years  of  age,  he  pub- 
lished his  famous  work  *'  Virgidemiarum"  {a  bundle  of 
rods),  six  books  of  Satires,  the  first  three  being  en- 
titled, "Toothless  Satyres ;"  1.  Poetical.  2.  Aca- 
demical. 3.  Morall;  and  the  last  three  called  "  Byting 
Satyres."  Hall  is  the  first  example  of  any  note  in 
English  literature  of  this  description  of  poetry, 
and  claims  this  distinction  for  himself  in  his  Pro- 
logue : — 

"  I  first  adventure,  follow  me  who  list, 
And  be  the  second  English  satirist." 

Pope  and  Gray  are  perhaps  the  best  examples  of 
men,  in  English  history,  who  have  alike  been  great 
poets  and  great  critics.  Each  of  them  held  Hall's 
Satires  in  high  estimation.  Pope  esteemed  them  the 
best  poetry  and  the  truest  satires  in  the  English  lan- 
guage, and  Gray  speaks  of  thera  as  being  full  of  spirit 
and  poetry.     The  celebrated  critic,  Warton,  who   has 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  93 

given  a  masterly  analysis  of  these  satires,  says  that 
"  the  poet  is  better  known  than  the  prelate  or  the 
polemic."  This,  however,  is  a  very  great  mistake. 
There  are  multitudes  who  are  familiar  enough  with  the 
Meditations  and  Sermons  of  Bishop  Hall,  but  have 
never  read  the  Satires,  and  perhaps  do  not  know  that 
they  were  ever  composed.  It  is  noticeable  that  Bishop 
Hall,  in  the  autobiographical  portion  of  his  writings, 
never  alludes  to  this  early  work. 

Sir  Edmund   Bacon,   the  grandson  of  Lord  Bacon^ 
the  brother  of  Lady  Drury,  who  had  presented  him 
with  his  living,  earnestly  requested  his  company  "  to 
the  spa  in  Ardenna" — that  is,  to  the  celebrated  water- 
ing-place in   the   forest  of  Ardennes.     There  was  an 
excellent  opportunity  of  going,  as  they  could  travel  in 
the  suite  of  the  English  ambassador,  the  Earl  of  Hert- 
ford.    Hall  had  an   acute  and  active   mind,  and  was 
eager  to  see  and  think  for  himself,   desirous  of  that 
valuable  knowledge  which  travel  always  brings  to  ob- 
servant and  thoughtful  men.     He,  however,  subordi- 
nated his  travels  to  the  service  of  his  sacred  profes- 
sion, being  desirous    of  seeing  the  real  working   of 
popery  on  the  Continent.     What  he  saw  in  his  travels 
confirmed  him  in  his  affection  for  the  pure  reformed 
faith,  and  deepened  his  aversion  to  the  Romish  system. 
For  this  portion  of  Hall's  life  the  autobiography  should 
be  carefully  collated  with  the  epistles.     Popular  and 
familiar   as   published    letters    were   in   France,    this 
species  of  letters  had  never  before  made  its  appearance 
from  the  English  press,   and  Hall  had  the  merit  of 
originating  that  splendid  series   of   epistolary  works 
which  contains  the  famous  letters  of  Pope  and  Cowper. 
The   first   of  these   letters   is    addressed   "  to   Jacob 


94  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

Wadsworth,  lately  revolted  in  Spain" — that  is,  aposta- 
tized to  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  who  appears  to  have 
been  with  him  at  Emmanuel  College.  "  I  saw  her," 
he  says,  "  at  the  same  time  in  her  gayest  dress ;  let 
my  soul  never  prosper,  if  T  could  see  anything  to  com- 
mand affection.  I  saw,  and  scorned ;  you  saw,  and 
adored.  Would  God  your  adoration  were  as  free  from 
superstition  as  my  scorn  from  impiety.  That  God 
judge  betwixt  us  whether  herein  erred;  yea,  let 
men  judge  that  are .  not  drunk  with  Babylonish 
drugs." 

In  order  to  travel  with  greater  safety,  Mr.  Hall  ex- 
changed his  sober  clerical  dress  for  the  silken  robes 
and  gay  colours  of  a  gentleman  of  fashion.  He  was 
unable,  however,  to  restrain  his  zeal  for  truth,  and 
was  always  ready  to  engage  in  eager  controversy  with 
monks  and  friars,  where  the  excellence  of  his  Latin 
and  the  superiority  of  his  divinity  must  have  excited  a 
measure  of  suspicion.  In  that  age,  in  that  country, 
an  Englishman,  both  an  avowed  and  zealous  Protes- 
tant, might  incur  the  imminent  hazard  of  martyrdom. 
Hall  would  never  admit  the  boasted  unity  of  the 
Church  of  Rome.  In  another  of  his  letters  he  triumph- 
antly quotes  Cardinal  Bellarmine,  who  enumerates 
no  less  than  two  hundred  and  thirty  contradictory 
opinions  concerning  doctrine  among  Romish  divines. 
At  Antwerp  he  tells  us  that  "  the  bulk  of  a  tall  Bra- 
banter"  saved  him  from  the  evil  consequences  that 
might  have  attended  his  want  of  reverence  for  a  reli- 
gious procession.  He  says  that  he  was  taught  and 
delighted  by  everything  he  saw.  At  Brussels  he  saw 
some  Englishwomen  taking  the  veil.  "  Poor  souls  !" 
says  Hall,  in  his  pithy  manner,  "  they  could  not  be  fools 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OP   EPISCOPACY.  95 

enougli  at  home  !"     Ghent  commanded  reverence  for 
its  age,  and  wonder  for  its  greatness.     "  At  Namur, 
on   a  pleasant  and  steep  hill-top,  we  found  one  that 
was  termed  a  married  hermit ;  approving  his  wisdom 
above  his  fellows,  that  could  make  choice  of  so  cheer- 
ful and  sociable  a  solitariness."     Thence  they  passed 
up  the  beautiful  scenery  of  "  the  sweet  river  Mosa" 
(Maas),  and  thence  to  Liege,  crowded  with  cloisters 
and  hospitals.     Then  they  came  to  Spa,  or,  as  he  likes 
to  call  them,   the   Spadane  waters,   "  more  wholesome 
than  pleasant,   and   more    famous  than  wholesome." 
The  country  surrounding  Spa  was   then  wild  desert, 
abounding  both  with  wolves  and  robbers.     He  then 
came  down  by  the  fair  broad  river  of  the  Scheldt  to 
Flushing,  and  being  at  Flushing  he  was   anxious  to 
visit  "  an  ancient  colles^e"   at  Middleburs^.     This  ex- 
cursion   proved  a  great  loss  to  him.     When  he  came 
back,  he  had  the  misfortune  to  see  the  ship  by  which 
he  was  going  in  full  sail  towards  England.     The  wind 
had  suddenly  altered,   and   the  master,  hastily  calling 
all  hands  on  board,  set  sail.     He  had  to  make  a  long, 
sad  stay  before  he  could  return  home  by  "  an  incon- 
venient and  tempestuous  passage."     Hall  was  not  a 
good  sailor,  and  he  thus  expressed  his  opinion  on  the 
ocean  :  *'  The  sea  brooked  not  us,  nor  I  it;  an  unquiet 
element,  made  only  for  wonder  and  use,  not  for  plea- 
sure."    He  wonders  why  men  will  trust  themselves  to 
fickle  winds   and  restless  waters  while  they  may  set 
foot  on  steadfast  and  constant  earth. 

In  1612  Mr.  Hall,  with  his  family,  removed  to  Wal- 
tham.  Not  long  before  this  Sir  Thomas  Sutton,  one 
of  the  wealthiest  merchants  of  the  day,  founded  Charter 
House.     Fuller  relates  that  this  gentleman  used  often 


96  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEyVNS. 

to  retire  to  a  private  garden,  where  lie  was  once  heard 
to  saj,  "  Lord,  thou  hast  given  me  a  large  and  liberal 
estate,  give  me  also  a  heart  to  make  use  of  it."  One 
of  Hall's  epistles  is  addressed  to  him,  as  the  title  says, 
"  to  excite  him  and  in  him  all  others  to  early  and 
cheerful  beneficence,  and  to  show  the  necessity  and 
benefit  of  good  works."  About  the  time  of  his  re- 
moval to  Waltham,  Hall  took  his  degree  of  Doctor  of 
Divinity.  For  two-and-twenty  years  Hall  continued 
at  Waltham.  A  numerous  young  family  grew  up 
about  him,  of  whom  three  became  ministers,  and  one 
of  the  three  a  bishop.  In  his  "  Balm  of  Gilead"  he 
speaks  of  the  cares  of  parents  for  their  children,  and 
gives  the  following  personal  anecdote :  "  I  remember 
a  great  man  coming  to  my  house  at  Waltham,  and 
seeing  all  my  children  standing  in  the  order  of  their 
age  and  stature,  he  said,  '  These  are  they  that  make 
rich  men  poor.'  He  strait  received  this  answer,  '  'Nay, 
my  lord,  these  are  they  that  make  a  poor  man  rich  ; 
for  there  is  not  one  of  them  whom  we  would  part  with 
for  all  your  wealth.'  " 

Just  before  he  came  to  Waltham,  he  had  an  oppor- 
tunity of  preaching  before  Henry  Prince  of  Wales. 
On  several  other  occasions  he  preached  before  the 
"  sweet  prince,"  who  was  desirous  of  always  retaining 
him  in  attendance,  but  Dr.  Hall  thought  it  his  duty 
to  hold  close  to  his  village  charge.  The  early  death 
of  this  pious  and  exemplary  Prince  was  a  grievous 
disappoiatment  to  the  whole  nation,  which  had  formed 
the  fairest  hopes  of  the  happiness  which  would  result 
from  his  reign.  On  New-Year's  Day,  1613,  Hall 
preached  before  the  royal  family,  and  spoke  at  length 


ON   THE   HISTORY   OF   EPrscorACY.  97 

of  the  grievous  blow  that  had  happened  to   them  and 
to  tlie  country. 

The  long  residence  of  Dr.  Hall  at  Waltham  was 
interrupted  by  three  important  travelling  expe- 
ditions. To  the  subject  of  travelling  Dr.  Hall  paid 
great  attention,  and  has  published  many  of  his 
thoughts. 

The  first  of  these  occasions  of  leaving  Waltham  for 

a  time,  was   when  he  accompanied  Lord    Doncaster, 

the  English  ambassador,   to   France.     Here  he  had  a 

severe  illness,  and  in  travelling  was  obliged  to   creep 

into  a  litter,  "  in  which,"  wrote  his  friend.  Dr.  Moulin. 

"  you  appeared  to   me  to  be  carried  as   it  were  in  a 

coflSn."     Having  returned  as  far  as   Dieppe,  he  went 

aboard  ship,  but  his  former  ill  luck  at  sea  accompanied 

him.     After  tossing  about  for  a  night  and  a  day  they 

were  driven  back  to  the  bleak  haven  from  which  they 

started.     The  old  "  complaint  returned  upon  me,  and 

landing  with  me,    accompanied  me  home."     On  his 

return,    he    found     that     King     James,     during     his 

absence,     had     nominated     him   to    the    deanery    of 

AVorcester. 

King  James,  a  weak  aiid  ill-judging  man,  in  whom 
speculative  religion  appears  to  have  been  little  accom- 
panied by  vital  godliness,  was  foolishly  anxious  to 
bring  the  kingdom  of  Scotland  into  literal  conformity 
with  the  Church  of  England.  In  order  to  effect  this 
object,  in  1617  he  made  a  journey  into  Scotland,  and 
was  pleased  to  command  the  attendance  of  Joseph 
Hall.  The  good  clergyman  appears  to  have  been 
received  with  great  attention  and  respect  by  the  Pres- 
byterians of  Scotland,  and  this  unhappily  occasioned 

VOL.  I.  H 


98  OUE  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

a  good  deal  of  envy  in  the  minds  of  some  of  his  own 
communion.  These  persons  tried  to  prejudice  the 
king  against  him,  but  it  would  seem  without  much 
effect.  Dr.  Hall's  stay  was  only  short ;  he  sought  and 
obtained  permission  to  return  home  before  the  rest  of 
the  court.  To  his  catholic  and  tolerant  mind,  this 
unhappy  attempt  at  proselytizing  must  have  been 
little  pleasing.  Nor  did  he  shrink,  when  a  proper 
occasion  came,  from  bearing  impartial  witness  to  the 
merits  of  his  Presbyterian  brethren.  "  For  the 
northern  part  of  our  land  beyond  the  Tweed,"  he 
said,  in  one  of  his  sermons  next  year,  "  we  saw  not, 
we  heard  not,  of  a  congregation  without  a  preaching 
minister,  and  though  their  maintenance  generally  hath 
been  small,  yet  their  pains  have  been  great  and  their 
success  answerable  ;  as  for  the  learning  and  sufficiency 
of  those  preachers,  our  ears  were  for  some  of  them 
sufficiently  witnesses  ;  and  we  are  not  worthy  of  our 
ears  if  our  tongues  do  not  thankfully  proclaim  it  to 
the  world." 

A  third  and  very  memorable  journey  was  that  under- 
taken by  Dr.  Hall  to  the  Synod  of  Dort  in  1618. 
Four  English  divines  were  requested  to  attend  this 
synod,  and  of  these.  Dr.  Hall,  then  dean  of  Worcester, 
was  one.  The  object  of  the  Synod  was  to  settle  the 
differences  that  prevailed  between  the  Calvinists  and 
Arminians,  or,  as  in  the  language  of  the  time  they  were 
called,  the  Remonstrants  and  Counter-Remonstrants. 
Dr.  Hall's  own  opinions  were  strongly  Calvinistic, 
but  he  loved  to  dwell  on  those  points  on  which  good 
men  agree,  rather  than  those  on  which  they  differ. 
In  a  sermon  preached  before  the  Synod,  he  cautioned 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  90 

his  hearers  strongly  against  the  refinements  common 
in  the  theology  of  the  day,  and  exhorted  them  earnestly 
to  Christian  peace  and  unanimity.  "  What  have  we 
to  do,"  said  he,  "  with  the  disgraceful  titles  of  Remon- 
strants and  Counter-Remonstrants,  Calvinists  and 
Arminians  ?  We  are  Christians,  let  us  be  like-minded. 
We  are  one  body,  let  us  be  of  one  mind.  I  beseech 
you,  brethren,  by  the  awful  name  of  G-od,  by  the 
sacred  and  cherishing  bosom  of  our  common  mother 
(the  Church),  by  your  own  souls,  by  the  most  holy 
mercies  of  our  Saviour  Jesus  Christ,  seek  peace, 
brethren,  and  ensure  it."  Dr.  Hall  has  some  mention 
of  his  own  health  at  this  time,  and  in  reference  to  this 
very  sermon.  "  By  the  time  I  had  stayed  two  months 
there"  [at  Dort]  "  the  unquietness  of  the  nights  in 
those  garrison  towns,  working  upon  the  tender  dis- 
position of  my  body,  brought  me  to  such  weakness, 
through  want  of  rest,  that  it  began  to  disable  me 
from  attending  the  Synod,  which  yet,  as  I  might,  I 
forced  myself  to,  as  wishing  that  my  zeal  could  have 
discountenanced  my  infirmity.  It  is  well  worthy  of 
my  thankful  remembrance  that,  being  in  an  afilicted 
and  languishing  condition  for  a  fortnight  together  in 
that  sleepless  distemper,  yet  it  pleased  God  the  very 
night  before  I  was  to  preach  the  Latin  sermon  to  the 
Synod,  to  bestow  on  me  such  a  comfortable,  refreshing, 
and  sufiicient  sleep,  as  thereby  my  spirits  were  re- 
vived, and  I  was  enabled  with  much  vivacity  to  per- 
form that  service,  which  was  no  sooner  done  than  my 
former  complaint  returned  upon  me,  and  prevailed 
against  all  the  remedies  that  the  counsel  of  physicians 
could  advise  me  to."     In  consequence  of  this  illness, 

H  2 


100  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Dr.  Hall  left  Dort  for  a  season,  and  repaired  to  tlie 
pleasant  and  famous  village  of  the  Hague,  the  seat  of 
the  Dutch  Court,  encircled  by  woods,  and  stretching 
down  to  the  sea.  His  health  not  improving,  he  was 
compelled  to  return  to  England.  The  English 
divines  were  throughout  treated  with  marked  con- 
sideration, and  on  his  retirement  the  Synod  presented 
him  with  a  gf'old  medal  struck  to  commemorate 
their  assembly.  Hall  wrote  a  treatise  entitled  "  Via 
Media,"  by  which  he  fondly  hoped  to  make  peace 
between  the  conflicting  parties.  The  blessing  of  the 
peace-maker  belonged  to  Hall,  but  he  was  unable  to 
accomplish  his  noble  and  benevolent  object,  and,  as 
is  oftentimes  the  case,  an  attempt  was  made  to  put  a 
wrong  construction  upon  his  endeavours.  He  says, 
"  I  was  scorched  a  little  with  this  flame  which  I  desired 
to  quench,  yet  this  could  not  stay  my  hand  from 
thrusting  it  into  a  hotter  fire."  This  last  refers  to 
his  controversies  with  the  church  of  Rome,  to  which 
he  was  always  a  zealous  and  consistent  opponent. 
Many  of  his  writings  on  popery  have  been  charac- 
terised as  "among  the  ablest  we  possess,"  among 
which  may  be  mentioned  his  memorable  treatise  "  No 
Peace  with  Rome." 

In  1624,  the  see  of  Gloucester  was  earnestly  proffered 
to  him,  but  humbly  declined.  Three  years  later,  the 
bishopric  of  Exeter,  a  very  poor  one,  was  offered  to 
him  and  accepted.  Dr.  Hall  saw  a  particular  provi- 
dence of  God  in  this  occurrence.  Some  letters  which 
the  royal  favourite  of  unhappy  memory,  the  Duke  of 
Buckingham,  had  sent  from  France,  would  have  had 
the  efi'ect  of  hindering  his  promotion,  but  the  appoint- 
ment was  made  three  hours  before  they  arrived.    Thus 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  101 

humbly  and  sinecerly  does  he  speak  of  his  elevation. 
"  For  me  I  need  not  appeal  to  heaven;  eyes  enough 
can  witness  how  few  free  hours  I  have  enjoyed,  since 
I  put  on  these  robes  of  sacred  honour.  Insomuch 
as  I  could  find  in  my  heart,  with  holy  Gregory,  to 
complain  of  my  change  :  were  it  not  that  I  see  these 
public  troubles  are  so  many  acceptable  services  to  my 
God,  whose  glory  is  the  end  of  my  being.  Certainly, 
if  none  but  earthly  respects  should  sway  me,  I  should 
heartily  wish  to  change  this  palace,  which  the  provi- 
dence of  God  and  the  bounty  of  my  gracious  sovereign 
hath  put  me  into,  for  my  quiet  cell  at  Waltham.  But  I 
have  followed  the  calling  of  my  God,  to  whose  service 
I  am  willingly  sacrificed."  He  also  tells  us  of  the 
unkind  prejudice  and  suspicion  which  he  had  to  en- 
counter from  those  who  looked  upon  him  as  too  great 
a  favourite  of  the  Puritans.  While  he  was  at  Exeter, 
he  addressed  to  the  clergy  of  his  diocese  his  work, 
"  Henochismus  ;  or  a  Treatise  on  the  Manner  of  Walk- 
ing with  God."  In  his  preface,  he  says,  "  1  am  utterly 
weary  of,  and  sorry  for,  those  wranglings  by  which  the 
Christian  world  is  miserably  agitated ;  and  I  wish  it 
could  be  possible  to  appease  them  by  any  means  in 
my  power.  I  say  not  by  my  prayers,  sighs,  or  tears 
only,  but  by  any  labour  or  fatigue  of  mine,  or  even  at 

last  by  my    blood It  is  heaven   we  seek,    but 

heaven  will  never  be  attained  by  contests  and  disputes, 
but  by  faith  and  a  godly  life.  The  articles  of  faith 
which  are  necessary  to  be  believed  by  every  Christian, 
in  order  to  his  salvation,  are  very  few,  nor  are  they 
difi&cult  to  be  understood." 

It  was  during  his  episcopate  at   Exeter  that   King 
Charles    unhappily  revived  the    "  Book    of    Sports," 


102  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

which  his  father,  King  James,  had  fooUshly  issued 
some  fifteen  years  before.  This  was  a  declaration  to 
be  read  in  churches,  encouraging  pubUc  dancing, 
diversions,  and  games,  upon  Sunday,  after  the  hours 
of  Divine  service.  Severe  penalties  were  denounced 
against  all  the  clergy  who  should  omit  to  read  the 
declaration,  and  a  great  number  of  the  clergy,  who, 
from  conscientious  motives,  disobeyed  the  royal  com- 
mand, were  punished  by  being  silenced,  or  by  being 
deprived  of  their  livings.  No  one  was  thus  punished 
in  Bishop  Hall's  diocese ;  and  Fuller  probably  refers 
to  him  when  he  mentions  a  bishop  in  the  west  who 
on  this  occasion  had  said,  "  I  will  never  turn  an 
accuser  of  my  brethren."  He  refused  also  to  require 
his  clergy  to  take  an  oath  which  was  unjustly  imposed 
upon  them.  In  November,  1641,  notwithstanding  his 
puritanical  leanings,  Dr.  Hall  was  translated  to  the 
see  of  Norwich.  The  King  probably  thought  that  this 
appointment  might  tend  to  disarm  the  suspicion  and 
dislike  which  had  attended  his  ecclesiastical  prefer- 
ments. 

A  dark  cloud  was  to  gather  over  the  evening  of  the 
days  of  "  the  old  man  eloquent."  He  had  scarcely 
become  Bishop  of  Norwich  when  the  Long  Parliament 
met,  in  the  memorable  November  of  1641.  Popular 
agitation  against  the  episcopal  order  at  that  time  ran 
higher  than  has  ever  happened  before  or  since.  Tu- 
multuous crowds  beset  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  and 
the  bishops  stood  in  great  dread  of  personal  violence. 
Under  these  circumstances,  they  resolved  to  absent 
themselves,  and  issued  a  protest  against  the  validity  of 
anything  that  might  be  done  in  their  absence.  It  was 
an  ill-advised  and  unconstitutional  step.     The  popular 


ON  THE  HISTORY  OF  EPISCOPACY.         103 

party  were  not  slow  to  take  advantage  of  this  mistake, 
and  twelve  bishops  were  at  once  impeached.  It  was 
about  eight  o'clock,  one  dark  December  evening,  and  a 
bitter  frost  was  over  the  land.  At  such  a  time  ten 
venerable  bishops,  among  whom  was  Hall,  were  com- 
mitted to  the  Tower,  two  more,  on  account  of  age  and 
infirmities,  being  kept  in  the  milder  custody  of  the 
Black  Rod.  Bishop  Hall  thus  speaks  of  this  unhappy 
circumstance  : — "  We,  who  little  thought  we  had  done 
anything  to  deserve  a  chiding,  were  called  to  our  knees 
at  the  bar,  and  charged  severally  with  high  treason ; 
being  not  a  little  astonished  at  the  suddenness  of  this 
crimination,  compared  with  the  innocence  of  our  own 
intention." 

He  turned  this  imprisonment,  as  might  be  expected, 
to  holy  and  profitable  uses.  He  would  preach  in  the 
Tower,  as  he  had  opportunity  on  Sunday,  and  also 
wrote  a  small  treatise  on  the  occasion,  entitled  "  The 
Free  Prisoner;  or,  the  Comfort  of  Restraint."  He 
shows  how  the  soul  is  imprisoned  in  the  body,  even  as 
the  body  was  imprisoned  in  the  Tower,  and  pities  the 
unhappy  case  of  those  who  are  worse  prisoners  still, 
fettered  by  lust  and  sinful  desires.  There  has  also 
been  published  "  A  Letter  sent  from  the  Tower  to  a 
Private  Friend,"  in  which  he  speaks  of  his  unfortunate 
situation  : — "  My  intention  and  this  place  are  such 
strangers  that  I  cannot  enough  marvel  how  they  met. 
But,  howsoever,  I  do  in  all  humility  kiss  the  rod 
wherewith  I  smart,  as  well  knowing  v^^hose  hand  it  is 
that  wields  it.  To  that  infinite  Justice  who  can  be 
innocent  ?  But  to  my  king  and  country  never  heart 
was  or  can  be  more  clear ;  and  I  shall  beshrew  my 
hand   if  it   shall    have,    against  my   thoughts,    justly 


104  OUR    EISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

offended  either."  He  acknowleds^es  that  he  was 
indeed  a  deep  sinner  before  God ;  but,  as  respects  man, 
he  appeals  to  his  well-known  innocency  and  blameless- 
ness  in  the  discharge  of  his  episcopal  duties.  He 
declares  that  he  had  always  been  as  a  brother  among 
his  clergy,  teaching  them  and  working  with  them  as 
such,  doing  what  he  could  for  the  "  sons  of  peace 
that  came  with  God's  message  in  their  mouths." 
When  had  his  hand  been  idle?  when  had  he  desisted 
from  constant  preaching?  when  had  he  shown  any 
regard  for  earthly  pomp  ?  He  appeals  to  Him  "  who 
shall  one  day  canse  mine  innocence  to  break  forth  as 
the  morning  light,  and  shall  give  me  beauty  for  bonds, 
and  for  a  light  and  momentary  affliction  an  eternal 
weight  of  glory." 

For  some  months  Bishop  Hall  continued  a  prisoner 
in  the  Tower,  with  this  preposterous  but  weighty 
charge  overhanging  him.  When,  however,  the  bishops 
were  deprived  of  their  seats  in  Parliament,  and  of  the 
larger  part  of  their  revenues,  they  were  liberated  on 
giving  bonds  to  appear  when  called  for.  Upon  his 
release.  Bishop  Hall  went  down  to  his  diocese,  where 
he  preached  to  large  audiences,  and  was  treated  with 
marked  respect.  Shortly,  however,  the  hand  of  per- 
secution was  again  busy.  The  details  are  melancholy 
enough,  but  they  should  be  recorded,  if  only  to  teach 
us  a  lesson  of  gratitude  for  the  settled  peace  and  order 
which  our  land  now  enjoys.  His  property  was  confis- 
cated, his  goods  were  sold,  even  down  to  the  cherished 
pictures  of  his  children,  and  but  for  the  help  of  a 
pious  woman  whom  he  had  never  known  or  seen, 
and  for  a  good  clergyman,  his  hard  condition  would 
have  been  much  harder   still.     The   sequestrators  of 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OP    EPISCOPACY.  105 

his  property  first  made  him  an  allowance,  but  before 
any  payment  was  made,  this  was  peremptorily  counter- 
manded ;  eventually,  however,  a  pittance  was  granted 
to  his  wife.  He  was  repeatedly  exposed  to  cruel 
insults  by  the  rabble  and  the  military.  Early  one 
morning,  for  instance,  the  soldiers  threatened  to  break 
down  his  gates,  and  insisted,  with  absurd  pretences,  on 
searching  his  house.  They  took  away  his  estates,  and 
yet  made  him  pay  the  heavy  taxation  to  which  they 
were  liable.  Finally,  he  was  ordered  to  leave  his 
home,  and  would  have  been  turned  into  the  streets, 
had  not  a  kind  neighbour  quitted  his  own  dwelling  to 
give  it  up  to  the  Bishop's  family.  Without  unkind 
feeling,  and  without  exaggeration.  Bishop  Hall  in 
his  "  Hard  Measure"  details  these  cruel  proceedings. 
To  add  to  his  griefs,  his  loved  and  venerated 
partner  was  now  taken  from  him  by  death.  He  was 
enabled,  however,  to  glory  in  tribulation,  and  to 
hold  fast  an  unconquerable  trust  in  the  goodness 
of  his  heavenly  Father.  On  this  last  occasion  he 
wrote  his  beautiful  little  tract  entitled  "  Songs  in  the 
Night." 

We  have  now  no  longer  tlie  guidance  of  any  auto- 
biographical writings,  but  a  few  more  notices  are  to  be 
found,  chiefly  in  the  sermon  preached  upon  the  occa- 
sion of  his  funeral.  He  lived  for  his  few  remainingf 
days  at  the  hamlet  of  Heigham,  on  the  western  side  of 
Norwich.  He  used  to  preach  in  the  Norwich  churches 
until  he  was  forbidden,  and  afterwards  effectually  dis- 
abled by  disease.  The  lame  old  bishop  might  then  be 
seen — now,  alas  !  solitary — trudging  with  the  help  of 
his  staff  to  church,  where  the  learned,  eloquent,  and 
famous  prelate  would  meekly  and   diligently  listen  to 


106  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

the  youngest  preacher,  and  seek  to  profit  by  his  teach- 
ing. His  heart  and  hope  were  fixed  in  heaven,  and  he 
had  learned  to  take  joyfully  the  spoiling  of  his  goods. 
Poor  as  he  now  was  he  had  something  to  give  to  those 
who  were  poorer  still.  To  his  dying  day  he  gave  a 
weekly  sum  of  money  to  some  poor  widows,  and  "  his 
bodily  alms  were  constant  and  bountiful."  He  would 
often  lament  the  misfortunes  of  others,  but  hardly  ever 
would  make  any  allusion  to  his  own.  He  was  a 
grievous  sufferer  in  health,  and  men  remembered  how 
on  his  sick-bed,  like  Jacob,  he  would  strengthen  him- 
self to  bless  those  who  sought  his  blessing.  As  his 
end  approached,  he  duly  "  set  his  house  in  order." 
He  died  at  the  advanced  age  of  eighty-two,  and, 
according  to  his  express  desire,  was  buried  without 
funeral  pomp.  Of  the  circumstances  of  his  death 
we  know  nothing,  but  the  preacher  of  his  funeral 
sermon  says  that  when  his  time  drew  near  that  he 
should  die,  he  "  much  longed  for  death  and  was  ready 
to  bid  it  welcome,  and  spake  always  very  kindly  of 
it." 

A  large  number  of  eminent  men  might  be  cited 
during  the  last  half  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The 
Carolinian  divines  are  especially  conspicuous  for  holi- 
ness and  learning.  Perhaps  the  brightest  period  of 
the  learning  and  holiness  of  the  Enghsh  Church  was 
at  the  very  period  of  the  Restoration,  when  all  the 
floodgates  of  sin  and  folly  appeared  to  be  thrown 
open.  Good  men  and  good  deeds  abounded  as  if  the 
very  wickedness  of  the  times  elicited  in  such  sharp 
days  of  spiritual  conflict  a  purifying  flame  of  good- 
ness.    We  take  one  exemplary  instance. 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OP   EPISCOPACY.  107 

The  life   of  a   o:reat  scholar  is  fre- 
Bisuop  Bull.  ° 

1634— 1"'09         quently  obscure  and  uncomprencnded. 

When  it  has  happened  that  he  has 
written  on  profound  subjects,  that  most  of  his  writings 
are  contained  in  a  dead  lanocua2:e,  that  he  has  addressed 
himself  not  so  much  to  his  contemporaries  as  to  the 
learned  audience  of  Europe,  that  he  has  lived  a  life  of 
retirement  remote  from  cities, — the  reward  of  such  a 
life,  as  to  literary  reputation,  soon  fades  away.  The 
learned  theological  works  of  Bishop  Bull,  issued  from 
the  Clarendon  Press,  are  especially  held  in  reverence 
by  the  University  of  Oxford.  It  is  no  wonder  that 
they  are  not  much  heard  of  beyond  an  audience  "  fit 
though  few."  They  are  indeed  remarkably  destitute 
of  all  the  elements  of  popularity  and  general  service- 
ableness,  but  nevertheless,  they  will  always  retain  a 
distinguished  place  in  the  library  of  theology,  from 
their  sound  judgment,  deep  piety,  and  profound  eru- 
dition. We  obtain  eminently  pleasing  glimpses  of  a 
man  of  primitive  simphcity,  thoughtful  and  studious 
in  the  extreme,  and  withal  wise,  patient,  and  chari- 
table. 

From  the  very  first,  his  parents  devoted  him  to  the 
special  service  of  God.  When  he  was  taken  to  the 
font,  his  father  declared  his  intention  and  hope  of 
bringing  up  his  son  for  the  ministry.  This  good 
father,  however,  died  before  his  little  son  was  more 
than  a  few  years  old.  He  was  a  man  of  good  family 
and  extraction,  but  as  the  pious  biographer  of  Bishop 
Bull  says  :  "  Let  the  family  be  ever  so  conspicuous, 
the  learning  and  piety  of  any  branch  of  it  addeth  more 
to  its  true  lustre  and  glory  than  it  is  capable  of  giving 
by  any  blood  it  can  convey."     His  son  was  left  under 


108  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

the  care  of  guardians,  with  a  fair  patriTnonj.  In  clue 
time,  he  left  school  and  went  up  to  Exeter  College, 
Oxford.  Bishop  Prideaux  was  then  resident  there. 
This  was  the  good  bishop  who  in  his  last  will  said  that 
he  left  no  legacy  to  his  children,  but  pious  poverty, 
God's  blessing,  and  a  father's  prayers.  He  took  great 
notice  of  the  young  scholar,  and  by  kind  advice  and 
encouragement  sought  to  bring  him  forward  in  his 
studies.  The  execution  of  King  Charles  I.  caused 
young  Bull  to  leave  Oxford.  An  oath  of  a  republican 
character  was  then  generally  exacted,  and  he  preferred 
to  give  up  the  university  rather  than  take  it.  He 
retired,  in  common  with  some  others  and  their  tutors, 
into  a  country  village,  where  they  were  allowed  peace- 
fully to  pursue  their  studies.  This  proved  a  happy 
season  to  the  young  man.  He  was  thrown  a  great  deal 
into  the  company  of  a  sister,  a  sensible  and  pious 
woman.  He  applied  himself  with  the  utmost  diligence 
to  his  studies,  and  determined  that  he  would  take  holy 
orders.  After  preparation,  he  went  to  one  of  the 
ejected  Bishops.  Those  were  times  of  great  trouble 
and  difficulty,  and  many  cases  were  necessarily  treated 
in  a  somewhat  irregular  manner.  Mr.  Bull  was  made 
deacon  and  priest  the  same  day,  when  he  was  only 
twenty-one.  The  Bishop  was  so  pleased  with  his 
examination  that  he  said  the  Church  wanted  persons 
qualified  as  he  was,  and  that  he  could  not  make  too 
much  haste. 

A  little  living,  near  Bristol,  worth  only  thirty  pounds 
a-year,  was  offered  to  him.  The  value  was  so  small 
that  he  thought  he  could  accept  it  safely.  Even  in 
those  troubled  times  he  imagined  that,  under  these 
circumstances,  he  could   hardly  be  prosecuted  or  dis- 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF   EPISCOPACY.  109 

possessed.  He  devoted  more  than  the  whole  of  his 
stipend  to  the  poor,  and  by  constant  preaching  and 
visitation  sought  to  do  the  best  for  his  people.  It 
was  hard  work.  Many  of  his  parishioners  were  pre- 
pared to  ridicule  and  harass  him.  A  curious  circum- 
stance is  related,  which  helped  to  extend  his  influence. 
He  used  to  preach  from  notes  written  on  little  slips  of 
paper.  When  he  was  preaching  one  Sunday,  in  the 
act  of  turning  over  his  Bible,  his  notes  flew  out  into 
the  middle  of  the  church.  The  congregation  consisted 
chiefly  of  wild  seafaring  people.  While  the  quiet 
elderly  people  remained  silent,  and  some  of  them  col- 
lected the  notes  and  handed  them  up  into  the  pulpit, 
the  rougher  sort  of  people  raised  an  irreverent  laugh, 
and  expected  to  enjoy  the  discomfiture  of  the  preacher. 
Mr.  Bull  took  up  his  notes,  which  were  handed  to  him, 
and  putting  them  into  his  Bible  closed  the  book.  He 
then,  without  their  aid,  continued  his  sermon  with 
great  earnestness,  so  that  those  who  waited  were  at 
length  aff'ected  by  his  words.  His  influence  was  much 
extended,  but  he  was  still  exposed  to  persecution. 
One  day,  a  man  called  out  to  him  in  the  church, 
"  George,  come  down ;  thou  art  a  false  prophet 
and  a  hireling."  Mr.  Bull  only  mildly  expostu- 
lated with  him,  and  vindicated  himself  from  such  a 
charge. 

The  lodgings  he  had  taken  were  in  the  near  neigh- 
bourhood of  a  powder-mill.  The  squire  of  the  parish 
and  his  wife,  making  him  a  visit  one  day,  pointed  out 
to  him  the  danger  to  w^hich  he  was  exposed,  and 
begged  him  to  come  to  them  and  make  their  house 
his  home.  After  repeated  importunity,  he  accepted 
this  obliging  ofi'er.     He  had  not  removed  many  days 


110  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

when  his  formor  residence  was  blown  up,  and  at  the 
very  time  when  he  always  used  to  sit  working  at  his 
books.  The  passion  for  study  grew  more  and  more 
upon  him.  Regularly  once  a  year,  he  used  to  go  up 
to  Oxford  for  the  purpose  of  consulting  the  public 
libraries.  Liviug  in  the  country,  he  was  afraid  his 
mind  might  rust,  and  so  took  each  year  two  months' 
hard  study. 

A  lady  who  had  a  great  respect  for  the  clergyman 
who  had  become  Mr.  Bull's  father-in-law,  procured 
him  the  rectory  of  Siddington  St.  Mary,  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  Cirencester.  By-and-by  he  also 
obtained  the  living  of  Siddington  St.  Peter,  close  by. 
He  was  able  to  help  his  aged  father-in-law  in  his 
decaying  years,  by  taking  his  duty  for  him.  The 
united  value  of  his  two  livings  did  not  exceed  a 
hundred  a-year.  In  the  neighbourhood  of  Siddington, 
lived  a  lady  named  Nelson,  with  her  son,  to  whom  Dr. 
Bull  gave  regular  instruction.  This  boy  afterwards 
became  an  eminently  pious  man,  a  good  writer,  and 
the  biographer  of  his  kind  tutor.  "  I  have  often  heard 
him  with  great  pleasure  and  edification,"  says  Nelson. 
.  .  .  .  "  He  enlivened  his  discourse  with  proper  and 
decent  gestures  ;  and  his  voice  was  always  exerted  with 
some  vehemency,  whereby  he  kept  the  audience  awake, 
and  raised  their  attention  to  what  he  delivered,  and 
persuaded  the  people  that  he  was  in  earnest,  and 
affected  himself  with  what  he  recommended  to  others. 
By  these  means  he  laboured  many  years  in  teaching 
the  ignorant,  in  confirming  the  weak,  in  quieting  the 
scrupulous,  in  softening  the  hard  heart,  in  rousing  the 
sinner,  and  in  raising  the  pious  soul  to  a  steady  and 
vigorous  pursuit  of  eternal  happiness." 


ON   THE    UISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  Ill 

For  twenty-seven  years  he  was  rector  of  Sidding- 
ton  :  diligent  in  all  ministerial  duty — preaching,  cate- 
chising, visiting.  His  own  mode  of  life  was  a  model 
of  simpHcity  and  order.  If  any  of  his  servants  could 
not  read,  he  assigned  the  duty  of  instruction  to  some 
member  of  his  own  family.  Always  kind  to  his  house- 
hold, one  thing  alone  provoked  him — any  absence 
from  family  prayer.  On  Sunday  evening,  after  a 
goodly  fashion,  he  added  to  these  devotions  a  chapter 
out  of  the  "  Whole  Duty  of  Man."  For  himself,  he 
took  very  little  sleep,  rising  early  and  going  to  bed 
late,  and  devoting  this  time  to  study  and  prayer.  Often 
when  his  family  were  gone  to  rest,  they  heard  him  in 
his  study  singing  psalms  and  hymns.  Then  through 
the  silent  hours  of  night  he  pursued  his  studies  with 
an  unwise  constancy  that  eventually  shattered  his 
health.  His  chief  delight  was  in  his  books,  and  his 
study  was  the  scene  of  his  most  exquisite  pleasures. 
He  used  to  declare  that  in  the  pursuit  of  knowledge  he 
tasted  the  most  refined  satisfaction  of  which  the  pre- 
sent state  of  nature  was  capable.  Even  the  only  inno- 
cent pleasure  he  allowed  himself  was  intellectual — 
agreeable  conversation  with  his  visitants.  His  hos- 
pitable temper  was  free  from  any  tincture  of  covetous- 
ness.  In  visiting  the  poor,  his  prayers  were  always 
accompanied  by  his  alms.  One  of  his  favourite  ways 
of  doing  good  was  to  keep  the  children  of  the  poor  at 
school.  Kind  and  charitable  to  all,  there  was  one 
class  the  especial  objects  of  his  care  and  concern — the 
widows  and  orphans  of  the  clergy  who  were  left 
unprovided  for.  To  these  he  gave  much,  and  he 
sought  in  every  direction  to  obtain  help  from  others. 
He    used  to   say   that  in    doing  good  to    others    we 


112  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

did  good  to  ourselves,  and  that  it  was  well  to  obtain 
an  interest  in  the  prayers  and  benedictions  of  the 
poor. 

During  the  twenty- seven  years  that  Mr.  Bull  thus 
continued  at  Siddiugton,  he  has  mentioned  that  he 
buried  ten  persons  whose  united  age  amounted  to  a 
thousand  years  :  two  of  them  were  a  hundred  and 
twenty-three  years  each.  During  nearly  all  these 
years  his  clerical  income  did  not  exceed  the  scanty 
limits  we  have  mentioned.  He  found  it  necessary  to 
spend  several  hundred  pounds  on  learned  books  for 
his  library.  In  the  course  of  time  there  were  clever 
children  to  be  supported  and  educated.  He  had  some 
severe  private  losses,  and  added  to  this,  he  was  not  a 
sufficiently  good  man  of  business  to  manage  the  re- 
mainder in  the  best  way.  We  are  told  that  all  this 
brought  him  into  great  straits  :  so  much  so  that  he 
was  compelled  to  sell  his  patrimonial  estate.  The 
Church,  as  is  too  often  the  case,  quite  failed  to  provide 
an  adequate  subsistence  for  her  worthy  son  who  did 
so  much  in  her  service.  Yet  he  was  never  heard  to 
trouble  the  world  with  any  complaints,  and  was  never 
known  to  give  way  to  discontent. 

His  reputation  now  began  to  enlarge  its  bounds,  and 
his  name  became  known  among  the  learned  of  Christ- 
endom. Lord  Chancellor  Nottingham  made  him  a 
prebend  of  Gloucester  Cathedral,  and  in  gratitude  he 
dedicated  to  him  his  Latin  work  in  defence  of  the 
Nicene  Creed  :  the  great  man  died,  however,  on  the 
eve  of  its  publication.  A  better  living  was  also  con- 
ferred on  him.  It  so  happened  that,  when  the  rectory 
of  Avening  became  vacant,   he  was  staying  with  some 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  113 

friends  at  a  watering-place.  One  of  them  was  the 
patron  of  the  living ;  and  when  he  heard  the  news,  he 
told  his  friends  that  he  had  a  very  good  living  to  dis- 
pose of,  and  described  the  kind  of  person  whom  he 
should  hke  to  appoint.  Mr.  Bull  was  present,  and 
everyone  perceived  that  Mr.  Bull  was,  as  it  were, 
sitting  for  his  portrait.  He  had,  however,  a  great  deal 
too  much  humility  to  take  home  the  description  to 
himself,  and  presently  left  the  company  for  a  walk.  Mr. 
Sheppard,  the  patron,  then  declared  that  he  had  given 
those  hints  that  Mr.  Bull  might  apply  for  the  living  if 
he  wished ;  but  finding  that  his  modesty  was  too  great 
for  him  to  take  that  step,  he  should  offer  it  to  him, 
"  since  he  had  more  merit  to  deserve  it  than  assurance 
to  ask  for  it."  This  preferment  doubled  the  amount  of 
his  clerical  income.  It  was,  nevertheless,  a  heavy  draw- 
back that  he  had  to  rebuild  the  parsonage,  part  of 
which  had  been  burnt  down  just  before  his  incumbency. 
The  parish  was  so  large,  and  his  health  was  so  much 
impaired  by  his  night  studies,  that  he  was  now  obliged 
to  have  a  curate.  He  proposed  to  his  curate  that  they 
should  agree  to  tell  one  another,  in  love  and  privacy, 
what  they  observed  amiss  in  each  other ;  this  would 
enable  him  to  regulate  the  conduct  of  his  own  life,  and 
without  offence,  in  the  exercise  of  their  natural  liberty, 
to  improve  his  friend. 

Subsequently,  Mr.  Bull  was  promoted  to  the  arch- 
deaconry of  Llandaff,  by  Archbishop  Sancroft.  He 
found  he  had  much  to  contend  with  in  his  new  parish ; 
especially  the  annual  village  wakes,  which  were  con- 
ducted in  a  most  disorderly  manner,  and  these  he  suc- 
ceeded in  suppressing.     While  here,  he  could  not  but 

VOL.  I.  I 


114  OUE   BISHOPS   AI^D   DEANS. 

be  gratified  by  the  language  of  the  famous  Bossuet, 
Bishop  of  Meaux,  who  caused  to  be  communicated  to 
him  the  congratulations  of  all  the  assembled  clergy  of 
France,  "for  the  service  he  had  done  the  Catholic 
Church,  in  so  well  defending  her  determination  of  the 
necessity  of  believing  the  divinity  of  the  Son  of  God." 
This  acknowledgment  by  Roman  Catholic  divines  of 
the  service  he  had  rendered  to  their  common  Christi- 
anity, did  not  hinder  his  publishing  a  vigorous  little 
work  on  "  The  Corruptions  of  the  Church  of  Rome," 
in  which  he  says  of  Bossuet  himself,  "  I  wonder  how 
so  learned  a  man  as  Monsieur  de  Meaux  can,  with  a 
good  and  quiet  conscience,  continue  in  it."  The  Uni- 
versity of  Oxford  also  about  this  time  gave  him  a  doc- 
tor's degree. 

Merit  so  conspicuous  as  Dr.  Bull's  could  not  be 
ignored.  It  was  felt  that  it  would  be  a  reflection  on 
the  Government  if  he  were  not  elevated  to  the  bench. 
This  did  not  take  place  till  his  seventy-first  year,  and 
then  he  was  raised  to  St.  David's,  one  of  the  poorest 
sees.  He  himself  felt  his  health  declining,  and  was 
unwilling  to  accept  the  charge.  One  reason,  however, 
that  prevailed  with  him,  was  the  great  assistance  which 
he  expected  to  receive  from  his  eldest  son.  He  was  a 
clergyman  of  thirty-five,  for  many  years  resident  in 
Oxford,  and  one  of  its  brightest  hopes.  It  pleased 
God,  however,  to  remove  from  him  this  staff  of  his  old 
age,  this  learned  and  pious  son  dying  of  the  small  pox. 
He  duly  took  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Lords,  where 
he  made,  on  one  occasion,  a  short  but  sensible  speech. 
He  then  went  down  to  his  diocese  and  apphed  himself, 
as  energetically  as  his  health  and  age  permitted,  to  the 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OP   EPISCOPACY.  115 

duties  of  his  office.  The  following  passage  from  one 
of  his  charges  is  curiously  illustrative  of  the  state  of 
things  in  Wales. 

"  What  shall  be  done  in  those  poor  parishes  where 
there  are  as  poor  ministers,   altogether  incapable  of 
performing  this  duty  of  preaching  in   any  tolerable 
manner  ?     I  answer  that,   in  such  places,   ministers, 
instead   of  sermons    of    their    own,    should   use   the 
Homilies  of  the  Church,  which  ought  to   be  in  every 
parish.     And  they  would  do  well  also,  now  and  then, 
to  read  a  chapter  or  section  out  of  '  The  Whole  Duty 
of  Man,'   which,    I   presume,   is   translated   into    the 
Welsh  tongue.     I  add  that  it   would  be  a  piece  of 
charity  if  the   clergy  of  the  neighbourhood  to  such 
places,  who  are  better  qualified,  would  sometimes  visit 
those  dark  corners,  and  lend  some  of  their  light  to 
them  by  bestowing  now  and  then  a  sermon  on  the  poor 
people,    suited   to    their    capacities   and    necessities. 
They  have  my  leave,  yea,  and  my  authority  so  to  do  ; 
and  they  may  be  sure  the  good  God  will  not  fail  to 
reward  them." 

It  is  easy  enous^h  to  find  hu«e  over- 
BisHOP  Wilson.  "^  °  ni 

1663— 17''5        gi^own  dioceses ;  they  are  all  huge  and 

overgrown ;    but   Sodor  and  Man   is 

the    only  standing    instance  of  a   small    manageable 

diocese.     There  are  many  parsons  of  an  old-fashioned 

type  who  object  to  an  increase  of  the  episcopate,   on 

the  ground  hardly  tenable,  we  should  think,  that  the 

bishops  do  not  leave  them  sufficiently  alone,  and  that  any 

further  interference  would  be  intolerable.  In  a  very  small 

bishopric  there  might  be  a  danger  of  over-legislation 

and  an  excessive  amount  of  oversight.     The  danger  of 

I  2 


116  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

microscopic  dioceses  is,  however,  exceedingly  remote. 
In  the  life  of  Bishop  Wilson  of  Sodor  and  Man, 
bishop  for  more  than  half  a  century,  we  have  an 
example  of  the  kind  of  episcopal  government  which 
may  exist  in  a  slender  episcopal  territory.  Its  popu- 
lation was  only  fourteen  thousand,  very  much  below 
that  of  many  large  parishes.  Bishop  Wilson's  cha- 
racter was  eminently  saintly  and  beautiful,  and  has, 
doubtless,  been  studied  by  many  episcopal  readers. 
He  could  be  a  little  severe  upon  his  own  order,  as 
when  he  observed  that  ecclesiastical  estates  seldom 
remain  above  three  or  four  generations  in  the  same 
family.  We  are  told  that  he  could  never  be  induced 
to  sit  in  the  House  of  Lords,  though  there  is  a  seat 
for  the  Bishop  of  Man,  detached  from  the  other 
bishops,  and  within  the  bar,  saying,  '^  That  the 
Church  should  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  State; 
Christ's  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world." 

The  great  idea  of  Bishop  Wilson's  episcopacy  was 
the  enforcement  of  discipline  in  his  diocese.  This 
idea  had  a  great  fascination  for  the  late  Mr.  Keble, 
and  probably  prompted  him  to  produce  his  ponderous 
life  of  Wilson,  and  we  see  in  his  biography  how 
he  longed  to  reproduce  it  at  Hursley.  The  wisdom 
of  his  procedure  seems  questionable.  It  is  difficult 
at  times  to  read  of  his  pains  and  penalties  without 
a  smile.  The  primitive  people  of  the  little  island 
seem  to  have  been  as  violent,  immoral,  and  dishonest 
as  if  they  had  belonged  to  the  purlieus  of  the  great 
metropolis.  There  appears  to  have  been  a  zeal  for 
raking  out  all  offences  against  continence  that  must 
have  had  a  somewhat  prurient  effect.  Even  husband 
and  wife  had  to  do  public  penance  for  misconduct 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OF    EPISCOPACY.  117 

before  marriage.  The  favourite  punishment  for  frailty 
was  to  draj?  the  offender  at  a  boat's  tail  throu"-h  the 
sea.  Nor  was  this  all.  He  had  to  pay  fees.  He  had 
to  suffer  imprisonment.  He  had  to  stand  bare- 
beaded,  bare-footed,  in  the  porch  of  the  church  after 
church,  year  after  year.  Sorcery  was  also  severely 
visited.  One  Alice  Knahill  had  to  do  three  Sunday's 
penance  in  neighbouring  churches,  and  in  each  to 
make  a  solemn  renunciation  of  such  diabolical  prac- 
tices for  the  future.  Such  ecclesiastical  regimen  as 
making  a  notorious  scold  wear  a  bridle  in  her  mouth 
might,  perhaps,  be  advantageously  revived  in  the 
present  day.  If  the  Church  and  the  World  were  con- 
terminous, the  revival  of  such  discipline  might  be 
much  to  be  wished.  But  it  brought  Bishop  Wilson 
into  serious  collision  with  the  secular  arm,  and  would 
be  altogether  impracticable  in  any  diocese  of  the 
present  day,  whether  of  small  or  large  dimensions. 
It  seems  scarcely  credible  that  in  the  last  century  a 
Christian  bishop  should  be  committed  to  prison  for 
nine  weeks  for  thoroughly  conscientious  proceed- 
ings. This  piece  of  tyrannical  persecution  happened 
to  Bisho'p  Wilson,  who  in  a  damp  cell  lost  the  use 
of  the  fingers  of  his  right  hand,  and  may  suffi- 
ciently prove  to  us  that  the  persecuting  spirit  is  not 
laid,  though  the  opportunities  of  persecution  rarely 
exist. 

Two  respects  may  be  named  in  which  Dr.  Thomas 
Wilson  afforded  a  bright  episcopal  example.  In  the 
first  place  he  was  a  large  benefactor,  and  in  later 
years  he  devoted  one-half  of  his  income  to  pious  and 
charitable  uses.     When  one  takes  up  the  reports  of 


118  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

our  great  Church  societies,  and  perceives  the  contribu- 
tions by  prelates  of  a  single  guinea,  a  sum  often 
exceeded  by  very  humble  curates,  one  may  consider 
that  this  antiquated  custom  is  not  followed  in  modern 
times.  Still  more  remarkable  was  his  conduct  towards 
candidates  for  Holy  Orders.  He  would  take  such 
young  students  into  his  house  for  a  whole  year,  and 
they  would  daily  read  the  Greek  Testament  with  him 
and  hear  his  remarks.  This  would  rather  be  too 
much  of  a  tax  upon  our  prelates,  but  many  of  them 
receive  their  candidates  as  guests  during  the  pre- 
liminary examinations  for  Orders.  This,  however,  is 
not  universally  the  case.  Wilson's  character  stood  in 
such  estimation  in  France  that  the  French  Ministry 
gave  orders  that  no  privateer  should  commit  ravages 
on  the  Isle  of  Man.  He  disinterestedly  refused  pre- 
ferment, and  so  Queen  Caroline  addressed  a  mob  of 
bishops  at  her  Court,  directing  attention  to  Wilson, 
who  happened  to  be  present.  "  Here,  my  lords, 
comes  a  bishop  whose  errand  is  not  to  apply  for 
a  translation,  nor  would  he  part  with  his  spouse  be- 
cause she  is  poor."  Queen  Caroline's  husband,  George 
the  Second,  used  to  say  that  all  his  bishops  were 
Atheists. 

^         ^  Bishop     Butler    was    one    of    the 

Bishop  Butlek.  *■  .    . 

1692—175''  greatest  and  most  origmal  thinkers 
that  the  world  has  ever  known.  He 
ranks  side  by  side  with  Bacon  and  Newton  and  Locke. 
The  study  of  his  writings  forms  an  era  in  a  man's 
intellectual  life.  No  author  who  has  written  so  httle 
has  achieved  so  much.  A  voluminous  literature  has 
gathered  around  writings  which  are  easily  contained 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OP    EPISCOPACY.  119 

in  a  single  volume ;  many  illustrious  writers  have 
done  themselves  honour  by  becoming  his  commen- 
tators. It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that  men  have 
eagerly  searched  for  any  discoverable  incidents  of  that 
simple  and  studious  life.  These,  such  as  they  are,  we 
now  propose  to  bring  together. 

The  father  of  Joseph  Butler  was  an  honest  tradesman 
carrying  on  a  substantial  business  as  a  linendraper  in 
the  town  of  Wantage,  in  Berkshire,  a  place  memorable 
as  the  birthplace  of  King  Alfred.  Thomas  Butler  had 
eight  children,  of  whom  Joseph  was  the  youngest,  and 
at  the  time  of  his  birth  had  retired  from  business,  and 
occupied  the  Priory,  at  the  end  of  the  town,  which 
is  still  shown  to  those  who  are  attracted  thither  by 
veneration  for  the  great  author.  The  town  of  Wantage 
curiously  possesses  two  churches  in  the  same  church- 
yard. The  smallest  of  these  was  used  as  a  grammar 
school,  where  the  future  author  of  the  "  Analogy" 
successfully  pursued  his  studies,  being  designed  by  'his 
father  for  the  Presbyterian  ministry.  From  thence 
he  was  sent  to  a  dissenting  academy  at  Gloucester, 
kept  by  Mr.  Samuel  Jones,  "  a  man,"  says  the  present 
Bishop  Fitzgerald,  "  of  no  mean  ability  or  erudition, 
who  could  number  among  his  scholars  many  names 
that  might  confer  honour  on  any  university  of  Christen- 
dom." Among  these  names  were  Seeker,  the  future 
archbishop,  Jeremiah  Jones,  the  writer  on  the  canon, 
Lardner,  the  apologist,  and  Chandler,  author  of  the 
"  Life  of  David."  Mr.  Jones  subsequently  removed 
from  Gloucester  to  Tewkesbury.  Of  all  his  companions 
Seeker  seems  to  have  been  Butler's  most  intimate 
friend,  and  their  warm  affection  continued  till  it  was 
dissolved  by  death.    When  Butler  was  still  at  Tewkes- 


120  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

bury,  where  he  continued  so  late  as  his  twenty-first 
year,  he  first  exhibited  his  extraordinary  metaphysical 
genius.  The  famous  Dr.  Clarke  had  recently  published 
his  "  Demonstration  of  the  Being  and  Attributes  of 
God,"  and  the  young  student,  believing  that  he  had 
detected  some  flaws  in  the  reasoning,  addressed  the 
author  on  the  subject.  He  was  modestly  anxious  to 
conceal  his  name,  and  his  friend  Seeker  undertook  to 
walk  over  to  Gloucester  to  post  the  letters  and  receive 
the  answers.  Of  these  letters  Sir  James  Mackintosh 
says  that  they  "  are  marked  by  an  acuteness  which 
neither  he  nor  any  other  man  surpassed."  In  one  of 
these  letters  he  uses  this  noble  language,  "  I  design 
the  search  after  truth  as  the  business  of  my  life." 
Clarke  was  much  struck  by  the  ability,  modesty,  and 
earnestness  of  his  anonymous  correspondent,  and  sub- 
sequently published  the  letters  as  an  appendix  to  his 
treatise.  After  much  thought  he  determined  to  enter 
the  Ministry  of  the  Church  of  England.  His  father 
scarcely  approved  of  this,  but  finding  that  his  son  had 
firmly  made  up  his  mind,  and  that  not  hghtly,  yielded 
his  assent.  He  was  accordingly  entered  at  Oriel 
College  in  Hilary  Term,  1714.  At  Oxford  we  find 
him  carrying  on  another  correspondence  with  Dr. 
Clarke,  and  this  time  in  his  own  name.*  He  does  not 
seem  to  be  very  well  satisfied  with  Oxford,  and  enter- 
tained thoughts  of  migrating  to  Cambridge.  '*  We 
are  obliged  to  misspend  so  much  time  here  in  attend- 
ing frivolous  lectures  and  unintelligible  disputations 
that  I  am  quite  tired  out  with  such  a  disagreeable 
way  of  trifling,"   and  he  proceeds  to  make  inquiries 

*  Mr.  J.  E.  B.  Mayor,  in  "  Notes  and  Queries,"  points  out  these  let- 
ters in  the  "  European  Magazine,"  for  1802. 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OP   EPISCOPACY.  121 

about  a  college  and  a  tutor.  He  entertained  the  idea 
of  having  Mr.  Langton  for  a  tutor,  and  of  taking  at 
Cambridge  the  degrees  of  B.A.  and  B.C.L.  Finding, 
however,  that  it  was  very  doubtful  whether  he  would 
be  allowed  at  Cambridge  the  benefit  of  his  Oxford 
terms,  he  gave  up  the  plan. 

At  Oxford,  he  formed  an  intimate  friendship  with 
Mr.  Edward  Talbot,  a  son  of  the  Bishop  of  Durham,  a 
circumstance  which  had  a  considerable  influence  on 
the  events  of  his  future  life.  It  does  not  appear  at 
what  time  he  took  orders,  but  in  1718,  owing  to  the 
influence  of  his  friends,  Edward  Talbot  and  Dr.  Clarke, 
he  obtained  the  honourable  appointment  of  preacher 
at  the  Holls  Court.  His  income,  however,  was  for 
some  years  so  inconsiderable  that  he  was  obliged  to 
receive  support  from  members  of  his  family.  In  1720, 
his  friend  Talbot  caught  the  small-pox,  of  which  he 
died.  On  his  death-bed  this  amiable  young  man 
earnestly  recommended  to  his  father  his  three  friends, 
Butler,  Seeker,  and  Brown.  The  very  next  year  he 
presented  Butler  with  the  living  of  Haughton,  near 
Darlington.  His  friend  Seeker  found  him  very  busy 
over  the  dilapidations  of  the  parsonage  of  Haughton, 
and  about  to  rebuild  it  in  whole  or  part,  and  fearing 
lest  Butler  should  become  embarrassed  in  his  under- 
taking, begged  the  bishop  to  provide  him  with  a  better 
living  and  a  suitable  house.  The  good  bishop,  remem- 
bering the  warm  afi"ection  which  his  deceased  son  bore 
to  Butler,  and  aware  of  the  growing  esteem  in  which 
the  young  clergyman  was  held,  presented  him  to  the 
important  benefice  of  Stanhope. 

Soon  after  this,  Butler  resigned  his  appointment  as 
preacher  at  the  Rolls,  and  on  this  occasion  he  pub- 


122  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

lished  bis  "  Fifteen  Sermons,"  preached  at  'the  cliapel 
of  the  Court,  and  dedicated  the  volume  to  Sir  Joseph 
Jekyl  "  as  a  pubhc  mark  of  gratitude  for  the  favours 
received  during  his  connexion  with  this  Society." 
They  are  taken  almost  indifferently  from  sermons 
preached  over  a  period  of  eight  years  :  many  more 
were  most  probably  wrought  up  into  the  "  Analogy," 
and  many  he  burnt,  the  loss  of  which  must  be  con- 
sidered a  serious  misfortune.  Respecting  these 
sermons  he  makes  a  remark  which  may  be  applied 
to  all  his  writings.  "  It  must  be  acknowledged  that 
some  of  the  following  discourses  are  very  abstruse  and 
difficult ;  or,  if  you  please,  obscure  :  but  I  must  take 
leave  to  add  that  those  alone  are  judges  whether  or 
no  or  how  far  this  is  a  fault,  who  are  judges  whether  or 
no  or  how  far  it  might  have  been  avoided — those  only 
who  will  be  at  the  trouble  to  understand  what  is  here 
said,  and  see  how  far  the  things  here  insisted  upon, 
and  not  other  things,  might  have  been  put  in  a  plainer 
manner ;  which  yet,"  he  modestly  adds,  "  I  am  very 
far  from  asserting  that  they  could  not."  He  proceeds 
to  make  a  remark  eminently  characteristic  of  a  close 
thinker,  but  which  would  scarcely  hold  good  in  general 
application.  "  I  have  often  wished  that  it  had  been 
the  custom  to  lay  before  people  nothing  in  matters 
of  argument  but  premises,  and  leave  them  to  draw 
conclusions  themselves."  He  laments  the  proverbial 
want  of  attention  and  thoughtfulness  in  language, 
which,  we  fear,  has  lost  none  of  its  meaning  in  the 
present  day.  "  The  great  number  of  books  and  papers 
of  amusement  which,  of  one  kind  or  another,  daily 
come  in  one's  way,  have  in  part  occasioned,  and  most 
perfectly  fall  in  with   and   humour  this  idle  way  of 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OF   EPISCOPACY.  123 

reading  and  considering  things.  By  tins  means  time, 
even  in  solitude,  is  happily  got  rid  of  without  the  pain 
of  attention  :  neither  is  any  part  of  it  more  put  to 
account  of  idleness,  one  can  scarce  forbear  saying  is 
spent  with  less  thought,  than  great  part  of  that  which 
is  spent  in  reading.  Thus  people  habituate  themselves 
to  let  things  pass  through  their  minds,  as  one  may 
speak  rather  than  think  of  them.  Thus  by  use  they 
become  satisfied  merely  by  seeing  what  is  said,  with- 
out going  any  further.  Review  and  attention,  and 
even  forming  a  judgment  becomes  fatigue  ;  and  to  lay 
anything  before  them  that  requires  it  is  putting  them 
quite  out  of  their  way." 

At  Stanhope  he  continued  for  seven  years.  There 
still  remain  faint  traditions  respecting  him  in  that 
place.  He  is  described  as  "  riding  a  black  pony,  and 
always  riding  very  fast."  The  life  he  led  was  very 
secluded,  and  moreover  very  charitable,  so  much  so 
that  he  was  completely  pestered  by  beggars,  and  to 
get  rid  of  them  he  was  often  obliged  to  return  to  the 
rectory  without  completing  his  ride.  People  have 
sometimes  regretted  that  Butler  continued  so  long  in 
this  village  obscurity.  But  it  is  such  retirement  that 
is  oftenest  visited  by  great  thoughts,  and  great  plans 
are  therein  often  conceived  and  carried  out.  It  was 
thus  that  Warburton  wrote  the  "  Divine  Legation," 
and  Cudworth  the  "  Intellectual  System,"  and  Jeremy 
Taylor  the  "  Ductor  Bubitantium.''^ 

"  And  Wisdom's  self 
Oft  seeks  to  sweet  retired  solitude ; 
Where,  with  her  best  nurse,  Contemplation, 
She  plumes  her  feathers,  and  lets  grow  her  wings, 
That  in  the  various  bustle  of  resort 
Were  all  too  rufSed,  and  sometimes  impaired." 


124  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Butler  was  so  far  forgotten  that  Queen  Caroline 
asked  Arclibisliop  Blackburn  whether  he  was  not 
dead  ?  "  No,  madam,"  was  the  witty  reply,  "  he  is 
not  dead,  but  he  is  buried."  This  seclusion  began  to 
prey  upon  his  spirits,  as  did  also  the  death  of  his 
father.  The  brother  of  his  dear  friend,  Talbot,  was 
now  Lord  Chancellor,  and  dragged  him  from  his 
retreat  to  Loudon,  and  made  him  his  chaplain.  The 
good  Queen  Caroline,  who  loved  philosophers  and 
divines  better  than  courtiers  and  statesmen,  appointed 
him  clerk  of  the  closet,  and  commanded  "  his  attend- 
ance every  evening  from  seven  till  nine."  After  the 
"Analogy"  was  published,  it  was  perpetually  in  the 
Queen's  hands. 

It  was  in  1736  that  the  "  Analogy  of  Religion  to 
the  Constitution  and  Course  of  Nature"  was  first  pub- 
lished. The  language  of  approbation  has  been  ex- 
hausted in  reference  to  this  wonderful  work.  "  I 
have  derived  greater  aid  from  the  views  and  reasonings 
of  Bishop  Butler  than  I  have  been  able  to  find  besides 
in  the  whole  range  of  our  extant  authorship,"  writes 
Dr.  Chalmers.  *'  The  most  original  and  profound 
work  extant  in  any  language  on  the  philosophy  of 
religion,"  says  Sir  James  Mackintosh.  "  The  most 
argumentative  and  philosophical  defence  of  Christianity 
ever  submitted  to  the  world,"  says  Lord  Brougham, 
in  his  "  Discourse  of  Natural  Theology."  It  would  be 
easy  to  multiply  these  testimonies  to  an  indefinite 
extent.  At  the  time  when  the  "  Analogy"  was  pro- 
duced the  nation  seemed  to  be  in  a  state  of  universal 
spiritual  lifelessness.  "  I  have  lived  to  see,"  said 
Bishop  Warburton,  *'  that  fatal  crisis  when  religion 
hath  lost  its  hold  on  the  minds  of  the  people."     One 


ON  THE   HISTORY   OP   EPISCOPACY.  125 

living  man  there  was  indeed  destined  to  woi^k  a  great 
revival  in  the  land,  but  lie  was  now  far  away  in 
Georgia,  unconscious  of  his  noble  destiny  :  this  man 
was  John  Wesley.  Infidelity  in  its  positive  and  nega- 
tive form  everywhere  abounded.  Some  of  our  greatest 
English  writers  had  either  openly  or  covertly  at- 
tacked revelation, — Hobbes,  Shaftesbury,  Bolingbroke, 
Hume ;  while  the  coarse  infidel  publications  of  such 
men  as  Woolstou,  Tindel,  and  Colhns,  were  widely 
disseminated  among  the  people.  Thus  writes  Bishop 
Butler  in  the  advertisement  prefixed  to  the  first  edi- 
tion. "  It  is  come,  I  know  not  how,  to  be  taken  for 
granted,  by  many  persons,  that  Christianity  is  not  so 
much  as  a  subject  of  inquiry,  but  that  it  is  now  at 
length  discovered  to  be  fictitious.  And  accordingly 
they  treat  it  as  if,  in  the  present  age,  this  were  an 
agreed  point  among  all  people  of  discernment,  and 
nothing  remains  but  to  set  it  up  as  a  principal  subject 
of  mirth  and  ridicule,  as  it  were  by  way  of  reprisals  for 
its  having  so  long  interrupted  the  pleasures  of  the 
world."  In  the  same  language  of  sober  irony  he  pro- 
ceeds to  indicate  that  his  book  may  show,  in  reference 
to  religion,  "  that  it  is  not,  however,  so  clear  a  case 
that  there  is  nothing  in  it."  This  immortal  work  not 
only  fully  combated  the  spirit  of  unbelief  then  pre- 
valent, but  in  deep  critical  power  meets  those  charac- 
teristics by  which  in  all  time  the  spirit  of  unbelief  may 
be  discerned.  It  has,  indeed,  with  startling  power 
not  only  proved  to  those  who  are  utterly  sceptical 
about  religion,  that  there  is  much  more  in  it  than  they 
supposed,  but  it  has  a  much  greater  than  the  merely 
neo:ative  value  which  has  at  times  been  attributed  to 
it.    To  the  deist,  who  in  his  melancholy  system  admits 


126  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

tlie  fundamental  truth  of  the  existence  of  a  God,  if  he 
is  of  that  "fairness  of  mind"  on  which  Butler  always 
lays  such  stress,  the  book  proves  with  the  irresistible 
conclusiveness  of  demonstration  the  truth  of  revela- 
tion. The  elder  Mill  fully  admitted  the  force  of  the 
reasoning,  and  could  only  meet  it  by  denying  the  pos- 
tulate of  the  work,  the  existence  of  God. 

The  calm  majesty  of  the  work  is  very  observable, 
and  though  written  in  a  controversial  age,  and  with  a 
controversial  design,  [it  is  in  itself  free  from  every 
trace  of  controversy.  He  does  not  even  mention  the 
name  of  the  writers  he  is  refuting,  and  it  requires 
some  acquaintance  with  the  literature  of  those  times 
to  recofruise  the  books  which  he  has  in  his  mind's  eye. 
It  is  this  freedom  from  temporary  discussion  which 
has  done  much  to  give  the  book  its  permanent  value. 

Lord  Karnes,  the  author  of  "  Evidences  of  Natural 
and  Revealed  Religion,"  had  some  correspondence  with 
him,  and  requested  an  interview.  This  was  declined 
in  a  manner  very  characteristic  of  his  caution  and 
modesty  :  "  On  the  score  of  his  natural  diffidence  and 
reserve,  his  being  unaccustomed  to  oral  controversy, 
and  his  fear  that  the  cause  of  truth  might  thus  suffer 
from  the  unskilfulness  of  its  advocate."  Lord  Karnes 
advised  his  kinsman,  David  Hume,  to  procure  Butler's 
opinion  on  his  work  on  Human  Nature.  "  Your 
thoughts  and  mine,"  says  Hume,  "agree  in  respect  to 
Dr.  Butler,  and  I  should  be  glad  to  be  introduced  to 
him."  The  introduction,  however,  never  took  place. 
To  this  universal  value  attached  to  Butler's  writings 
one  of  his  own  family  showed  an  exception.  The 
Bishop  had  given  a  copy  of  his  "Analogy"  to  a 
nephew,  a  rich  and  eccentric  man,  who,  very  much 


ON   THE    HISTORY   OF   EPISCOPACY.  127 

liking  an  iron  instrument  belonging  to  a  neighbour, 
and  liis  neighbour  liking  his  book,  promptly  proposed 
and  effected  an  exchange. 

In  1747  Butler  was  asked  to  become  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury.  This  he  refused,  and  the  state  of  matters 
at  the  time  looked  so  gloomy  that  he  said  that  "  it  was 
too  late  for  him  to  try  and  support  a  falling  Church." 
His  nephew  John,  the  one  who  had  exchanged  his 
work  for  an  iron  vice,  could  not  at  all  understand  this 
refusal.  He  thought  that  a  want  of  ready  money 
must  be  the  reason,  and  implored  his  uncle  to  take  it, 
offering  to  let  him  have  twenty  thousand  pounds,  if 
necessary.  His  nephew  returned  to  Wantage  greatly 
dissatisfied  by  his  persistent  refusal.  Some  years  after- 
wards he  accepted  the  important  Bishopric  of  Durham. 
The  feeling;  with  which  he  did  so  is  thus  described  in 
a  letter  to  a  friend  :  "  Increase  of  fortune  is  insignifi- 
cant to  one  who  thought  he  had  enough  before ;  and  I 
foresee  many  difl&culties  in  the  station  I  am  coming 
into,  and  no  advantage  worth  thinking  of,  except  some 
greater  power  of  being  serviceable  to  others;  and 
whether  this  be  an  advantage  entirely  depends  on  the 
use  one  shall  make  of  it ;  I  pray  God  it  may  be  a  good 
one.  It  would  be  a  melancholy  thing  in  the  close  of 
life  to  have  no  reflections  to  entertain  oneself  with,  but 
that  one  had  spent  the  revenues  of  the  Bishopric  of 
Durham  in  a  sumptuous  course  of  living,  and  enrich- 
ing one's  friends  with  the  promotions  of  it,  instead  of 
having  really  set  oneself  to  do  good,  and  promote 
worthy  men." 

The  course  of  his  life  was  consistent  with  this  lan- 
guage. He  lived  in  a  most  frugal  and  unostentatious 
manner,  and  spent  his  income  in  the  support  of  public 


128  OUE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

and  private  charities.  He  once  invited  a  man  of 
fortune  to  dine  with  him,  and  appointed  a  time.  When 
the  guest  came  there  was  a  simple  joint  and  a  pudding. 
The  Bishop  apologised  for  the  plain  fare,  but  said  it 
was  his  way  of  living ;  "  that  he  had  been  long  dis- 
gusted with  the  fashionable  expense  of  time  and  money 
in  entertainments,  and  was  determined  that  it  should 
receive  no  countenance  from  his  example."  So  far 
was  he  from  showing  the  slightest  favouritism  that  one 
of  his  nephews  once  exclaimed,  "  Methinks,  my  lord, 
it  is  a  misfortune  to  be  related  to  you."  One  day  a 
gentleman  called  on  him  to  lay  before  him  the  details 
of  some  projected  benevolent  institution.  The  Bishop 
highly  approved  of  the  object,  and  calling  his  steward, 
he  asked  how  much  money  he  then  had  in  his  posses- 
sion. The  answer  was,  "  Five  hundred  pounds,  my 
lord."  "  Five  hundred  pounds  !"  exclaimed  his 
master ;  "  what  a  shame  for  a  bishop  to  have  so  much 
money  !  Give  it  away  !  Give  it  all  to  this  gentleman, 
to  his  charitable  plan."  He  died  worth  less  than  half 
a  year's  income. 

Of  his  appearance  and  behaviour  as  Bishop  of  Dur- 
ham we  have  three  distinct  accounts.  "  From  the 
first  of  my  remembrance,"  says  Miss  Talbot,  "  I  have 
ever  known  in  him  a  kind,  affectionate  friend,  the 
faithful  adviser,  which  he  would  condescend  to  when  I 
was  quite  a  child ;  and  the  most  delightful  companion, 
from  a  delicacy  of  thinking,  an  extreme  pohteness,  a 
vast  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  a  something  peculiar 
to  be  met  with  in  nobody  else.  And  all  this  in  a  man 
whose  sanctity  of  manner  and  sublimity  of  genius  gave 
him  one  of  the  first  ranks  among  men."  "  During  the 
short  time,"   says  Surtees,   "  that  Butler  held  the  see 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  129 

of  Durham,  he  concihated  all  hearts.  In  advanced 
years  he  retained  the  same  genuine  modesty  and  native 
sweetness  of  disposition  which  had  distinguished  him 
in  youth  and  in  retirement."  "  He  was,"  says 
Hutchinson,  author  of  a  history  of  Durham,  "  of  a 
most  reverend  aspect ;  his  face  thin  and  pale ;  but 
there  was  a  divine  placidness  in  his  countenance,  which 
inspired  veneration,  and  expressed  the  most  bene- 
volent mind.  His  wdiite  hair  hung  gracefully  on  his 
shoulders,  and  his  whole  figure  was  patriarchal." 

One  of  his  portraits  shows  an  expression  of  painf ul- 
ness,  and  he  seems  to  have  been  subject  to  much 
melancholy  and  depression.  He  had  an  oval  face, 
regular  and  delicate  features ;  his  forehead  was  ex- 
pansive, his  eyes  full,  and  remarkable  as  expressive  of 
extreme  abstraction.  His  looks  had  a  sweetness  and 
benignity  which  always  won  affection  and  veneration. 

The  Bishop  used  to  reside  at  times  in  London,  that 
he  might  attend  Parliament.  He  had  a  house  at 
Hampstead,  which  once  belonged  to  the  celebrated  Sir 
Harry  Vane,  adorned  with  painted  glass  representing 
scriptural  subjects.  Here  he  and  his  beloved  friend 
Seeker  used  to  dine  together  every  day.  He  attended 
the  House  of  Lords  regularly,  but  was  never  known  to 
speak.  He  was  extremely  fond  of  music,  and  when 
he  was  not  employed  in  necessary  employment  he 
would  ask  his  secretary,  Mr.  Emm,  to  play  on  the 
orean,  and  found  it  a  grateful  relief  to  his  mind,  after 
severe  application  to  study. 

It  must  not  be  imagined  that  Prelacy  could  not 
exhibit  a  very  different  picture.  Look  at  the  letter 
which  a  certain  Archbishop  wrote  to  Dean  Swift — 
Swift  the  YahoOj  who  was  almost  made  an  Archbishop 

VOL.  I.  K 


130  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Liraself  : — "  I  conclude  that  a  good  bishop  has  nothing 
more  to  do  than  to  eat,  drink,  grow  fat,  rich,  and  die, 
which  laudable  example  I  propose  for  tlie  remainder  of 
my  life  to  follow  ;  for,  to  tell  you  the  truth,  I  have  for 
these  four  or  five  years  past  met  with  so  much 
treachery,  baseness,  and  ingratitude  among  mankind, 
that  1  hardly  think  it  incumbent  on  any  man  to  en- 
deavour to  do  good  to  so  perverse  a  generation."  An 
Archbishop  so  ungrateful  to  Providence  must  himself 
have  been  marked  with  treachery,  baseness,  and  in- 
gratitude. 

It  is  thus  that  a  bishop's  son  writes  of  the  bishops 
of  a  generation  ago  : — "  The  popular  notion,  justified 
by  the  habit  of  many  who  occupied  the  bench,  was 
that  of  a  stately  gentleman,  of  dignified  demeanour, 
and  ample  income,  who  appeared  in  public  on  solemn 
occasions  of  confirmations  and  visitations,  passing  the 
rest  of  his  time  either  in  retired  leisure,  or  in  the 
society  of  London,  or  perhaps  in  fulfilling  the  duties 
of  some  other  preferment  which  he  held  in  conjunction 
with  his  bishopric,  and  whose  name  was  remembered 
in  his  diocese  rather  from  the  circumstance  of  so  many 
of  tlie  cathedral  dignities  being  filled  by  those  who 
bore  it  than  from  any  permanent  benefit  which  he 
had  conferred  upon  the  district  of  which  he  had  the 
spiritual  oversight."  Still  more  severe  was  the 
language  of  Bishop  Horsley  of  the  clergy  in  general : — 
"  We  make  no  other  use  of  the  high  commission  we 
bear  than  to  come  abroad  one  day  in  the  seven,  dressed 
in  solemn  looks,  and  in  the  external  garb  of  holiness, 
to  be  the  apes  of  Epictetus." 

The  sad  case  of  the  Bishop  of  Clogher  maybe  men- 
tioned from  some  striking  points  it  presents.     I  am 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  131 

not  aware  of  any  other  clergyman  against  whom  such 
fearful  crimes  have  been  brought  home.  There  is  one 
pecuhar  feature  of  horror  in  his  case.  His  sin  had 
been  detected  by  a  poor  man  in  his  employ.  He  had 
denounced  it,  and,  being  convicted  of  perjury  ou 
perjured  evidence,  was  publicly  flogged  most  cruelly 
throug'h  the  streets  of  Dublin.  This  Prelate  was 
deprived,  and  might  have  suffered  from  the  common 
law  of  the  country.* 

Another  singular  episcopal  history  may  be  briefly 
glanced  at.  We  find  one  of  our  English  Prelates  re- 
markably distinguished  by  curious  relations  with  no 

less  a  personage  than  Alexander  von 

LokdBkistol,       Humboldt.     This  was    Lord  Bristol, 

Bishop  of  Derry. 

the  Bishop  of  Derry.  Gothe  has 
some  very  unfavourable  remarks  about  this  Prelate, 
and   he  is  briefly   but  emphatically   characterised  by 

*  "  In  a  letter  from   the  Rev.  C.  H— — ,  is  the  following  remarkable 

account  of  the  late  Bishop  of  C ,  who  died  at  Edinburgh  under  the 

name  of  T.  W .     In  1820  he  fled  the  country  to  save  his  life.     About 

eight  years  ago  he  introduced  himself  to  the  Rev.  J.  F ,  under  the 

assumed  name  of  T.  W .     Mr.  F was  somewhat  startled  at  the 

contrast  between  his  personal  appearance  and  mode  of  address.  He 
had  all  the  manners  of  a  person  of  rank,  which  he  seemed  to  wish  to 

conceal.     He  frequently  asked  Mr.    F how  far  the  mercy  of  God 

would  reach?  Did  Jesus  die  for  the  very  chief  of  sinners?  By  some 
means  "The  Sinners'  Friend"  had  fallen  into  his  hands.     This  httle 

work  (he  told  Mr.  F )  roused  him  from   a  deathlike   sleep  in   sin, 

and  he  saw  himself  in  colours  that  made  him  miserable,  and  terrified 
him  into  reflection.     One  night,  about  three  years  and  a  half  ago  he 

broke  his  thigh.     Mr.  F found  him  in  extreme  agony  of  body  and 

mind,  crying  lamentably  for  mercy.  He  lived  a  few  months  after  this 
accident,  and  at  last  found  peace.  "  The  Sinners'  Friend"  was  his 
constant  companion  and  he  was  always  speaking  about  it,  blessing  God 
that  it  had  come  into  his  hands.     After  bis  death  it  became  known  to 

Mr.  F for  the  first  time  that  T.  W was  no  other  than  the  once 

Bishop  of  C ."  — Sinner's  Friend,  an  Autobiography 

K    2 


132  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

Gothe's  bio^^raphers  as  "  a  bold  free-thinkor  and 
votary  of  pleasure."*  Humboldt,  with  the  frankness 
of  friendship,  used  to  call  him  the  "  mad  old  lord." 
His  Ecclesiastical  bonds  had  sat  very  lightly  upon  the 
right  reverend  Prelate.  Although  a  free-thinker,  he 
was  attended  by  an  orthodox  chaplain.  He  had  visited 
Greece,  and  spent  many  years  in  Italy,  and  at  Rome 
he  had  made  the  acquaintance  of  Hirt,  the  archaeologist, 
court-counsellor  at  Berlin.  He  invited  Hirt  and  Alex- 
ander von  Humboldt  to  accompany  him  in  an  expedi- 
tion which  he  projected  to  Upper  Egypt.  He  also 
invited  his  chere  amie  et  adorable  Comtesse  de  Lich- 
tenau,  and  the  Countess  Dennis,  remarking  to  the 
former,  "  Jamais  un  voyage  ne  sera  plus  coraplet  tant 
pour  I'ame  que  pour  le  corps."  The  Bishop  of  Derry, 
writing  to  Hirt,  says  : — "  We  shall  have  two  large 
spronasi  with  both  oars  and  sails.  La  Dennis  et  M. 
le  Professeur  Hirt  are  to  accompany  the  dear  Countess 
in  her  boat.  M.  Savary,  the  author  of  the  charming 
Letters  upon  Egypt,  will  be  in  mine.  I  intend  to  take 
with  me  two  or  three  artists,  not  only  for  the  rivers 
and  the  grand  points  of  view,  but  also  for  the  costumes, 
so  that  nothing  shall  be  wanting  to  render  the  journey 
agreeable.  Dear  Hirt,  will  not  this  be  an  expedition 
worthy  of  your  profound  knowledge  and  your  inde- 
fatigable industry  ?  What  splendid  drawings  may  we 
not  expect  from  our  artists  !  what  a  magnificent  work 
will  not  our  united  efforts  furnish  for  publication  !" 
The  Countess  says  herself  that  this  was  the  most 
foolish  journey  ever  projected,  and  the  King  of  Prussia 
would  never  have  allowed  her  to  go  to  Egypt. 

The  episcopal  expedition  was  projected  on  a  most 

*  Gothe's  "  Sammtliche  Werke,"  vol.  x.  p.  367. 


ON   THE    HISTORY    OF   EPISOOPACy.  133 

liberal  and  luxurious  scale.  The  Bishop  guaranteed  a 
kitchen  and  a  well-provided  cellar.  He  would  have 
his  own  yacht,  his  own  sculptors  and  artists,  and  no 
armed  men.  They  were  to  go  as  far  as  Syene,  and 
return  by  way  of  Constantinople  and  Vienna.  Hum- 
boldt seems  to  have  thought  that  the  only  thing  dis- 
agreeable in  the  expedition  was  the  last.  "  You 
might  possibly  think  the  society  of  the  noble  lord 
objectionable  ;  he  is  eccentric  in  the  highest  degree. 
I  have  only  once  seen  him,  and  that  was  during  one  of 
the  expeditions  he  used  to  make  on  horseback  between 
Pyrmont  and  Naples.  I  was  aware  that  it  is  not  easy 
to  live  at  peace  with  him.  But  as  I  travel  at  my  own 
expense,  I  preserve  my  independence,  and  do  not  risk 
anything.  I  can  leave  him  at  any  time  if  he  oppose 
me  too  much."  This  last  clause  is  not  quite  consist- 
ent with  a  letter  to  another  friend,  in  which  he  says 
that  he  was  to  be  free  of  expense  throughout,  and  that 
such  a  proposition  was  not  to  be  declined. 

It  was  destined,  however,  that  the  expedition  should 
not  come  off.  It  was  rumoured  everywhere  that  the 
French  intended  to  take  possession  of  Egypt,  and  in 
that  case  an  English  bishop  with  suite  would  certainly 
not  be  permitted  to  go  up  the  river.  Lord  Bristol's 
trip  did  not  escape  the  eagle  eye  of  Napoleon.  A 
political  motive,  of  which  we  may  be  sure  that  the 
bishop  was  quite  innocent,  was  attributed  to  him. 
It  was  thought  that  his  trip  up  the  Nile  was  to  create 
an  agitation  in  favour  of  England  against  the  French. 
Humboldt,  who  had  been  working  most  eagerly  to 
gratify  him  and  to  gain  all  the  advantages  which 
might  be  expected  from  such  a  trip,  was  greatly  dis- 
appointed, but  his  work  was  splendidly  utilized  for 


]34  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

subsequent  and  more  important  expeditions.  As  for 
the  mad  old  bishop  he  came  to  much  sorrow ;  when 
at  Milan  he  was  seized  by  the  police,  and  was  kept 
a  prisoner  for  eighteen  months.  He  sought,  after 
his  liberation,  to  renew  friendly  relations  with  the 
Countess,  who  seems  to  have  had  the  art  of  inspiring 
many  persons  with  affection  and  respect,  but  it  was 
impossible.  He  was  suspected  of  having  given  in- 
formation respecting  Germany  to  the  French.  Once 
he  had  written  thus,  "  Mon  coeur  est  un  grand,  et 
j'ose  dire,  vaste  chateau  dont  le  corps-de-logis  est 
tout  a  vous  seul  consacr^ ;  chaque  appartement 
meuble  de  votre  nom,  de  votre  charmante  figure,  et 
d^core  de  votre  physionomie  tendre  et  spirituelle." 
When  these  friendly  relations  were  at  an  end,  all  the 
Bishop's  regard  was  changed  into  hate.  We  do  not 
pursue  any  further  this  singular  history,  but  hasten 
to  place  in  relief  the  spotless  career  of  one  of  our 
saintlier  prelates. 

There   are    few   persons    who    are 

Bishop  Hokne.        n       •^■  -^i     ,i  .  t        i 

-i^„gy  lamihar  with  the  sweet   and   solemn 

literature  of  our  English  sacred 
writers  who  do  not  hold  in  peculiar  love  and  regard 
the  memory  of  George  Home,  the  good  Bishop  of 
Norwich.  The  author  of  the  most  favourite  "  Com- 
mentary on  the  Psalms  "  was  not  only  celebrated  for 
his  great  knowledge  and  great  attainments,  but  re- 
markable, also,  for  his  gentle  spirit  and  his  cheerful 
piety.  His  happy,  quiet  lot  was  cast  in  uneventful 
days,  and  spent  almost  entirely  in  the  college  cloister 
and  the  cathedral  close.  No  biography  of  him  has 
been  written  that  really  deserves  the  name. 


ON    THE    HISTORY    OF    EI'ISCOPACY.  135 

The  life  of  the  Bishop,  so  far  as  we  are  able  to 
judge,  seems  an  uninterrupted  career  of  peace  aud 
prosperity.  His  father  was  a  country  clergyman 
residing  at  Otham,  in  Kent,  a  man  of  great  learning, 
and  remarkable  for  "  the  integrity  of  his  mind  against 
all  temptations  from  worldly  advantage."  At  Othara 
his  illustrious  son  was  born  in  the  year  1730.  His 
father,  a  man  of  very  mild  and  amiable  disposition, 
would  arouse  his  little  son  from  sleep  by  playing 
upon  the  flute,  that  the  child  might  wake  up  in  a 
gradual  and  pleasant  manner;  and  as  he  grew  up 
he  had  "  a  tender  feeling  of  music,  especially  that  of 
the  church."  At  Oxford  he  soon  gained  the  friend- 
ship of  such  of  his  contemporaries  as  were  of  good 
learning  and  good  manners.  During  his  under- 
graduate course  the  boy  grew  up  into  the  young  man, 
and  was  noted  for  his  handsome  appearance;  but  he 
was  always  so  shortsighted  as  to  be  quite  lost  without 
the  help  of  his  glasses.  He  was  not  very  strong,  and 
was  indisposed  for  active  exercise ;  he  used  to  take 
horse  exercise  sometimes,  but  so  awkwardly  that  some 
amusing  stories  are  told  respecting  him,  and  he  used, 
with  much  pleasantry,  to  tell  them  against  himself, 
having  "  the  rare  and  happy  talent  of  disarming  all 
the  little  vexatious  incidents  of  life  of  their  power  to 
molest  by  giving  them  some  unexpected  turn." 

After  a  time  he  was  elected  Fellow  of  Magdalen 
College.  We  can  well  imagine  him,  as  Addison  before 
him,  in  those  pleasant  and  renowned  walks,  embowered 
by  the  elms'  overarching  shade,  and  bordered  by  the 
murmuring  Cherwell.  Here  he  added  to  his  classical 
knowledge  the  persevering  study  of  Hebrew,  and  with 
friends  of  congenial  disposition  devoted   much   atten- 


136  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

tion  to  music.  The  famous  Dr.  Parr  was  one  of  his 
contemporaries,  and  has  given  some  description  of 
him.  He  describes  him  as  a  man  of  great  learning 
and  dignified  manners,  who  never  showed  the  least 
ill-humour  himself,  and  would  gently  repress  it  in 
others.  He  had  a  great  deal  of  natural  pleasantry, 
and  as  an  instance  it  is  narrated  that  when  an  under- 
graduate asked  leave  of  absence,  saying  he  was  going 
to  Coventry — "  Better  to  go  than  be  sent,"  said 
Home.  People  would  watch  the  good  man  in  the 
pulpit  while  the  psalm  was  being  sung  just  before  the 
sermon  in  the  University  church,  joyfully  beating  time 
with  his  hand  and  joining  in  the  strain. 

Among  the  incidents  recorded  of  him  is  the  follow- 
ing. A  poor  man  lay  in  Oxford  jail  condemned.  He 
was  a  bad  man,  who  had  committed  many  robberies. 
This  man  had  heard  of  Mr.  Home's  high  character 
for  piety  and  humanity,  and  sent  to  beg  him  to  come 
and  see  him.  This  Home  accordingly  did,  and  found 
in  the  criminal  an  Irishman  of  gentlemanly  appear- 
ance and  address.  The  case  of  this  wretched  man  lay 
heavily  on  Home's  mind.  Night  and  day  he  used 
anxiously  to  think  how  he  could  best  address  the 
unhappy  criminal,  for,  while  sensible  and  ready  on 
ordinary  occasions,  he  found  him  deplorably  destitute 
of  all  religious  knowledge.  To  a  man  of  his  kindness 
of  mind  these  circumstances  proved  a  severe  trial,  and 
considerably  affected  his  health  for  some  time.  Those 
who  are  acquainted  with  Oxford  will  recollect  that  in 
the  first  quadrangle  of  Magdalen  there  is  an  elevated 
stone  pulpit  inserted  where  the  preacher  in  the  open 
air  used  to  address  an  open-air  congregation.  Ac- 
cording to  college  custom,  he   there  preached  before 


ONT   THE    HISTORY    OF   EnSOOPAOT.  137 

the  University  on  the  day  of  St.  John  the  Baptist,  on 
which  occasion,  according  to  an  ancient  usage,  the 
quadrangle  was  furnished  round  with  a  fence  of  green 
boughs,  that  the  audience  might  be  reminded  of  St. 
John  in  the  wilderness.  These  customs  have  been  for 
some  time  discontinued,  not  without  the  complaints 
of  those  who  fondly  recollected  them,  and  knew  our 
forefathers  were  not  afraid  of  a  httle  wind,  or  sun,  or 
rain.  Home  was  concerned  to  hear  on  this  occasion 
that  his  hearers  considered  that  he  had  "  a  very  fine 
imagination  ;"  he  would  have  greatly  preferred  that 
they  had  indeed  entered  into  the  spirit  and  the  truth 
of  what  was  said;  he  found  that  they  were  better 
critics  than  doers,  and  in  a  private  letter  he  laments 
this. 

He  used  to  reo^ret  that  he  knew  so  little  of  the  world 
that  he  found  it  very  difficult  to  discover  proper  ob- 
jects for  his  beneficence,  and  would  say,  "  Let  any- 
body show  me  in  any  case  what  ought  to  be  done,  and 
they  will  always  find  me  ready  to  do  it."  His  alms 
were  given  away  with  such  secresy  that  people  little 
imagined  how  extensive  they  were,  but  after  his  death, 
when  his  pensioners  had  to  look  about  for  other  means 
of  support,  it  was  discovered  how  many  pensioners  he 
had  quietly  maintained. 

He  thus  speaks  of  himself  in  1788  :  "  I  have  been 
more  than  ever  harassed  this  year,  for  four  months 
past,  with  defluxions  on  my  head  and  breast;  they 
have  driven  me  to  take  the  benefit  of  the  Headington 
air  this  charming  season,  which  by  God's  blessing  will 
enable  me  to  get  clear  for  the  summer,  I  believe  :  but 
as  I  grow  older  I  shall  dread  the  return  of  winter." 
Such  was  the  state  of  his  health  when  he  was  pressed 


13S  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

to  become  Bishop  of  Norwicli,  He  by  no  means  felt 
inclined  to  undertake  so  weighty  an  office,  but  he 
eventually  complied.  He  survived  his  elevation  for 
little  more  than  half  a  year.  The  Bishop's  palace  at 
Norwich  is  entered  by  a  large  flight  of  steps.  "  Alas  !" 
said  the  good  Bishop  one  day,  "  I  am  come  to  these 
steps  at  a  time  of  life  when  I  can  neither  go  up  them 
nor  down  them  with  safety."  His  chaplain  persuaded 
him  to  take  an  early  walk  in  his  garden  every  morning. 
One  day  he  said  to  his  chaplain,  in  his  usual  pleasant 
manner,  "  Mr.  Wilham,  I  have  heard  you  say  that  the 
air  of  the  morning  is  a  dram  to  the  mind  ;  I  will  rise 
to-morrow  and  take  a  dram."  In  the  midst  of  these 
infirmities  he  derived  some  benefit  by  visits  to  Bath  on 
two  occasions  ;  and  was  on  his  third  journey  when  he 
was  struck  down  by  a  paralytic  stroke.  He  was,  how- 
ever, able  to  complete  his  journey.  One  who  was  with 
him  to  the  last  thus  writes :  "  Had  you  seen  him 
bolstered  up,  blessing  his  children  and  speaking  com- 
fort to  his  wife,  in  the  hope  and  trust  of  their  meeting 
again,  you  would  never  have  forgot  it.  I  am  sure  I 
never  shall ;  nor  do  I  wish  it." 

It  has  been  said  of  Dr.  Home  that  so  rich  was  his 
conversation,  that  if  some  friend  had  followed  him 
about  with  pen  and  ink  to  note  down  his  sayings  and 
observations,  they  would  have  furnished  a  collection  as 
good  as  Boswell's  "  Life  of  Johnson,"  but  frequently 
of  a  superior  quality,  because  the  subjects  which  fell  in 
his  way  were  occasionally  of  a  higher  nature.  A  col- 
lection of  these  "  Aphorisms  and  Opinions  of  Dr. 
Home"  has  been  of  late  years  published.  Here  is  one 
anent  episcopacy  : 

"An   Italian  bishop,  who  had   endured   much   per- 


ON   THE   HISTORY    OF    EPISCOPACY.  139 

secLition  with  a  calm,  unruffled  temper,  was  asked  by 
a  friend  how  he  attained  to  such  a  mastery  of  himself? 
'  By  making  a  right  use  of  my  eyes,'  said  he ;  '  I  first 
look  up  to  heaven  as  the  place  where  I  am  going  to 
live  for  ever ;  I  next  look  down  upon  earth,  and  con- 
sider how  small  a  space  of  it  will  soon  be  all  that  I 
can  occupy  or  want ;  I  then  look  round  me,  and  think 
how  many  are  far  more  wretched  than  I  am.'  " 

So  rapid  is  the  flight  of  the  ages,  so  few  are  the 
necessary  links  that  connect  generation  to  generation, 
that  we  come  to  the  prelates  who  have  passed  away 
during  the  present  happily  prolonged  reign. 


140 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  EMINENT  PRELATES  OF  THE  EEIGN. 

WHEN  Her  Gracious  Majesty  ascended  the  throne 
the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  was  the  mild  silver- 
voiced  Howley.  He  was  a  retiring,  gentle-minded 
man,  whose  episcopacy  has  been  looked  upon  as  a 
golden  age,  and  he  himself  regarded  as  the  patriarch 
of  the  time.  Old  Queen  Charlotte  and  two  Princesses 
had  attended  his  consecration  to  the  Bishopric  of  Lon- 
don in  ]813.  This  was  his  first  see  ;  for  the  first  time 
since  the  Restoration  an  immediate  appointment  was 
made  to  the  Metropolitan  See — the  precedent  has  been 
repeated  in  the  case  of  Dr.  Tait.  His  memory  carries 
us  back  to  the  times  that  are  now  historical.  His 
name  was  linked  with  the  private  history  of  the  royal 
family  and  many  great  transactions  of  the  reign.  He 
had  been  entrusted  with  the  education  of  the  young 
Prince  of  Orange,  when  the  plan  had  been  formed  that 
the  young  man,  subsequently  Prince  of  Orange,  should 
be  the  husband  of  the  Princess  Charlotte.  Again  and 
again  he  was  present  at  the  dying  beds  of  the  large 
family  of  King  George  and  Queen  Charlotte ;  he  bap- 
tised and  married  them,  he  performed  royal  funerals 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES    OP    TUE    REIGN.  141 

and  royal  coronations.  He  was  of  the  old  High  school, 
and  when  he  opposed  the  Catholic  Emancipation  Act 
he  did  so,  ''  dreading  the  designs  of  the  Papists  more 
than  the  consequences  which  might  result  from  a  re- 
fusal of  their  claims."  He  was  a  man  who  had  his 
private  sorrows  and  his  public  trials,  but  nothing  im- 
paired the  even  quietude  of  his  days  and  the  sweetness 
of  his  disposition.  He  lived  in  those  old  days  when 
the  Ecclesiastical  Commissioners  had  not  laid  hands 
on  the  revenues  of  the  see  of  Canterbury,  and  Dr. 
Howley  was  one  of  the  greatest  of  our  modern  prince 
bishops.  His  hand  was  open  as  the  day,  and  he  spent 
at  least  a  hundred  thousand  pounds  on  Lambeth  and 
on  Addington.  A  living  American  divine  recently  in 
this  country,  Dr.  Tyng,  of  New  York,  wrote  an  account, 
while  the  Archbishop  was  still  living,  of  an  interview 
which  he  had  with  him  : — 

"  The  Archbishop  crossed  the  room  to  meet  me, 
and  shaking  hands  with  me  in  a  very  cordial  manner, 
handed  me  a  chair  with  so  much  meekness  and  kind- 
ness of  manner  as  at  once  to  cast  off  all  reserve,  and 
make  me  feel  entirely  at  home  with  him.  The  distinct- 
ive traits  of  his  manner  and  appearance  are  meekness 
and  cheerfulness.  He  is  so  perfectly  unassuming ;  and 
I  was  unconsciously  detained  in  a  conversation  which 
1  might  have  reasonably  feared  would  have  been  an 
intrusion  in  a  perfect  stranger.  I  was  surprised,  con- 
sidering his  age,  station,  and  occupation,  at  the  know- 
ledge he  had  of  many  minute  and  subordinate  matters 
among  us.  There  was  a  remarkable  moderation  of 
sentiment  in  all  his  conversation,  and  nothing  which 
savoured  in  any  degree   of  an  encouragement  of  the 


142  OUR    EISHOPS   AND    DEANS, 

strange   doctrines    which    the   men    of    Oxford   have 
brought  into  the  Church." 

The  Times,  in  its  Memoir,  brought  the  Primate  into 
personal  relations  with  the  Queen.  "  He  had  baptised 
the  Queen  ;  he  had  solemnised  her  marriage ;  he  had 
placed  the  crown  npon  her  head ;  he  was  the  first 
ecclesiastic  in  the  realm,  and  when  it  appeared  to  him, 
as  well  as  to  other  distinguished  members  of  the  hier- 
archy, that  in  the  palace  of  the  Sovereign  Sunday  was 
observed  rather  in  accordance  with  the  gaiety  of  Con- 
tinental taste  than  with  the  quiet  reserve  of  English 
and  Protestant  habits,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  call  her 
Majesty's  attention  to  the  subject ;  and  it  has  been 
stated  that  more  than  once  during  the  Melbourne 
Ministry  he  respectfully  tendered  to  the  Crown  advice 
not  quite  in  accordance  with  the  wishes  of  those  who 
at  that  time  surrounded  our  youthful  and  inexperienced 
Sovereign.  Though  a  man  of  remarkably  mild  and  un- 
assuming manners,  he  was  by  no  means  deficient  in 
moral  courage,  nor  likely  to  be  deterred  by  any  set  of 
courtiers  from  discharging  a  duty  due  to  his  Sove- 
reign, or  to  the  Church  of  which  that  Sovereign  is  the 
head. 

We  pass   now  to   his  successor. 
Archbishop  Sumner.      John  Bird  Sumner.    He  was  a  man 

who  held  his  own  place  deep  in  the 
affections  of  the  great  Evangelical  party,  and  indeed 
of  all  sections  in  the  Church.  People  complained  at 
times  that  there  was  a  great  absence  of  state  in  the 
old  gentleman  who,  umbrella  in  hand,  would  come 
across  Westminster  Bridge  to  attend  to  his  business  at 
the  House  of  Lords.     But  when  that  good  grey  head 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  143 

was  at  last  laid  low,  there  was  none  that  did  not  offer 
a  tribute  of  veneration  and  regard  to  the  spotless 
memory  of  this  truly  Christian  bishop.  For  as  he 
himself  would  say,  he  did  not  for  himself  seek  this 
high  office;  he  took  it  as  God's  appointment;  he  be- 
sought the  prayers  of  Christians  that  he  might  be 
strengthened  in  its  faithful  discharge,  and  he  ever 
humbly  and  perseveringly  sought  to  approve  himself 
a  useful  minister  in  the  Church  of  Christ.  He  appears 
to  have  been  one  of  those  elevated  natures  whom  the 
searcliing  heat  of  prosperity  serves  but  to  purify,  so 
simple  and  unaffected  was  he  in  life,  so  pure  and 
fervent  in  faith,  so  apostolic  in  practice. 

His  father  was  the  Rev.  John  Sumner,  vicar  of 
Kenilworth  and  Stoneleigh,  in  the  county  of  Warwick, 
and  formerly  fellow  of  Eton  College.  His  mother  was 
the  daughter  of  a  Loudon  merchant,  a  venerable  lady, 
who  lived  to  see  two  of  her  sons  bishops,  and  who 
died  in  1846,  at  the  advanced  age  of  eighty-eight. 
For  generations  the  family  of  the  Sumners  had  been 
connected  with  Eton,  and  a  list  of  their  names  is 
carved  in  the  "  Lower  School  Passage."  More  than  a 
hundred  years  ago  now,  his  grandfather.  Dr.  Sumner, 
had  been  Head  Master  of  Eton.  John  Bird  Sumner 
was  sent  to  Eton  at  the  usual  age,  and  continued  there 
for  a  number  of  years.  In  1798,  he  proceeded  to 
Cambridge  as  scholar  of  King's  College,  the  post 
awarded  to  the  first  of  his  year  at  Eton  College.  Those 
were  the  old  days  of  the  Eton  Montem,  and  a  con- 
siderable sum  would  be  subscribed  for  the  benefit  of 
the  scholar  going  up  to  Cambridge.  That  beautiful 
college,  King's  College,  with  its  cathedral-like  chapel, 
and  stately  grounds  stretching  down  to  the  margin  of 


144  ODE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

the  Cam,  was  then  regarded  by  university  men  as  im- 
parting a  pecidiarly  happy  lot  to  its  inmates.  For  the 
scholars  became  fellows  as  a  matter  of  course,  without 
any  further  labour  and  competition,  and  in  due  time 
succeeded  to  the  enjoyment  of  other  advantages.  In 
the  year  1800,  Mr.  Sumner  obtained  one  of  the  few 
University  distinctions  then  open  to  undergraduates  of 
King's  College,  namely,  the  Brown  Gold  Medal  for  the 
best  Latin  ode,  "a  prize  once  considered  in  the  Uni- 
versity as  the  blue  riband  in  the  Latin  poetic  field." 
The  subjects  of  these  odes  frequently  bore  reference 
to  contemporary  political  events,  and  the  present  was 
an  instance  of  this.  Our  renowned  Duke  of  Welling- 
ton, then  Colonel  Wellesley,  had  recently  signalized 
himself  and  delighted  the  country  by  his  capture  of 
Seringapatam,  the  capital  of  Mysore,  in  which  the 
debased  and  faithless  tyrant  of  the  country,  Tippoo 
Saib,  fell.  The  subject  was  Tippoo's  death  (Mysore! 
Tyranni  Mors),  and  the  young  Latinist  descanted  on 
the  subject  in  a  tolerably  fair  imitation  of  Horace, 
characteristically  concluding  by  reminding  his  readers 
that  the  lowly  olive  branch  of  peace  might  be  fittingly 
blended  with  victorious  laurels.  In  1802  he  obtained 
the  Hulsean  prize,  and  the  same  year  took  his  degree 
of  B.A. 

The  year  following  he  was  nominated  Assistant 
Master  of  Eton  College,  and  thereupon  resigning 
his  fellowship,  he  married.  In  1810  he  produced 
his  first  public  work,  entitled,  "  Apostolical  Preaching, 
considered  in  an  examination  of  St.  Paul's  Epistles." 
This  work  has  goae  through  nine  editions,  and  has 
also  been  translated  into  the  French,  and  will  most 
probably  take  a  standard   place  in  the  library  of  the- 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF   THE    EEIGN.  145 

ology.     On  the  title-page  of  the  book  he  took  as  his 
motto  the  Hues  of  Cowper  : — 

"  Would  I  describe  a  preacher  sucli  as  Paul, 
Were  he  on  earth,  would  hear,  approve,  and  own, 
Paul  should  himself  direct  me." 

Upon  this  lofty  exemplar — the  apostolical  preaching 
of  St.  Paul — the  good  Archbishop  always  sought  to 
model  his  own  religious  teaching.  In  1815,  according 
to  the  will  of  Mr.  John  Burnett,  of  Deas,  Aberdeen- 
shire, £]  ,200  was  given  as  a  first  prize,  and  £400  as  a 
second  prize  for  the  best  treatises  on  *' The  Evi- 
dences." Such  treatises  were  to  show  forth  "  the 
evidence  that  there  is  a  Being  all-powerful,  wise,  and 
good,  by  whom  everything  exists,"  and  should  seek  to 
"  obviate  difficulties  regarding  his  wisdom  and  good- 
ness." The  first  prize  was  obtained  by  an  unknown 
Scottish  minister,  and  the  second  by  Mr.  Sumner.  In 
1817  he  pubhshed  this  under  the  title  of  "  A  Treatise 
on  the  Records  of  the  Creation,  and  on  the  Moral  At- 
tributes of  the  Creator."  He  especially  points  out  that 
Moses  could  not  have  invented  the  doctrine  he  taught, 
nor  yet  have  derived  it  from  the  Egyptians.  This  work 
has  been  thus  characterised  by  a  friendly  critic : — "  This 
treatise  of  Mr.  Sumner's  is  well  known  as  being  in 
advance  of  his  time  on  scientific  points  ;  and  no  less 
an  authority  than  Sir  Charles  Lyell  has  appealed  to  it 
to  show  that  revelation  and  geology  are  not  necessarily 
discordant.  It  has  gone  through  a  great  many  editions, 
and  is  a  most  masterly  performance,  the  one,  too,  on 
which  Mr.  Sumner's  fame  as  an  author  is  most  likely 
to  rest.  He  bases  his  evidence  on  the  credibility  of 
the  Mosaic  records ;  he  occupies  half  the  space  with 

VOL.   I.  L 


146  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

proofs  of  the  existence  of  a  God;  and  in  the  second 
and  third  part  discusses  with  much  scientific  ability 
the  attributes  of  God,  and  his  wisdom  and  goodness, 
with  their  influences  on  the  moral  and  political  con- 
dition of  mankind." 

Many  eminent  men,  including  several  Cabinet 
Ministers,  were  in  his  house  while  he  was  one  of 
the  masters  at  Eton.  In  1817  he  obtained  the  com- 
parative leisure  of  an  Eton  fellowship,  and  it  became 
part  of  his  duty  to  preach  to  the  boys.  We  can  well 
imagine  the  affectionate  earnestness  with  which  he 
would  address  his  peculiar  auditory  in  the  bright 
morning  of  their  youth. 

In  1818  he  succeeded  to  the  valuable  Eton  living  of 
Mapledurham,  near  Reading,  and  in  the  county  of 
Oxford.  The  next  year  a  still  higher  distinction  was 
bestowed  on  him.  Dr.  Shute  Barrington,  the  Bishop 
of  Durham,  a  man  of  great  virtues  and  abilities,  and 
also  a  great  discerner  and  rewarder  of  literary  merit, 
gave  him  a  prebendaryship,  and  the  next  year  one  of 
the  "  golden  stalls"  of  Durham,  which  last  he  retained 
till  his  elevation  to  the  Primacy.  In  1821  Mr.  Sumner 
published  his  "  Sermons  on  the  Christian  Faith  and 
Character,"  which  he  dedicated,  as  a  mark  of  gratitude, 
■  to  Bishop  Barrington,  a  work  which  has  been  over  and 
over  again  reprinted.  Many  of  these  sermons  had 
been  preached  in  the  chapel  of  Eton  College,  and  must 
have  been  equally  beneficial  to  masters  and  boys.  In 
1824  he  published  an  important  work  on  the  "  Evi- 
dence of  Christianity  derived  from  its  Nature  and 
Reception." 

In  1825,  Mr.  Sumner  preached  the  anniversary  ser- 
mon for  the   Church  Missionary  Society.     "  We  well 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    EEIGN.  147 

remember,"  says  a  certain  writer,  "  that  tlais  was  called 
a  very  bold  step.  Bishops  and  great  men  did  not  at 
that  time  favour  the  Society.  John  Sumner,  it  was 
said,  might  have  looked  for  preferment,  but  noiv  he 
could  never  rise ;  it  was  great  self-denial,  it  was 
added,  in  him  to  have  so  committed  himself."  On  the 
21st  of  May,  1826,  he  preached  another  memorable 
sermon.  This  was  on  the  consecration  of  his  younger 
brother,  Charles  Richard  Sumner,  ten  years  his  junior, 
to  the  Bishopric  of  Llandaff. 

In  1828  his  brother,  the  Bishop  of  Llandaff,  was 
translated  to  the  Bishopric  of  Winchester.     The  same 
year  the  Government  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington  and 
Sir    Robert     Peel     appointed     John     Bird     Sumner 
to  the  Bishopric  of  Chester.     The  conge  d^elire  was 
issued  Aug.  5,  1828.     The  Chester  local  paper  (the 
"  Courant")  described  their  new  prelate  as  "  a  most 
amiable  man,  with  a  strong  bias  in  favour  of  those 
doctrines  called  Evangelical,  and  consequently  a  friend, 
and  it  may  be  a  patron,  of  Bible  and  Missionary  So- 
cieties."    He  was  consecrated  at  Bishopsthorpe,  near 
York,  September  13th,  and  enthroned  by  proxy  the 
following  November.     It  was  a  time  of  great  religious 
excitement  on  the  Roman  Catholic  question,  and  the 
good  Bishop  took  great  pains  to  disentangle  what  was 
religious  from  what  was  purely  political  in  these  dis- 
cussions.     He    addressed    a   letter  to    his    clergy    in 
which  he   endeavoured   to    calm    the    apprehensions 
which     many    good    people    then    entertained    res- 
pecting the  Emancipation  Act.     "What,"  he  asked, 
"  could  even   fifty  Romanists   do  to  hurt  the  Church 
against    six   hundred     Protestants  ?    Let   them    hope 
charitably  of  the  Romanists.    The  condition  of  Ireland 


L  2 


148  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

was  deplorable.  The  upper  class,  tlie  Protestant 
minority,  were  endeavouring  to  keep  down  the  lower. 
What  idea  of  Protestant  truth  was  conveyed  to  the 
Roman  Catholics  by  the  favourite  phrase  "  Protestant 
ascendancy  ?'  Protestants  mistook  party  feelings  for 
religious  zeal,  and  when  Orangeism  was  too  much 
accustomed  to  pass  for  Christianity,  who  could  won- 
der if  Protestantism  was  generally  confounded  with 
Orangeism  ?" 

The  diocese  over  which  the  new  Bishop  was  called 
to  preside  was  one  of  enormous  area.  It  extended 
over  the  whole  of  Cheshire,  a  great  part  of  Lancashire, 
and  even  reached  into  Wales.  His  labours  and  re- 
sponsibilities were  enormous.  The  state  of  spiritual 
destitution  among  the  teeming  manufacturing  popula- 
tion was  appalling.  Although  his  predecessor,  Bishop 
Blomfield,  had  worked  with  herculean  energy,  com- 
paratively little  impression  was  made  upon  the  enor- 
mous mass.  For  twenty  years  Bishop  Sumner  proved 
himself  a  preaching  and  a  working  bishop.  His  energy, 
activity,  and  zeal  were  everywhere  felt  throughout 
his  vast  diocese.  He  consecrated,  it  is  said,  more 
than  two  hundred  churches  in  the  course  of  his 
Chester  episcopate.  So  great  were  his  labours  that 
Sir  Robert  Peel  in  memorable  language  alluded  to 
them  in  the  House  of  Commons.  Having  eulogized 
the  labours  of  the  Bishop  of  Ripon  (the  new  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury)  he  added,  "Here  also  it  would 
not  be  just  were  I  not  to  express  in  the  strongest 
terms  my  admiration  of  the  conduct  of  the  Bishop  of 
Chester,  who  has  effected  so  much  improvement  in 
the  diocese  which  has  the  fortune  to  be  under  his 
charge,  and  to  witness  his  example.     It  is  impossible 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  149 

for  any  one  to  read  tlie  charge  of  tlie  Bishop  of 
Chester  without  entertaining  sentiments  of  the  deepest 
respect  for  that  venerable  prelate." 

Early  in  1848  Archbishop  Howley  died.  It  was 
known  at  the  time  that  the  Premier,  Lord  John 
Kussell,  hesitated  in  his  selection  of  a  successor  be- 
tween the  Bishop  of  Chester  and  Dr.  Lonsdale,  the 
late  Bishop  of  Lichfield.  His  resolution  was  soon 
taken.  On  the  15th  of  February,  Bishop  Sumner 
received  a  royal  message  to  go  up  to  London  at  once. 
On  Friday,  the  10th  of  March,  he  was  confirmed  at 
Bow  Church,  Cheapside.  As  he  was  leaving  the 
church  after  the  service,  and  passing  through  the 
crowd,  a  stranger  emphatically  exclaimed,  though  in  a 
low  tone,  "  God  bless  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  !" 
His  Grace  immediately  paused,  and  said  in  a  most 
impressive  manner,  "  I  thank  you ;  I  indeed  need  all 
your  prayers."  He  was  the  nineteenth  Archbishop, 
the  see  being  founded  a.d.  596,  "  by  Divine  provi- 
dence," the  style  of  all  other  prelates  being  "  by 
Divine  permission."  We  may  add  that  in  two  other 
instances,  and  in  only  two  others,  have  two  brothers 
been  respectively  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  suf- 
fragan bishop.  In  the  time  of  James  I.  the  two  Abbotts 
were  respectively  of  Canterbury  and  Sahsbury ;  and 
in  the  twelfth  century  Radulphus  and  Saffredus,  of 
Canterbury  and  Chichester.  In  no  other  cases  have 
two  brothers  been  bishops  at  the  same  time,  in  the 
course  of  English  history. 

In  his  primary  charge  to  the  clergy  of  the  diocese 
of  Canterbury  he  feelingly  alluded  to  his  own  advanced 
age,  in  speaking  of  the  character,  courtesy,  and  wisdom 
of  his  predecessor.     "  Nothing  remains  for  me  except 


150  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

to  endeavour  that,  during  the  much  shorter  career  that 
I  can  expect  to  run,  1  may  act  in  the  same  spirit,  and 
acquire  the  same  confidence  of  the  clergy  over  whom  I 
am  placed,  by  a  faithful  attention  to  the  great  interests 
which  we  are  all  concerned  to  maintain."     As  primate 
of  all  England  and  metropolitan,  he  showed  the  same 
qualities  which  shone  so  brightly  in  his  long  episco- 
pate at  Chester.     During  his  primacy  some  remark- 
able events  occurred  that  caused  much  trouble  and 
discussion  in  the  Church  of  England;  and  though  the 
Archbishop    was   not   remarkable   for  really   brilliant 
talents,  or  really  deep  learning,  he  had  more  success 
than  could  have  been  hoped  for  with  more  able  men. 
His  calmness  and  gentleness  invariably  tranquillized 
the    surrounding   atmosphere.      His   meek  and   holy 
demeanour    everywhere    conciliated ;    and  during  his 
time  Lambeth  Palace  was  utterly  divested  of  all  the 
unbecoming  state  and  sumptuous  splendour  by  which 
at  one  time  it  was  surrounded. 

The  speeches  of  the  venerable  prelate  in  the  House 
of  Lords  would  well  repay  a  careful  perusal.  To  the 
dexterity  of  the  debater  he  made  no  pretence,  and 
would  probably  consider  that  sucH  was  unworthy  of 
his  character  and  office.  Still  less  were  they  con- 
cerned with  any  personal  or  political  object.  But 
they  show  no  ordinary  amount  of  experience,  sagacity, 
moderation,  and  holiness,  such  as  went  far  to  dignify 
the  debates  in  the  House  of  Lords  in  which  he  took 
part,  and  commanded  the  instinctive  respect  of  all  who 
heard  him.  We  may  give  a  quotation  or  two  from 
these  speeches.  Thus  wisely  he  speaks  in  advocating 
the  omission  of  the  political  services  in  the  Prayer- 
Book  of  the  Church  of  England.     After  speaking  of 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP    THE    PvEIGN.  151 

the  duty  of  a  nation's  acknowledgment  of  events  of 
great  importance  to  tlie  national  weal,  he  proceeds 
thus : — 

"  The  providential  discovery  of  a  plot  which  might 
have  endangered  our  Protestant  confession,  the  res- 
toration of  legitimate  government,  the  establishment 
of  a  free  constitution, — all  these  were  events  which 
could  not  fail  to  rouse  the  strongest  emotions  of  which 
the  mind  is  capable.  You  cannot  be  surprised  if 
prayers  and  thanksgivings  composed  under  such  cir- 
cumstances partook  of  the  feelings  of  the  times  and  of 
the  composers — if  they  were  not  only  vehement,  but 
IDassionate,  and  sometimes  savoured  of  politics  as 
much  as  of  religion.  I  hold  it  to  be  impossible,  even 
if  it  were  desirable,  that  we  at  distance  of  two  or  three 
centuries  should  entertain  the  feelings  or  sympathize 
with  the  expressions  which  are  found  in  those  services. 
It  is  very  inexpedient  that  the  people  should  be  invited 
to  offer  up  prayers  and  thanksgivings  in  which  their 
hearts  take  no  concern.  Praise  or  prayer  which  does 
not  issue  from  the  heart  is  mockery.  No  doubt  it  is 
from  this  conviction  that  those  services  have  fallen 
into  desuetude  ;  and  it  is  more  seemly  that  they 
should  be  regularly  abolished  than  irregularly  dis- 
regarded." 

When  the  Government  of  India  Bill  was  passing 
through  the  House  of  Lords,  the  good  Archbishop 
made  an  earnest  speech  in  reference  to  that  Mis- 
sionary cause  which  was  so  dear  to  his  heart : — 

"  Surely,  my  lords,  we  ought  to  look  forward  to  the 
time  when,  under  the  Providence  of  God,  India  shall 
form  no  exception  to  the  multitude  of  countries  in 
which  truth  has  prevailed  against  falsehood,  and  the 


152  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

gospel  has  triiimplied  over  idolatry  and  superstition  ; 
and  we  shall  know  why  a  remote  country  like  England 
should  have  been  allowed  to  have  dominion  over  the 
vast  territory  of  India." 

Again,  when  in  the  House  of  Lords  a  peer  attacked 
the  Exeter  Hall  services,  in  which  the  bishops  and 
others  bore  part,  the  Archbishop  said  he  would  only 
just  ask  whether  it  would  be  wise,  even  if  it  were 
possible,  to  check  these  innovations.  "  He  could  not 
imagine  that  any  greater  reproach  or  disparagement 
could  be  cast  upon  the  Church  than  to  suppose  it  was 
incapable  of  accommodating  itself  to  the  changing 
necessities  of  the  age,  or  allowed  its  dignity  to  inter- 
fere with  its  usefulness." 

One  more  appearance  in  the  House  of  Lords  ought 
to  be  mentioned.  In  1847,  when  he  appointed  one  of 
his  sons  to  a  prospective  registrarship  of  the  Preroga- 
tive Court,  His  Grace  clearly  showed  that,  on  the  doc- 
trine of  chances,  the  value  of  the  office  was  not  equal 
to  that  of  the  stamp  ;  and  Bishop  Tait  informed  the 
House,  that  when  the  most  lucrative  registrarship, 
worth  many  thousands  a  year,  became  vacant,  the 
Archbishop  gave  it  to  a  perfect  stranger,  on  condition 
that  he  personally  performed  the  duties  of  the  office. 
Might  it  not  have  been  better  if  the  two  prelates  had 
concurred  to  obtain  the  abolition  of  the  office,  or,  at 
all  events,  curtail  it  of  its  excessive,  unwholesome 
gains  r  We  have  heard  it  said  that  to  be  a  con- 
nection of  his  was  nearly  a  disqualification  for  pre- 
ferment. 

Nothing  can  be  conceived  more  pleasing  than  the 
private  life  of  the  Archbishop.  He  lived  in  the  quiet, 
frugal  manner  of  a  country  clergyman.    We  have  been 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES   OF   THE    EEIGN.  153 

told  that  lie  would  rise  early  in  the  morning,  light  his 
own  fire,  and  finish  his  important  correspondence 
before  breakfast.  Pomp  and  show  he  especially 
avoided  ;  with  a  princely  income,  always  appearing  a 
plain,  simple  man.  In  all  relations  of  life — son, 
father,  grandfather,  brother — he  was  tender,  affec- 
tionate, and  engaging.  He  used  to  take  the  chief  part 
in  the  quiet  family  services  in  Lambeth  Chapel.  On 
Sundays  he  was  generally  employed  in  pleading  for 
some  religious  or  charitable  cause.  One  Sunday  every 
month  he  was  accustomed  to  preach  in  the  morning  at 
the  parish  church  of  the  pretty  village  of  Bromley, 
Kent,  where  we  have  listened  to  his  simple  and  affec- 
tionate addresses.  He  baptized  all  the  junior  members 
of  the  royal  family,  and  confirmed  them  all ;  he  mar- 
ried the  Princess  Royal,  and  but  for  illness,  would 
have  married  the  Princess  Alice.  It  was  also  his  lot 
to  bury  the  Queen's  mother  and  the  Queen's  husband  ; 
and  it  is  understood  that,  on  more  than  one  occasion, 
his  presence  was  sought  and  welcomed  by  Her  Majesty 
and  the  Prince  Consort.  In  her  "  Sunny  Memories," 
Mrs.  Beech er  Stowe  relates  how,  in  1858,  the  Primate 
invited  her  to  breakfast  at  Lambeth,  and  on  that  occa- 
sion, for  the  first  time,  he  ascended  Lollards'  Tower  to 
amuse  his  visitor. 

One  of  his  last  labours  was  to  issue  a  new  edition 
of  his  work  on  the  "  Evidences  of  Christianity  derived 
from  its  Nature  and  Reception."  He  designed  this  as 
the  contribution  of  his  old  as^e  to  the  defence  of  the 
faith  against  the  innovating  flood  of  modern  doubt. 
The  design  was  occasioned  by  the  publication  of  the 
"  Essays  and  Reviews,"  and  the  work  is  throughout 
"  revised   with   reference    to    recent  objections."     It 


154  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

shows  abundant  evidence  of  carefulness  and  thouglit 
continued  to  ttie  very  last. 

Up  to  May,  1861,  the  Archbishop,  though  eighty, 
had  shown  few  of  the  symptoms  incident  to  so  ad- 
vanced an  age.  His  first  attack  then  occurred,  from 
which  he  speedily  recovered.  The  death  of  his 
youngest  daughter  proved  a  very  trying  affliction  to 
him.  He  bore  part  in  the  opening  of  the  Exhibition, 
beinof  the  commissioner  rankino;  next  to  the  Duke  of 
Cambridge,  and  it  is  understood  that  the  excitement 
was  too  much  for  so  aged  a  man.  Nevertheless,  up 
to  the  13th  of  August,  he  was  able  to  transact  busi- 
ness with  the  regularity  for  which  he  was  always  so 
remarkable ;  but  he  knew  his  days  were  numbered, 
and  in  calm,  childlike  faith  awaited  his  end. 

A  few  words  may  here  be  added  respecting  Arch- 
bishop Sumner's  brother,  the  retired  Bishop  of  Win- 
chester, who  has  so  lately  passed  away.  He  was  not 
one  of  those  prelates  who  by  the  force  of  character 
and  achievement  impress  their  name  upon  the  history 
of  their  Church  and  land.  His  great  title  to  distinc- 
tion is  this,  that,  as  one  of  the  first  five  prelates  of 
England,  he  once  sat  in  the  high  seat  once  held  by 
Lancelot  Andrewes.  Adopting  Shakspeare's  classifi- 
cation he  was  not  born  to  greatness,  neither  had 
he  achieved  greatness;  but  he  had  a  great  deal  of 
greatness,  with  very  gentle  violence,  forced  upon 
him.  He  was  not  one  of  those  prelates  whose  lustre  of 
character  and  renown  is  such  that  an  office,  however 
dignified,  only  imparts  an  adventitious  splendour  to 
their  names.  Dr.  Sumner,  if  he  had  not  been  Bishop 
of  Winchester,  would  have  held  a  very  modest  and 


THE    EMINENT    TEELATES    OF    THE    EETGN.  155 

unpretending  position  of  bis  own,   but   the  Bishopric 
of  Winchester  stands  for  a  very  great  deal.     In  this 
high  office,  he  appears  to  have  carefully  and  sedulously 
sought  to  fulfil  his   manifold  important  duties.     The 
needs  of  his  diocese  seemed  constantly  before  him,  and 
according  to  the  measure  of  his  power  he  sought  to 
supply   them.     It   is   perhaps    to   be   regretted    that 
while  Presbyterians  were  thankful  for  the   sympathy 
which  they  have  received  from  him,  and  he  was  will- 
ing to  act  in  conjunction  w^ith  Dissenters  and   others 
on  the  widest  possible  platform,    the  great    Church 
movement  in  this   country  received    from    him    only 
a  very   languid   measure    of  support.     Indeed,    both 
within  and  without  the  Jerusalem  Chamber,  he   was 
noted   for   his    steady   opposition   to    the  revival    of 
Convocation  and  the  synodal  action   of  the  Church. 
This  has  been,  perhaps,  the  most   marked  feature  of 
the  Bishop's  public  life.     We  should  refer,  however, 
to  the  annual  appearances  which  he  made  at  the  May 
Meetings  at  Exeter  Hall,  in  which  his  presence  might 
be  considered  to  impart  a  degree  of  solid  weight  to 
any  proceedings  in  which  he  participated.     In  private 
life   the  Bishop  was    a   pleasant  and  genial  English 
clergyman  and  gentleman,  whose  extreme  urbanity  of 
speech  and  manner,  which  was  carried  to  a  proverbial 
degree  of  polish,  would  be  flattering  to  all  his  curates, 
if  not  rather  delusive  to  some  of  them.     His  private 
tastes  were  so  admirably  carried  out,  that  they  would 
reflect  credit  on  any  private  individual.     He   was  a 
keen  floriculturist  and   orchid  grower,  his  conserva- 
tories were  splendid,  and  we  understand  that  he  was 
quite  an  authority  on  ferns  and  tropical  plants.     These 
pleasant   tastes  were  not  allowed    to    interfere  with 


156  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

those  higher  duties,  to  which  they  furnished  a  graceful 
relaxation. 

During  the  Bishop's  life  there  was  a  curious  story 
constantly  whispered  respecting  the  origin  of  his 
fortunes,  which  was  openly  told  in  the  newspapers 
after  his  death,  with  a  great  deal  of  inaccuracy  and 
exaggeration.  The  story  was,  that  he  saved  a  noble 
pupil  from  a  mesalliance  with  a  foreign  young  lady  by 
the  simple  process  of  marrying  her  himself.  In  grati- 
tude, the  husband  of  Mile.  Maunoir  was  introduced 
to  court  by  the  powerful  Marchioness  of  Conyngham, 
"who  lived  a  life  of  scandal,  and  died  in  the  odour  of 
sanctity,  and  was  thus  started  on  his  episcopal  career. 
A  somewhat  cruel  publicity  was  given  to  supposed 
facts  which  in  reality  rest  only  on  the  thinnest  founda- 
tion. It  does  not  appear  that  the  young  nobleman  in 
question.  Lord  Mount-Charles,  then  little  more  than 
a  boy,  was  ever  attached  to  the  young  Swiss  lady,  or 
that  Lady  Conyngham  had  ever  promised  him  that  if 
he  would  solve  the  difficulty  by  marrying  the  young 
lady  himself,  his  future  interests  should  not  be  dis- 
res^arded  or  forgotten.  Sir  John  Coleridgfe  has  stated 
that  he  himself  was  at  Geneva  in  1816.  It  is  just 
half  a  century  since  this  little  bit  of  ecclesiastical 
romance  happened,  and  it  was  he  who  gave  the  in- 
troduction to  the  Maunoirs.  The  parents  of  the 
pupil  were  in  fact  somewhat  annoyed  by  the  derange- 
ment of  their  plans  consequent  on  the  engagement 
and  marriage  of  their  tutor.  So  far  from  any  promo- 
tion being  given  in  consequence,  Mr.  Sumner,  after 
holding  a  ministerial  charge  at  Geneva,  continued  for 
five  years  in  the  modest  position  of  a  curate  taking 
pupils.      One  of  those  pupils  was  a  brother  of  Lord 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF   THE    REIGN.  157 

Mount-Cbarles ;  another  was  Frederick  Oakley,  who 
says  in  the  Times  that  he  kept  up  a  constant  personal 
and  epistolary  intercourse  with  him  till  it  was  be- 
coming more  or  less  interrupted  by  his  secession  to 
Rome.  The  original  story,  if  correct,  would  have  left 
a  slur  on  the  late  Bishop  which  all  good  Anglicans 
will  rejoice  to  find  removed.  In  1821  Mr.  Sumner 
visited  the  Conynghams  at  Brighton,  and  was  intro- 
duced to  the  King.  George  the  Fourth  wished  to 
appoint  him  a  Canon  of  Windsor,  but  Lord  Liver- 
pool refused  to  ratify  the  appointment.  The  refusal 
had  nothing  to  do  with  any  gossip  or  ill-natured  re- 
port, but  it  struck  the  Prime  Minister  as  an  ano- 
malous thing  that  a  curate  should  be  promoted  to  a 
canonry.  It  might  be  difiicult  to  arrange  precedent 
between  a  canon-curate  and  his  incumbent.  The 
Premier  stated  that  something  of  this  kind  was  his 
only  objection,  but  that  he  would  recommend  him  for 
preferment  as  soon  as  there  was  an  an  opening.  He 
was  accordingly  soon  preferred  to  the  living  of  Abing- 
don and  a  stall  at  Worcester.  Five  years  later  he 
was  made  Bishop  of  Llandaff,  a  see  whose  scanty  in- 
come was  eked  out  by  the  Deanery  of  St.  Paul's.  The 
new  Bishop  expressed  his  grave  disapproval  of  the 
pernicious  custom  of  translations,  at  the  present  time 
almost  abolished  by  Act  of  Parliament.  Within  a 
twelvemonth  he  was  himself  translated.  Dr.  Pretv- 
raan-Toulman — for  under  a  double  name  does  this 
choice  constellation  shine — passed  away  gorged  with 
the  spoils  of  Lincoln  and  Worcester.  A  late  Cabinet 
Minister  used  to  tell  the  story  that  when  the  news 
arrived  the  King  exclaimed,  "  This  will  please  the  Mar- 
chioness."    And  so  Charles   Sumner  passed  to  the  see 


158  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

considered,  we  believe  inaccurately,  the  richest  in 
England,  certainly  with  the  most  splendid  palace  and 
deer-park,  which  he  held  for  forty  years. 

The  early  ministerial  connection  of  the  Bishop  with 
Geneva  it  was  his  good  fortune  to  renew  in  advanced 
life.     At  the  present  day,  every  great  town  and  water- 
ing-place  of  the  Continent  has  its   English  minister 
and  its  English  congregation.     The   Continental  and 
Colonial  Church   Society  has  led   the    way,   but   the 
venerable  Society  for  the   Propagation  of  the  Gospel 
is  following,  as  is  most  necessary,  in  the  same  direc- 
tion, but  with  unequal  steps.     Things  were  very  dif- 
ferent in  the  year  1814,  when  the  long  wars  of  Na- 
poleon had  hardly  ceased,  and  the  thunders  of  Waterloo 
were  brooding  in  the  distance.      Then  it   was   that 
Charles  Sumner  had  first  gathered  together  one  of  the 
earliest  congregations    of   the    Continental  English. 
In   1853,  a  beautiful  little   church,  familiar  to  very 
many,  especially  by  the  disgraceful  episode  of  the  per- 
secution of  its  last  minister,  was  opened  in  Geneva, 
on  land  granted  by  the  Swiss  Government,  the  site  of 
former  fortifications.     In  1853  the  church  was  conse- 
crated and  opened  by  the  Bishop  of  Winchester,  who 
also  opened  the  neat  little  church  at  Chamouni.     On 
this  occasion  an  entertainment  was  given  to  the  Bishop 
by  the  committee,  and  the  pastors  of  the  Swiss  Church 
sympathised  and  coalesced  with  the  Bishop,  and  re- 
minded him  of  his   early  connection  with  this  town. 
But  there  was  that  in  all  this  which  must   occasion 
grave  regret.     Was  the  Bishop   aware  of  the  tainted 
character  of  the  Church   of  these  pastors  ?     Did  he 
not  know  that  the  most  illustrious  divines  of  Switzer- 
land, such  men  as  Merle  D'Aubigny,  and  Gausseu,  and 


THE   EMINENT   PKELATES    OE   THE    REIGN.  159 

Csesar  Malan  had  left  that  Cliurcli  on  no  light  pretext, 
but  on  account  of  its  Arian  character  ?  Is  it  true,  as 
stated  at  the  time,  that  he  was  informed  of  this 
serious  matter,  and  therefore  knew  that  there  was  no 
real  union  at  Geneva,  and  that  the  best  and  holiest  of 
the  clergy  had  conscientiously  absented  themselves 
from  this  gathering  ?  We  quote  a  few  remarks  which 
have  a  sort  of  autobiographic  interest :  "  What,  then, 
must  be  my  feelings  when,  after  a  period  of  thirty- 
eight  years,  I  am  again,  under  such  peculiar  and  ex- 
citing circumstances,  in  the  scene  of  my  former  labours, 
in  the  place  where  I  first  entered  upon  my  public 
ministry  ?  It  causes  me  feelings  of  joy  and  humilia- 
tion— of  joy  at  being  again  in  scenes  of  so  much  inte- 
rest to  me  at  such  a  happy  moment,  of  humiliation 
because  I  fear  that  in  my  first  ministry  I  may  not  have 
done  all  the  good  which  I  might  have  efi*ected.  It  is 
pleasing  to  recollect  that  amongst  our  old  reformers 
who  were  in  this  city,  and  in  other  parts  of  Switzer- 
land and  on  the  Continent,  there  was  unity  of  feeling 
on  all  the  great  points  of  faith  which  characterise  our 
rehgion."  The  Bishop  quite  ignored  the  fact  that  the 
want  of  this  unity  was  notorious  at  the  time  when  he 
was  speaking. 

We  have  no  occasion  to  discuss  the  Bishop  of  Win- 
chester as  an  author,  as  he  can  hardly  be  said  to  have 
appeared  in  tliat  character.  In  the  vigorous,  intel- 
lectual literature  of  the  Church  of  England  he  has 
borne  no  part.  In  the  House  of  Lords  he  hardly 
ever  spoke.  It  is  unnecessary  to  quote  from  his 
sermons,  and  one  or  two  other  publications 
of  the  sermon  kind.  In  dedicating  these  to  the 
King  he  begged  to  "  avail  myself  of  this  opportunity 


160  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

to  express  my  gratitude  for  Your  Majesty's  gracious 
protection  and  condescending  kindness  towards  me." 
He  had  become  domestic  chaplain  to  the  King  after  his 
brief  tenure  of  the  vicarage  of  St.  Helen's,  Abingdon. 
It  was  while  he  was  connected  with  Windsor  Castle 
that  the  event  occurred  which,  by  a  solitary  link,  con- 
nects his  name  with  the  general  course  of  English 
literature.  This  was  the  editing  of  that  recovered 
manuscript  of  Milton's,  on  which  young  Macaulay  of 
Trinity  founded  his  first  splendid  contribution  to  the 
"  Edinburgh  Review."  The  circumstances  are  related 
in  the  first  paragraph  of  that  brilliant  series  of  essays 
which  has  became  a  locus  classicus.  Among  the  archives 
of  the  State  Paper  Office  was  discovered  Milton's  lost 
treatise  on  the  "  Doctrines  of  Christianity,"  which  he 
is  known  to  have  completed  after  the  Restoration,  and 
to  have  entrusted  to  his  friend  Cyriac  Skinner.  How 
it  found  its  way  to  its  ultimate  resting-place  can  only 
be  conjectured,  George  IV.  entrusted  the  editing  of 
this  precious  document  to  his  domestic  chaplain.  "  Mr. 
Sumner,"  writes  Macaulay,  "  who  was  commanded  by 
His  Majesty  to  edit  and  translate  the  treatise,  has 
acquitted  himself  of  his  task  in  a  manner  honourable 
to  his  talents  and  his  character.  His  version,  indeed, 
is  not  very  easy  or  elegant ;  but  it  is  entitled  to  the 
praise  of  clearness  and  fidelity.  His  notes  abound 
with  interesting  quotations,  and  have  the  rare  merit  of 
really  elucidating  the  text.  The  preface  is  evidently 
the  work  of  a  sensible  and  candid  man,  firm  in  his 
own  religious  opinions,  and  tolerant  towards  those  of 
others."  It  is  singular  that  the  retired  Bishop  of 
"Winchester  should  thus  have  been  connected  with 
those  great  names  in  English  literature,  Milton  and 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES   OF    THE    REIGN.  161 

Macaulay.  In  ages  far  distant,  when  Bisbop  Sumner's 
name  is  utterly  forgotten,  save  for  its  casual  mention 
on  the  roll  of  the  Bishops  of  Winchester,  Macaulay's 
brief  sentence  will  be  a  voucher  to  posterity  of  the 
honourable  repute  in  which  the  first  editor  of  Milton's 
lost  work  was  held. 

Dr.   Longley  was  not  a  man  in- 
Archbishop  Longley.     ^^^^  ^j-^^  ^    ^      Conspicuous  action 

THE   THIRD   PRIMATE   OF  i    -t  i  i  ■  i 

THE  REIGN.  ^^  ability  has  won  a  place  m  the 

annals   of  this   country.      He    was 
not  an  author,  like  some  of  our  prelates  ;   or  a  great 
orator  as  others,  although  his  pulpit  addresses — ear- 
nest, affectionate,  and  simple — achieved  the  chief  ends 
of  sacred  oratory ;  neither  has  he  specially  identified 
himself  with  any   of  the   great   practical  movements 
of  the  age,   although,  at  the  same  time,    Dr.  Bicker- 
steth,    his     successor    in    the     see    of    Ripon,     has 
given    an    account  of  various   great   services    which 
Dr.  Longley  rendered  to  the  diocese.     But   he  always 
performed     his     laborious    duties    with    the    utmost 
care  and  assiduity.     His  father  was  one   of  the  police 
magistrates    of    London.      The     son    went    up    from 
Westminster   School  to   Christ  Church,   Oxford,  as  a 
student  on    the   foundation.     In    his    quiet   scholarly 
career  he  achieved  the  best  honours  which  could  be  ob- 
tained at  the  University,  and  in  due  time  took  his  post 
in  the  cycle  of  college   and  university  honours.     He 
became  tutor  and  senior  censor  of  Christ  Church,  and 
his  portrait  is  a  conspicuous   ornament  in  the  great 
hall.     He  was  ordained  by  the  then  Bishop  of  Oxford, 
and  like  various  other  tutors  of  Christ  Church,  he  pre- 
sently became  perpetual  curate  of  Cowley,  in   the  im- 

VOL.  I.  M 


162  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

mediate  neisjlibourhood  of  Oxford.  He  was  afterwards 
appointed  Wliitehall  preacher.  For  a  single  year  he 
held  the  living  of  West  Tytherley.  In  ]  829  he  ob- 
tained the  dignified  and  influential  office  of  head  master 
of  Harrow. 

In  1836  the  new  diocese  of  Ripon  was  formed,  and 
Dr.  Longley  was  consecrated  its  first  bishop.    In  Mrs. 
Gaskell's  "  Life  of  Charlotte  Bronte,"  we  find  a  letter 
from  the  popular  authoress,  in  which   she  describes  a 
visit  paid  by  Bishop  Longley  to  her  father's  modest 
little  parsonage  of  Haworth.     "  The  Bishop  has  been, 
and  is  gone,"  writes  Charlotte  Bronte.     "  He  is  cer- 
tainly a  most  charming  bishop  ;  the  most  benignant 
gentleman  that  ever  put  on  lawn  sleeves ;  yet  stately 
too,  and  competent  to  check  encroachments."     Then 
we  have  a  glimpse  at  the  unavoidable  state  of  a  country 
parsonage  at  such  a  bewildering  event  as  a  visit  from 
a  Bishop.     "It  is  very   well  to  talk   of  receiving  a 
bishop  without  trouble,  but  you  must  prepare  for  him. 
The  house  was  a  good  deal  put  out  of  its   way,  as  you 
may  suppose.     All   passed,  however,  quietly,  orderly, 
and  well.     Martha  waited  very  nicely,  and  I  had  a 
person  to  help  her  in  the  kitchen.     Papa  kept  up,  too, 
fully  as  well  as  I  expected,  though  I  doubt  whether  he 
could  have  borne  another  day  of  it."     Mrs.  Gaskell 
adds,  apparently  from  a  communication  received  from 
the  Bishop,  that  Dr.  Longley  was  agreeably  impressed 
with  the  gentle   unassuming  manners  of  his  hostess, 
and  with  the  perfect  propriety  and  consistency  of  the 
arrangements  in  the  modest  household. 

The  new  diocese  of  Ripon  was  one  of  a  peculiar 
character,  and  requiring  special  energy  and  pains.  It 
would  present  a  striking  contrast  to  the  scholarly  at- 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP    THE    REIGN.  1G3 

mosphere,  quiet  and  subdued,  of  Harrow  and  Oxford. 
The  dense  population  engaged  in  mining  and  manufac- 
turing ;  the  thinly  scattered  hamlets  on  hills  and 
wolds  ;  the  hard-headed,  hard-handed  character  of  the 
people;  the  rapid  development  of  the  resources  and 
industries  of  the  country,  were  all  circumstances  that 
would  render  the  first  Episcopate  peculiarly  arduous 
and  anxious  work.  "  His  services,"  writes  a  friend 
who  is  in  a  condition  to  speak  with  peculiar  authority, 
"  great  and  valuable  as  they  have  been  to  the  diocese 
of  E^ipon,  were  far  more  appreciable  when  they  were 
rendered,  nearly  thirty  years  ago,  than  they  would  be 
now.  His  Work  can  hardly  be  described  in  a  mere 
narrative  of  acts  such  as  are  in  the  present  age  fami- 
liarized to  us  in  the  practice  of  the  majority  of  the 
dioceses  of  England.  None  but  those  who  witnessed 
his  labours  can  really  measure  the  amount  of  toil,  and 
courage,  and  wisdom,  and  administrative  talent  which 
was  required  to  carry  them  to  a  successful  issue."  A 
very  remarkable  episode  occurred  during  his  Episco- 
pate, in  the  matter  of  St.  Saviour's,  Leeds.  There 
were  a  number  of  Romish  practices  at  this  church,  to 
which  the  Bishop  was  steadily  opposed,  and  he  refused 
to  consecrate  the  church  until  an  alteration  was  made. 
Although  there  was  at  first  a  formal  compliance  with 
the  Bishop's  wishes,  yet  subsequently  a  system  of  dis- 
ingenuous evasion  was  adopted,  and  the  Bishop  was 
compelled  to  say  "  that  their  study  seemed  to  be  how 
far  they  could  evade  their  bishop's  known  wishes  with- 
out violating  the  letter  of  the  law.  .  .  .  Exemplary 
conduct  cannot  blind  me  to  the  peril  of  the  course 
they  have  been  pursuing.  Again  and  again  have  I 
warned  them  of  its  probable  issue,  but  in  vain.     I  de- 

M   2 


164  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

plored  tlieir  infatuatioD,  and  the  consequences  which  I 
knew  must  ensue  from  their  self-will  and  insubordina- 
tion; and  I  can,  with  truth,  say  that  the  execution  of 
these  acts  of  necessary  discipline  has  cost  me  more 
pain  than  any  I  have  ever  been  called  upon  to  exercise." 
The  worst  fears  of  the  Bishop  were  realized  by  the 
fact  that  the  incumbent  and  four  of  the  clergy  of  St, 
Saviour's,  Leeds,  went  over  to  the  church  of  Rome. 

Another  case,  which  occurred  in  the  diocese  of 
E-ipon,  where  the  Bishop  refused  ordination  to  one  of 
the  candidates,  excited  a  good  deal  of  public  attention 
at  the  time.  Some  of  the  clergy  addressed  a  remon- 
strance to  him  on  the  subject.  Opinions  will  always 
differ  on  the  point  raised,  but  no  one  can  peruse  Dr. 
Longley's  language  without  being  strongly  impressed 
with  his  earnestness  and  sincerity.  The  expression  of 
his  personal  feelings  has  a  strong  autobiographical 
interest. 

"  I  have  long  enough  gone  in  and  out  among  you  to 
justify  my  appeals  to  your  convictions  that  it  is  from 
no  love  of  power  and  its  exercise,  but  from  a  stern  and 
imperative  sense  of  duty  alone,  that  I  have  acted  as  I 
have  done  in  the  case  on  which  you  have  addressed 
me.  I  felt  that  a  solemn  responsibility  rested  upon 
me,  from  which  I  had  not  been  absolved,  and  that  I 
was  bound  to  execute  it  as  in  the  sight  of  God  and  of 
his  church.  I  could,  indeed,  have  been  well  content 
to  have  still  pursued  that  tranquil  course  which  it  has 
pleased  God  to  permit  me  for  so  many  years  to  tread, 
'  studying  to  be  quiet  and  to  do  my  own  business'  in 
this  remote  part  of  the  kingdom  without  attracting 
notoriety ;  but  tranquillity  may  be  purchased  at  too 
dear  a  price,  if  it   be  at  the   sacrifice  of  one's  own 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  ]  G5 

intimate  convictions,  and  I  can  truly  say  that  I  would 
rather  forego  all  the  worldly  advantages  with  which 
Providence  has  so  richly  blessed  me,  and  begin  life 
again  at  the  age  of  nearly  three-score  years,  than  T 
would  bear  in  my  bosom  to  the  grave  during  the  few 
remaining  years  of  my  life  the  corroding  consciousness 
that,  through  favour  or  affection  towards  some,  or 
through  fear  of  others,  I  had  ever,  knowingly,  dealt 
unrighteous  judgment." 

When  Dr.  Longley  thus  wrote,  he  could  little  have 
anticipated  that  he  would  be  called  to  the  charge  of 
three  successive  dioceses.  For  many  years  he  con- 
tinued in  the  comparative  retirement  of  Ripon  Palace, 
close  to  the  shades  of  Studley  Park  and  the  beautiful 
scenery  of  Fountains  Abbey.  He  worked  hard,  espe- 
cially in  the  direction  of  church  extension,  and  a 
diocesan  fund,  raised  for  this  object,  is  still  called 
Bishop  Longley's  Fund.  Subsequently  he  was  pro- 
moted to  another  northern  diocese,  that  of  Durham, 
and  subsequently  to  York,  the  Archiepiscopate  of  the 
north.  His  experience  and  authority  on  the  religious 
state  of  the  north  were  now  necessarily  of  the  amplest 
and  most  extended  character.  As  Archbishop  of  York 
he  continued  his  career  of  diligent  supervision  and 
care.  On  one  occasion  we  recollect  his  visiting  a  con- 
demned murderer  at  York  Castle,  and  the  earnest- 
ness of  his  ministrations  with  the  wretched  criminal. 
When  the  lamented  death  of  the  venerable  Archbishop 
Sumner  occurred,  in  1862,  he  went  up  one  more  step  in 
Episcopal  rank,  and  became  Primate  of  All  England. 

In  the  Archbishopric  of  Canterbury  the  details  of 
diocesan  work  must  be  considerably  less  than  they 
are   in   the    northern    provinces.     But,   on  the  other 


166  OUS   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

band,  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  is  the  most 
influential  exponent  of  the  mind  of  the  church  of 
England,  so  far  as  that  expression  is  allowable.  He 
is  especially  charged  with  the  care  of  the  doctrinal 
integrity  and  practical  interests  of  the  church.  The 
publication  of  that  unhappy  and  notorious  work, 
"  Essays  and  Reviews,"  brought  eventually  to  the 
Archbishop  a  duty. of  peculiar  gravity  and  difficulty. 
He  was,  by  virtue  of  his  ofiice,  one  of  the  judges  of 
the  Judicial  Committee  of  the  Privy  Council  before 
whom  came  the  appeal  from  the  Court  of  Arches. 
The  decision  that  condemned  "  Essays  and  Reviews" 
was  reversed,  but  the  two  English  Archbishops  were 
unable  to  acquiesce  in  the  view  adopted  by  one  other 
bishop  and  by  the  law-lords.  It  was  understood  that 
among  the  judges  the  Archbishop  had  expressed  his 
views  with  an  eloquence,  learning,  and  earnestness 
which  had  excited  marked  attention,  and  even  caused 
some  astonishment.  He  was  precluded,  however, 
from  delivering  his  sentiments  by  the  rules  of  pre- 
cedent. The  Archbishop,  however,  could  not  be 
content  to  be  silent  in  a  matter  of  such  paramount 
importance.  He  issued  a  pastoral  letter  to  the  clergy 
of  his  province,  and  a  similar  letter  was  issued  by 
the  Archbishop  of  York  to  the  clergy  of  the  north. 
A  few  brief  extracts  from  this  important  letter  will 
hardly  fail  to  be  instructive.  "  The  church  has  a 
right  to  know  my  mind  on  matters  of  such  solemn 
interest  to  each  of  her  members.  ...  I  must  claim  to 
myself  the  privilege  of  giving  expression  to  opinions 
formed  prior  to  the  delivery  of  the  judgment,  and 
wholly  irrespective  of  the  terms  in  which  it  is  couched. 
...  I  conceived  that  I  was  bound  by  the  most  solemn 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES   OF    THE    REIGN,  1G7 

obligations  to  maintain,  at  its  exact  level,  the  estima- 
tion in  which  Holy  Scripture  is  held  by  our  church, 
as  shown  by  the  tenor  of  her  Articles  and  Liturgy, 
and  to  beware  lest  I  should  seem  to  sanction  a  de- 
cision which  would  detract  one  jot  or  tittle  from  the 
authority  with  which  it  is  invested  according  to  their 
lano^uasre." 

The  public  appearances  of  the  Archbishop  were,  of 
course,  exceedingly  numerous.  He  did  not  often 
speak  in  the  House  of  Lords,  but,  when  he  did,  his 
observations  were  always  received  with  marked  atten- 
tion. Having  been  head -master  of  Harrow,  and  a 
prominent  member  of  the  Oxford  University  Commis- 
sion, he  spoke  with  peculiar  authority  on  the  subject 
of  education  at  the  university,  and  in  our  public 
schools. 

The  Archbishop's  speeches  at  that  most  interest- 
ing of  all  London  dinners,  the  dinner  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  had  both  a  great  deal  of  brevity  and 
a  great  deal  of  wit.  A  picture  of  Mr.  Millais's 
gave  rise  to  a  felicitous  allusion.  "  I  would  say 
for  myself,  that  I  always  desire  to  derive  profit  as 
well  as  pleasure  from  my  visits  to  these  rooms. 
On  the  present  occasion  I  have  learnt  a  very 
wholesome  lesson,  which  may  be  usefully  studied, 
not  by  myself  alone,  but  by  those  of  my  right 
reverend  brethren  also  who  surround  me.  I  see 
a  little  lady  there  (pointing  to  Mr.  Millais's  picture 
of  a  cliild  asleep  in  church,  entitled  '  My  Second 
Sermon',)  who  although  all  unconscious  whom  she 
has  been  addressing,  and  of  the  homily  she  has 
been  reading  to  us  during  the  last  three  hours, 
has  in  truth,  by  the  eloquence  of  her  silent   slumber, 


168  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DRANS. 

given  us  a  grave  waraing  of  tbe  evil  of  lengthy  ser- 
rnons  and  drowsy  discourses.  Sorry  indeed  should  I 
be  to  disturb  that  sweet  and  peaceful  slumber,  but  I 
beg  that  when  she  does  awake  she  may  be  informed 
who  the}^  are  who  have  painted  the  moral  of  her  story, 
have  drawn  the  true  inference  from  the  chansfe  that 
has  passed  over  her  since  she  heard  her  first  sermon, 
and  have  resolved  to  profit  by  the  lecture  she  has  thus 
delivered  to  them." 

We  remember  his  holding  a  meeting  at  Lambeth 
to  promote  church  extension  among  the  poor  who 
cluster  at  Lambeth  so  thickly  around  the  archiepis- 
copal  towers,  and  he  entitled  the  curate's  humble 
work  as  the  highest,  expressing  his  regret  that  his 
own  range  of  duties  excluded  him  from  equal  partici- 
pation in  curates'  work. 

Whately  at  Oxford  was   a  more 

Archbishop  Whately.     •    j  ,•  ,1  ttti     j.   i         j. 

mterestmg    man    than   Whately  at 

Dublin.  He  was  certainly  sur- 
rounded by  a  brilliant  galaxy  of  friends  at  Oxford, 
who  were  only  faintly  reproduced  at  Dublin.  His 
history  is  chiefly  to  be  read  in  the  works  which  he 
pubhshed  when  at  Oxford,  which  relate  to  his  mental 
history,  the  most  interesting  part  of  any  man's  his- 
tory, and  which  subsequently  brought  him  his  pre- 
ferment. There  is  a  pause  in  his  Oxford  career, 
between  his  tutorship  at  Oriel  and  the  principalship 
of  St.  Alban's  Hall,  when  he  settled  down  as  a  married 
man,  on  a  country  living,  where  before  long  he  be- 
came non-resident.  St.  Alban's  Hall  had  been  known 
as  a  retreat  for  elderly  undergraduates,  who  were 
designated    at   times    Albani   ])atres.      Whately    did 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  1G9 

much  to  raise  the  character  of  the  institution,  and 
found  it  necessary  to  build  additional  rooms.  Among 
his  friends  were  JNTewman  and  Pusey,  who  were  sub- 
sequently, in  some  measure,  ahenated  from  him, 
through  the  wide  divergence  in  their  opinions.  "  As 
to  Dr.  Whately,"  says  Dr.  Newman  in  his  "  Apologia," 
"  I  owe  him  a  great  deal.  He  was  particularly  loyal 
to  his  friends,  and,  to  use  a  common  phrase,  '  all 
his  geese  were  swans.'  While  I  was  still  awkward 
and  timid  in  1822  he  took  me  by  the  hand,  and  acted 
the  part  to  me  of  a  gentle  and  encouraging  instruc- 
tor. He  had  done  his  work  towards  me,  or  nearly 
so,  when  he  had  taught  me  to  think  and  use  my 
reason.  His  mind  was  too  different  from  mine  for 
us  to  remain  long  on  one  line."  It  is  interesting  to 
know  that,  when  at  Halesworth,  Mr.  Keble  visited 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Whately,  and  read  aloud  to  them  the 
manuscript  of  his  "  Christian  Year."  Whately 
strongly  advised  its  publication,  but  this  must  have 
been  before  his  mind  fossilized  into  its  subsequent 
indurated  state.  Writing  to  his  curate  about  prepa- 
rations for  sermons  and  lectures — "  T  would  think 
over  what  I  had  to  say — sometimes  two  or  three 
days  before — and  that  often,  while  I  was  digging  or 
shooting  ;  different  ways  of  studying,  but  no  one  can 
do  his  best  without  study."  In  fact,  when  Whately 
was  indulging  in  any  corporeal  extravagances,  he 
was,  in  fact,  working  out  some  knotty  matter  in  his 
own  mind. 

In  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Arnold,  of  Fox  How,  he  gives 
some  particulars  of  Dr.  Arnold's  election  to  Rugby, 
which  might  be  admitted  advantageously  into  the 
next  edition  of  Dean  Stanley's  famous   Life  of  Arnold 


170  OUR  KISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

Criticizing  the  "  Life,"  Whately  says,  "  It  might  be 
as  well  to  mention  that  he  had  withdrawn  his  name 
from  the  Hst  of  candidates,  at  the  instance  of  a  friend 
who  persuaded  him  that  it  was  hopeless  to  make 
head  against  the  powerful  interest  that  others  could 
command;  that  I,  having  learned  that  Sir  H.  Halford 
was  resolved  to  induce,  if  he  could,  the  other  trustees 
to  disregard  interest  altogether,  urged  him  to  come 
forward  again,  and  to  convey  to  Sir  H.  Halford  my 
full  conviction  that  they  would  not  find  any  one  so 
well  qualified.  This  made  him  the  last  in  the  field." 
It  was  at  Dr.  Arnold's  that  a  letter  came  to  him  from 
Earl  Grey,  offering  him  the  Irish  primacy.  The  Earl 
had  previously  had  no  personal  knowledge  of  him.  It 
happened  the  same  morning  that  Whately's  climbing 
dog,  who  is  rather  a  conspicuous  personage  in  the 
earlier  annals,  was  trotted  out  for  exhibition  before  a 
visitor.  The  animal  performed  as  usual,  and  when 
he  had  reached  his  highest  point  of  ascent,  and  was 
beginning  his  yell  of  wailing,  Whately  turned  to  the 
stranger,  and  said,  "  What  do  you  think  of  that?" 

Visitor:  "I  think  that  some  besides  the  dog,  when 
they  find  themselves  at  the  top  of  the  tree,  would 
give  the  world  they  could  get  down  again." 

Whately  :  "  Arnold  has  told  you  ?" 

Visitor  :  "  Has  told  me  what  ?" 

Whately  :  "  That  I  have  been  offered  the  Arch- 
bishopric of  Dublin." 

Visitor :  "  I  am  very  happy  to  hear  it ;  but  this,  I 
assure  you,  is  the  first  intimation  I  have  had  of  it ; 
and  when  my  remark  was  made,  I  had  not  the  re- 
motest idea  that  the  thing  was  likely  to  take  place." 

Thus  Whately  climbed  to  the  top  of  the  tree,  and 


THE    EMINENT    TKELATES    OP    THE    EETGN.  171 

found  that,  in  point  of  fact,  it  was  an  extremely  unde- 
sirable locality.  It  was  suggested  that  he  should  ex- 
change for  an  English  bishopric  ;  but,  without  deny- 
ing that  an  English  bishopric  would  be  much  nicer, 
Whately's  intrepid  mind  revolted  from  the  idea  of  thus 
turning  back  on  his  troubles.  Various  circumstances 
conspired  to  give  him  great  unpopularity  at  the  outset. 
Before  his  arrival  he  had  succeeded  in  directing 
against  himself  a  good  deal  of  general  prejudice.  It 
so  happened  that  the  system  of  national  education  was 
first  brought  into  action  in  Ireland  in  the  very  month 
of  his  appointment,  and  it  became  a  wide-spread, 
though  most  erroneous  idea,  that  he  had  been  sent  to 
Ireland  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  it  out.  His  active 
part  on  the  Board  greatly  alienated  the  minds  of  his 
clergy,  and  nothing  more  conciliated  the  minds  of  his 
people  towards  him  than  his  tardy  withdrawal  from 
the  Board  when  he  found  that  the  directors  had  not 
scrupled  to  break  public  faith.  When  he  created  a 
Professorship  of  Political  Economy  in  the  University 
of  Oxford,  even  this  was  construed  to  bear  a  reference 
to  party  politics.  He  did  not  possess,  either,  what  is 
popularly  called  good  manners ;  his  absence  of  mind 
caused  him  to  commit  blunders  ;  at  his  own  table  he 
would  confuse  a  guest  by  his  violent  dialectics  and  sup- 
posed conversational  triumphs ;  while  men  who 
thought  it  worth  while  to  study  his  character,  and 
make  social  capital  out  of  his  weaknesses,  continued,  to 
a  considerable  degree,  to  monopolise  his  favours  and 
attention. 

Yet  Whately  was,  in  truth,  one  of  the  noblest  and 
most  generous-minded  of  men.  Those  who  most 
bitterly  opposed  him  must  have  undergone  a  strange 


172  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

revulsion  of  feeling-  at  the  revelations  which  his 
biography  contained  of  his  inner  character  and  motives. 
The  Archbishop  said,  one  day,  that  he  had  given 
forty  thousand  pounds  away  in  charity,  but  never  six- 
pence to  a  beggar.  Only  a  man  thus  munificent  in 
benefactions  could  have  been  justified  in  making  that 
hard-hearted  speech.  If  he  had  added  some  qualify- 
ing clause,  such  as  without  inquiry,  the  sentence  would 
have  been  perfect.  Such  a  principle,  without  such  a 
qualification,  would  overlook  many  cases  of  severe 
and  sudden  distress.  It  seems  that  this  fortv  thou- 
sand  pounds  would  only  very  imperfectly  indicate  the 
extent  of  his  Christian  liberality.  His  daughter, 
through  a  very  proper  feeling,  passes  over  in  the 
biography  which  has  done  such  ample  justice  to  his 
memory  this  topic  as  lightly  as  possible.  But  it  is 
only  just  to  the  memory  of  a  great  and  good  man, 
whose  cross  it  was  that  he  should  be  much  misunder- 
stood in  this  life,  and  who  was  refused  that  sympathy 
for  which  he  instinctively  yearned,  that  his  acts  of 
practical  self-denying  goodness  should  be  commemo- 
rated to  his  honour,  and  be  held  up  to  our  imitation. 
In  the  Irish  famine  he  gave  away  about  eight  thousand 
pounds.  He  was  anxious  to  strip  himself  of  part  of 
his  revenue  to  endow  a  theological  college.  He  fre- 
quently gave  away  from  one  hundred  to  one  thousand 
pounds  at  a  time.  He  often  paid  a  curate  for  a  poor 
rector,  and  gave  hard-worked  clergy  the  means  of 
recruiting  their  health  by  a  holiday.  His  agent  re- 
ported that  entries  like  these  were  common  :  "  To  a 
clergyman,  two  hundred  pounds  ;  to  a  gentleman,  one 
hundred  pounds;  cash  given  away,  fifty  pounds."  In 
fact,  he  appears  to  have  given  away  the  whole  of  his 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP   THE    REIGN.  173 

revenues,  except  what  was  needed  for  the  expenses  of 
his  office,  and  at  his  death  left  his  family  nothing  but 
insurances,  the  premiums  of  which  he  had  paid  out  of 
his  own  private  income.  However  illogical  it  may  be, 
men  will  judge  of  his  character  much  more  by  his 
good  deeds  than  by  his  amplitude  of  argument. 

M.  Guizot,  in  his  "  Memoirs,"  has  an  interesting 
mention  of  Whately  :  "II  devait  parler  le  13  Avril  a 
la  Chambre  des  Lords,  contre  I'archeveque  de  Can- 
torbery  et  I'eveque  d'Exeter,  dans  la  question  des 
biens  a  reserver  pour  le  clerg^  au  Canada.  '  Je  ne 
suis  pas  sur,'  me  dit  Lord  Holland,  *  que  dans  son  in- 
discrete sinc<^rite  il  ne  dise  pas  qu'il  ne  sait  point  de 
bonne  raison  pour  qu'il  y  ait,  a  la  Chambre  des  Lords, 
un  banc  d'eveques.'  "  This  really  was  his  opinion, 
as  expressed  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Senior.  He  met  his 
old  friend,  Dr.  Pusey,  at  Brighton.  His  daughter 
complains  that  various  false  accounts  have  been  given 
of  this  interview,  and  she  gives  the  true  one.  "  They 
met  as  old  college  associates  on  the  most  friendly 
terms.  Dr.  Pusey,  in  the  course  of  the  interview, 
asked  the  Archbishop's  permission  to  preach  in  his 
diocese.  The  Archbishop  told  him  candidly  he 
dreaded  his  introducing  novelties.  '  Not  novelties,' 
replied  the  other.  '  Well,  if  you  will,  antiquities,'  said 
the  Archbishop.  Dr.  Pusey  requested  him  to  name 
some  of  these  '  antiquated  novelties,'  and  he  instanced 
the  practice  lately  introduced  of  mixing  water  with 
wine  at  the  Communion.  Dr.  Pusey  excused  the  prac- 
tice by  observing  that  at  the  early  communions  com- 
plaints had  been  made  that  the  wine  affected  the  heads 
of  the  communicants.  The  Archbishop  exclaimed, 
'  Oh,  Pusey,  you  cannot  be  serious  !'  and  at  last  he 


17-i  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

added,  in  his  own  account  of  the  conversation,  '  I 
fairly  made  him  laui^h.'  "  We  are  not  told,  however, 
in  this  account  whether  the  Archbishop  did  or  did  not 
commit  the  incredible  outrage  of  forbidding  Dr.  Pusey 
to  preach. 

To  the  late  Earl  of  Derby,  when  Mr.  Stanley,  he 
wrote  on  one  occasion  as  follows  :  "  Permit  me  to 
express  the  great  satisfaction  I  feel  in  reading  the 
reports  of  your  speeches,  which  appear  to  me  more 
uniformly  the  result  of  strong  sense  and  right  feeling 
than  almost  any  others,  however  oratorically  beautiful. 
The  testimony  must  always  be  worth  something  of  a 
man  who  has  nothing  to  look  to  that  any  Ministry  can 
give,  and  who,  when  poor  and  unfriended,  was  .well 
known  to  have  never  deigned  to  flatter."  Even  Lord 
Derby  himself  would  have  been  glad  to  receive  such 
testimony.  It  is  curious  to  compare  with  this  his 
impressions  of  Mr.  Gladstone.  He  says  he  always 
neutralises  his  own  reasoning,  as  the  doctor  who 
ordered  ice  to  be  warmed.  It  is  of  Gladstone,  also, 
we  think,  that  he  complains  that  his  mind  was  full  of 
culs-de-sac.  Thackeray  he  regarded  with  intense  dis- 
like.    Speaking  of  the  slave  trade,  he  says  : — 

"  Mr.  Thackeray  was  saying  at  a  party  where  I  met 
him,  that  the  cases  of  ill-usage  are  only  here  and 
there,  one  out  of  many  thousands ;  and  that  Mrs. 
Stowe's  picture  is  as  if  one  should  represent  the  Eng- 
lish as  a  humpbacked  or  a  clubfoot  nation.  Wonder- 
ful people  are  the  Americans  !  In  all  other  regions 
it  is  thought  at  least  as  likely  as  not  that  a  man  en- 
trusted with  absolute  power  will  abuse  it.  We  jealously 
guard  against  this  danger,  and  so  do  the  Americans. 
I  think  the  only  excuse  for  Mr.  Thackeray  would  have 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  175 

been  the  supposition  that  he  was  so  very  favourable  in 
his  judgment  of  human  character  as  to  reckon  men 
much  better  than  they  are ;  but  in  his  works  ho  gives 
just  the  opposite  picture." 

The  following  is  a  valuable  remark,  and  is  as  acutely 
put  as  anything  by  Thackeray  himself : — 

"  I  think  some  censure  should  have  been  passed  on 
Thackeray's  sneer  against  piety  and  charity.  He 
might  have  been  asked  whether  he  knew  many  in- 
stances (or  any)  of  a  person  utterly  destitute  of  all 
principle,  and  thoroughly  selfish,  being  '  ih.e fast  friend' 
of  the  destitute  poor.  Such  will,  on  some  grand  occasion, 
make  a  handsome  donation,  and  join,  when  solicited, 
a  bazaar;  but  a  life  habitually  devoted  to  such  works 
is  not  consistent  with  such  a  character;  at  least,  I 
never  knew  an  instance.  And  he  implies  that  it  is 
quite  common  and  natural." 

Archbishop  Whately  would  frequently  give  an  amus- 
ing story  in  illustration  of  some  knotty  point.  In  this 
he  was  right,  according  to  the  wise  saying,  that  though 
reasons  may  be  the  pillars  of  an  argument,  yet  illustra- 
tions are  the  windows  which  let  in  the  lis^ht.  The 
argument  would  be  forgotten,  but  the  illustration 
would  be  remembered.  And  thus  the  Archbishop 
won  the  dubious  reputation  of  a  maker  of  the  newest 
jokes — the  archiepiscopal  Miller.  For  a  very  sensible 
man — perhaps  the  most  sensible  man  that  ever  lived 
since  Solomon — the  Archbishop  made  an  extraor- 
dinary number  of  mistakes.  A  collection  of  the 
fallacies  of  Dr.  Whately  would  not  be  an  inappropriate 
supplement  to  the  next  edition  of  the  "  Logic."  Com- 
mon sense  is  a  faculty  which  is  perhaps  too  indiscri- 
minately praised  by  the   great  mass   of  people,   who 


176  OUR    BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

flatter  themselves  that  they  are  extremely  sensible. 
Its  natural  tendency  is  to  mediocrity,  and  it  frequently 
curbs  and  limits  higher  qualities.  Only  when  allied 
with  sympathy  and  comprehensiveness,  originality  and 
insight,  is  it  the  leading  characteristic  of  mental  great- 
ness. Whately's  wonderful  sense  was  unallied  with 
sympathy,  imagination,  or  much  originality,  and  so  his 
mind  was  not  perfectly  balanced,  nor  yet  of  the  highest 
order.  His  general  tone  is  hard,  dry,  and  unloving  ; 
and  this  is  the  more  remarkable  because  no  words  are 
less  fitted  to  describe  the  real  character  of  the  man. 
He  was,  with  all  his  leonine  boldness,  as  tender-hearted 
as  a  child. 

But  there  were  men  of  far  greater 

Bishop  Blomfield.     •    -    n      ,      i     p  i  ti  .1 

intellectual   lorce    and     calibre    than 

the  Archbishops  we  have  named, 
even  than  Whately  himself ;  men  who  were  really 
princes  and  great  men,  and  have  left  an  impress  on 
Church  and  State  much  deeper  than  those  who  have 
occupied  archiepiscopal  thrones.  Such  men  of  a 
somewhat  heroic  type,  and  who  in  comparison  with 
the  men  of  our  time  look  through  the  mist  of  inter- 
vening years  "  larger  than  human,"  were  Charles 
James  of  London  and  Henry  of  Exeter.  Blomfield 
was  the  most  remarkable  of  a  set  of  bishops  who  are 
called  "Greek  Play  Bishops."  The  "Greek  Play 
Bishops"  often  were  men  of  a  more  robust  nature  than 
the  Courtier  Bishops.  The  Greek  play  was  his  earliest 
distinction,  but  it  was  not  his  latest  or  his  best.  His 
hard  work  at  Cambridge  recalled  the  tradition  of  what 
Paley  had  done  when  he  suddenly  abandoned  idle 
ways,  and  settled  down  into   the  steady  work  which 


TUE    EMINENT   PKELATES    OF   THE    REIGN.  177 

made  him  Senior  Wrangler.  Blomfield  constantly 
read  twelve,  or  fifteen,  or  eighteen  hours  a  day.  He 
injured  his  health  for  life,  but  he  obtained  everything 
that  he  wanted.  His  natural  powers  were  stupendous. 
He  gave  some  attention  to  mathematics  in  order  to 
qualify  himself  for  the  Chancellor's  Medal  and  came 
out  third  Wrangler.  He  was  one  of  a  set  of  scholars 
who  succeeded  to  the  vacant  places  of  Person  and 
Parr.  Some  of  his  contemporaries  became  Greek  play 
bishops  like  himself.  Such  a  one  was  Maltby,  who 
loved  Blomfield  because  Blomfield  loved  Greek.  He 
took  him  into  his  house  as  a  pupil  without  pay,  and 
coached  him  in  all  the  best  ways  of  learning.  Another 
man  was  Monk,  who  succeeded  Person  in  his  chair, 
and  was  subsequently  Bishop  of  Gloucester  and 
Bristol.  These  were  among  the  dozen  men  in  England 
who  really  studied  the  minutim  of  Greek  scholarship. 
The  great  German  scholars  wrote  him  Latin  letters, 
and  if  he  took  private  pupils  he  might  charge  each 
four  hundred  a  year  if  he  liked.  We  regret  to  say 
that  the  learned  bosoms  were  sometimes  torn  with 
animosities,  reminding  us  of  the  mediaeval  scholar, 
who  exclaimed  to  another,  "  God  forgive  you  your 
theory  of  the  irregular  verbs."  When  the  erudite 
Tate  published  his  diatribe  on  Greek  metres,  our 
future  Greek  play  bishop  writes  to  another  future 
Greek  play  bishop — 

"  O  Tate,  tute,  what  canst  thou  have  said  ? 
With  club  of  Greelc  I'll  break  Tate's  tete  or  head." 

A   great   broad-minded,    jovial,    hearty    man    was 
Bishop   Blomfield,    odd   and   generous    to    rashness, 

VOL.  I.  N 


17S  OUK    BISHOPS    A^'D    DEANS. 

somewliat  impsrious,  but  with  a  delicate  mind,  a 
sensitive  conscience,  God-fearing,  law-abiding.  There 
is  more  individuality  about  his  character,  more  stories 
indicating  a  frank  genial  nature  about  him  than 
about  any  other  prelate  of  the  era.  His  life,  by  one 
of  his  sons,  is  one  of  the  best  ecclesiastical  biogra- 
phies in  the  language.  He  had  many  faults  and 
errors,  there  are  some  fierce  passages  in  his  life,  but 
he  was  emphatically  a  good  man  and  of  as  truly 
statesmanhke  mind  as  any  since  the  days  of  Cardinal 
Wolsey,  to  whom  he  was  not  unlike. 

Episcopal  charges  are,  as  a  rule,  extremely  un- 
exciting. To  hear  them  is  technically  to  "  undergo 
a  visitation,"  and  in  that  serious  light  they  are 
generally  regarded.  But  Bishop  Blomfield's  charge 
in  1842  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  events,  a 
landmark  in  the  modern  history  of  the  Anglican 
Church.  The  great  sensation  excited  by  the  charge 
is  still  a  tradition  among  the  Metropolitan  clergy. 
E-eading  this  charge  at  a  distance  of  thirty  years,  it 
strikes  us  as  a  wise,  moderate,  and  fair  charge.  At 
the  present  day  its  language  would  seem  to  err  on 
the  side  of  tenuity  and  moderation.  But  the  fact  is 
that  the  whole  surface  has  been  raised  to  a  higher  level 
within  late  years.  Bishop  Blomfield's  view,  which 
was  assailed  with  obloquy  at  the  time,  is  probably 
that  safe  and  moderate  one  to  which  the  Church  of 
the  future  will  most  closely  approximate.  It  does  not 
however  follow  that  the  protest,  unnecessary  in  our 
day,  might  not  have  been  necessary  at  an  earlier  day. 
Those  who  looked  upon  the  charge  as  Eitualistic  would 
now  regard  it  as  of  a  pale  and  negative  character. 
No  congregation   would  now  be  thrown  into  convul- 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES    OP   THE    REIGN.  179 

sions  by  so  mild  an  innovation  as  tlie  use  of  the 
surplice.  The  Bishop's  charge  was  intensely  rubrical. 
He  thought  the  surplice  ought  to  be  worn  by  preachers 
durino"  the  morninGf  sermon,  with  sever-al  other  like 
matters  of  anise  and  cummio.  It  would  have  been 
a  better  policy  for  the  Bishop,  and  have  saved 
him  much  unhappioess  if  he  had  pointed  out  the 
unimportance  of  such  a  matter,  and  had  left  it  to  the 
discretion  of  each  clergyman  and  his  parish  as  to 
what  should  be  done.  He  laid  down  a  hard  and  fast 
line  which  it  was  really  not  worth  while  to  do,  and 
he  found  himself  oblis^ed  to  retreat  from  it.  He 
desired  to  impose  a  rigid  uniformity,  which  was  not 
possible  and  hardly  desirable.  The  Islingtonian 
clergy  demanded  that  they  should  not  be  obliged  to 
read  the  prayer  for  the  Church  Militant,  and  to  make 
collections  through  the  offertory.  Under  the  cir- 
cumstances which  they  alleged  he  gave  them  an 
exemption,  which  broke  down  the  bard  and  fast  line, 
and  which  was  resented  by  the  clergy  who  punctually 
obeyed  his  instructions.  There  was  something  like  a 
hurricane  in  the  diocese,  which  was  only  assuaged  by 
a  wise  moderate  letter  from  the  mild  Archbishop 
Howley. 

The  Evangelicals  of  that  day  charged  the  Bishop 
with  being  a  Tractarian ;  up  to  a  certain  point  this 
was  the  case.  He  thoroughly  sympathised  with  that 
zeal  to  do  all  things  decently  and  in  order,  which  the 
Oxford  school  had  so  thoroughly  identified  with  their 
system.  He  was  of  the  opinion  that  the  Low  Church 
system  had  weakened  the  Church  and  strengthened 
the  Dissenters.     On  the  other  hand  he  thought  that 

N  2 


180 


OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 


the    Tractarians  had  strengthened  the  estimate  of  the 
Church's  authority  and  office,  and  had  shown  that  it 
rested  on  better  authority  than  mere  Act  of  Parha- 
ment.     Coming  to  a  still  more  vital  point,    he  would 
declare  that  the  Tractarians  were  corrupting  the  sim- 
plicity of  the   Christian  faith.     He  held  with    them 
formally   the  Doctrine    of    Baptismal    Regeneration, 
and  entrenched  himself  behind  the  impregnable  posi- 
tion that  this    is    the  doctrine  of    the    Church,     as 
evidenced  in  the  language   of   the   service.     In  any 
discussion  of  this  kind,  however,  it  is  always  regarded 
as  absolutely  necessary  that  the  meaning  of  this  phrase 
should   be     accurately    defined.     But   he  thoroughly 
opposed    those    who    would    engraft    whatever  they 
could  of  the  Romish  system  on  the  Anglican  Church. 
He  was  himself  loyal  to  Articles  and  Liturgy,    and 
declared  of  others  that  they  were  disloyal.     He  would 
rather  that  they  went  over  to  Rome  at  once  than  dis- 
honestly continue  as  they  were. 

There  is  no  one  who  has  filled  a 
Bishop  Phillpotts.    more   prominent  place  in   the  annals 

of  our  modern  ecclesiastical  history 
than  the  late  venerable  Bishop  of  Exeter.  There  are 
few  names  that  will  suggest  such  mixed  and  angry 
memories.  Even  at  this  late  day,  many  persons  find 
it  difficult  to  speak  calmly  about  Bishop  Phillpotts. 
And,  truth  to  say,  the  Bishop  did  not  lead  a  calm 
life.  He  was  a  man  of  war  from  his  youth ;  the  most 
militant  member  of  the  Church  Militant.  His  whole 
career  has  frequently  been  made  the  subject  of  un- 
mixed reproach  and  invective.  Certainly,  in  his  time, 
he  exhibited  a  greater  amount  of  fiery  churchmauship 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OE    TOE    IJFJGN.  131 

than  has,  perhaps,  been  manifested  since  Tlildebrand. 
His  name  has  been  very  far  dissociated  from  the  idea 
of  quietness  and  peace.  It  has  been  his  fault,  or  his 
fate,  to  have  been  mixed  up  with  all  the  disturbanfc 
and  controversial  elements  of  modern  theology.  To 
some  he  was  one  that  troubleth  Israel ;  to  others  he 
was  Athanasw.s  contra  Mmidum.  Every  detail  of  his 
public  life  has  been  subjected  to  pertinacious  scrutiny, 
and  has  been  construed  with  perverse  uncharitable- 
ness.  He  was  one  who  himself  admitted  many 
faults,  chiefly  faults  natural  to  an  impetuous  and 
ardent  temperament.  He  rallied  around  himself  both 
an  energy  of  hatred  and  an  enthusiasm  of  friendship. 
In  the  minds  of  multitudes  such  a  load  of  prejudice 
was  attached  to  his  name  that  he  most  probably  looked 
to  a  distant  generation  for  a  calm  and  exact  measure 
of  justice.  That  stormy  career  had  a  long  sunset  of 
calm.  That  episcopal  life  covers  the  whole  of  the 
long  and  anxious  period  that  has  elapsed  since  the  old 
Reform  days  and  his  death.  It  may  even  be  said  that 
the  study  of  that  career  is  essential  for  the  due  com- 
prehension of  the  history  of  England  during  a 
generation  of  three  and  thirty  years.  We  desire  to 
look  back  upon  it,  remembering  the  language  of  his 
last  years  and  his  best.  But  in  passing  this  career  in 
review,  very  different  language  is  recalled,  a  very 
difi*erent  figure  rises  in  the  mind's  eye.  It  is  best  to 
dwell  fearlessly  and  justly  on  each  portion  of  a  public 
career ;  but  perhaps  both  the  most  accurate  and  the 
most  generous  estimate  is  obtained  when  it  is  ex- 
amined in  its  twilight  light  and  its  latest  utterances. 

The  "  Bell  Hotel,"  at  Gloucester,  is  the  largest  and 
most  celebrated  tavern  in  that  fair  and  ancient  city. 


182  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

It  is  celebrated  in  Fielding's  great  work.  Two  cele- 
brated men,  leaders  of  men  in  diverse  directions, 
Lave  identified  their  names  with  the  "  Bell."  Here 
George  Whitfield  was  born.  Here  Henry  Phillpotts 
was  in  part  brought  up ;  he  was  born  in  1778, 
at  Bridgewater,  hard  by  the  memorable  field  of  Sedg- 
moor.  His  father,  an  energetic  man,  followed  in 
succession  the  calling  of  brickmaker,  innkeeper, 
auctioneer,  land-manager.  At  the  end  of  the  last 
century  he  was  laud-agent  to  the  Dean  and  Chapter 
of  Gloucester.  This  latter  proved  a  most  fortunate 
connection  to  his  family.  From  such  lowly  begin- 
nings, greatly  to  the  honour  of  the  country  where 
such  things  are  possible,  infinitely  to  his  own  honour, 
did  the  poor  man's  son  win  his  way  to  a  foremost 
place  in  the  House  of  Lords  and  on  the  Episcopal 
Bench. 

At  Oxford  he  was  the  Boy  Bachelor.  Educated  at 
the  college  school  of  Gloucester,  under  Arthur  Benoni 
Evans,  a  name  which  still  enjoys  provincial  celebrity, 
he  was  only  thirteen  when  he  matriculated  at  Corpus 
Christi ;  he  then  obtained  an  open  scholarship  while 
he  might  be  said  to  be  yet  in  his  jacket.  He  was 
only  seventeen  when  he  became  Fellow  of  Magdalen. 
Such  early  promise  and  attainment  pointed  to  the 
highest  future  advancement.  There  was  no  point 
which  might  not  be  reached  by  one  of  such  industry 
and  such  abihty.  The  President  of  Magdalen 
College  was  then  Dr.  Routh.  Between  the  President 
and  the  young  Fellow  the  greatest  intimacy  sub- 
sisted. 

He  became  connected,  through  marriage,  with  Lord 
Eldon,  having  married  Miss   Surtees,  Lady   Eldon's 


TUB    EAIINENT    PRELATES    OF    TOE    EETGN.  183 

niece.  A  shower  of  benefices  rained  down  upon  him. 
The  Crown  bestowed  upon  him  a  hving  in  the  diocese 
of  Bath,  and  tlie  year  following,  another  in  the 
diocese  of  Durham.  Shute  Barrington,  the  renowned 
Bishop  of  Durham,  woidd  be  no  stranger  to  the 
academic  fame  of  this  new  acquisition  to  his  diocese, 
who  would  also  be  provided  with  other  and  perhaps 
more  powerful  introductions.  The  Bishop  made  him 
his  chaplain,  an  appointment  which  he  held  for 
twenty  years,  and  proved  the  main  architect  of  his 
splendid  career.  He  soon  fleshed  his  maiden  weapon 
in  controversy,  by  writing  in  defence  of  his  patron 
against  Dr.  Lingard,  who  had  anonymously  attacked 
the  Bishop  of  Durham's  charge.  This  was  the  com- 
mencement of  the  prominent  part  taken  by  Dr.  Phill- 
potts  in  the  Roman  Catholic  question.  Meanwhile, 
the  Crown  and  the  Bishop  vied  in  conferring  on  him 
their  richest  benefices,  and  he  continued  to  accept  all 
favours  with  a  grateful  heart.  The  Crown  substituted 
for  the  Bath  and  Wells  living  a  more  convenient 
appointment  in  the  diocese  of  Durham,  and  the 
Bishop  preferred  him  to  the  important  parish  of  Gates- 
head. The  importance  of  this  parish  can  hardly  be 
exaggerated.  It  is  the  southern  suburb  of  Newcastle, 
and  has  a  population  of  many  thousands,  chiefly  of 
the  very  poor.  We  should  have  been  glad  to  have 
discovered  that  Dr.  Phillpotts'  incumbency  was  ren- 
dered memorable  by  gigantic  attempts  to  cope  with, 
the  spiritual  destitution  of  the  place,  such  as  he 
subsequently  exhibited  at  Plymouth  and  Devonport. 
This,  we  regret  to  say,  has  not  been  the  case.  The 
Bishop  soon  preferred  him  to  a  good  canonry  at 
Durham,  and  the  good  canonry  was   soon  exchanged 


184  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

for  a  better.  Nor  was  this  all ;  a  living  fell  vacant 
in  the  city  of  Durham  itself.  Its  value  was  only  three 
or  four  hundreds  a  year,  and  the  minor  canons  re- 
garded it  as  a  peculiar  claim  of  their  own.  Nothing  was 
regarded  as  too  minute  for  the  voracious  appetite  of 
the  great  dignitary ;  all  was  grist  that  came  to 
the  mill.  A  certain  minor  canon,  in  particular, 
was  greatly  disappointed,  and  probably  missed  a 
home  of  rest  and  repose.  A  possessor  of  flocks  and 
herds  is  generally  looking  after  some  little  ewe 
lamb. 

Mr.  Phillpotts  now  appeared  on  a  wider  field.  He 
commences  his  literary  and  public  labours.  He  justi- 
fies the  extraordinary  load  of  preferment  to  which  he 
has  attained.  He  does  not,  however,  apply  himself 
to  the  extraordinary  practical  difficulties  presented 
by  the  overgrown  parish  of  Gateshead.  Neither,  it 
is  hardly  necessary  to  observe,  does  he  champion  the 
cause  of  hard-worked  and  poorly  remunerated  minor 
canons.  The  astuteness  of  that  well-trained  intellect, 
the  subtleties  of  that  lawyer-like  nature,  were  appro- 
priately displayed  in  reference  to  the  difficulties  and 
perplexities  of  the  Poor  Law  question. 

The  Roman  Catholic  question  emerged  as  the  great 
question  of  the  day.  Dr.  Phillpotts  threw  himself 
vehemently  into  the  controversy.  It  was  certainly  an 
ecclesiastical  question,  but  the  religious  interest  was 
subordinated  to  the  political  interest.  In  his  opening 
letter  to  Lord  Grey,  in  that  peculiar  tone  which  sub- 
sequently reached  its  highest  note  in  the  celebrated 
letter  to  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  he  assured 
the  Earl  that  he  had  "  yet  to  learn  what  the  pure 
spirit  of  Christianity  is."     Other  political  events  of 


THE    EMINENT   PEELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  ]85 

very  painful  celebrity  occurred,  which  gave  him  an 
opportunity  of  doing  something  for  the  government 
which  had  done  so  much  for  him.  In  the  evil  days 
of  1819,  fierce  riots  occurred  in  the  distressed  manu- 
facturing districts.  Mr.  Hunt,  with  the  natural 
sedition  of  a  popular  agitator,  was  haranguing  a  vast 
multitude,  when  the  yeomanry  cavalry,  with  sabres 
drawn,  dashed  among  the  unarmed  crowd,  and,  in  the 
cutting  down,  some  were  killed  and  many  wounded. 
A  very  painful  sensation  was  excited  throughout  the 
country  by  this  unhappy  butchery.  It  was  certainly 
not  the  day  when  "  crowds  were  sane  and  crowns  were 
just."  We  ought  to  remember  both  the  real  distress 
of  the  people  and  the  real  inability  of  the  government 
to  remove  the  distress.  Many  great  cities,  the  Com- 
mon Council  of  London  leading  the  way,  denounced 
the  deed,  and  a  great  county  meeting  at  Durham  en- 
dorsed such  a  condemnation.  It  is  with  great  regret 
that  we  look  back  upon  the  course  taken  by  Dr.  Phill- 
potts  at  this  time.  A  strong  prima  facie  case,  in  the 
opinion  of  the  country,  was  made  out  against  the 
yeomanry.  A  clergyman  might  be  supposed  to  have 
something  better  to  do  than  to  mix  himself  up  with 
the  defence  of  this  unhappy  shedding  of  blood.  Dr. 
Phillpotts  gave  his  name  to  a  famous  declaration  in 
favour  of  Ministers,  and  followed  it  up  by  a  letter  to 
the  freeholders  of  the  county  of  Durham.  An  article 
on  this  letter  in  the  "  Edinburgh  Review"  was  the 
commencement  of  a  hfe-long  feud  which  subsisted 
between  Dr.  Phillpotts  and  this  powerful  periodical. 

The  question  of  the  divorce  of  Queen  Caroline  was 
another  subject  which  convulsed  the  nation.  Here 
again  Dr.  Phillpotts  took  a  prominent  part,  not  much. 


186  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

we  imagine,  to  the  advantage  of  liis  office  and  work. 
We  do  not  ask  whether  he  took  the  right  side  or  the 
wrong  side.     Most  probably  he  took  the  right  side. 
But  the  subject  of  adultery  would  be  as  little  congenial 
to  a  clergyman  as  the   subject  of  murder.     When  the 
county  of  Durham  had  very  emphatically  expressed  an 
opinion  in  favour  of  the  queen,  Dr.  Phillpotts  took  a 
large  share  in  drawing  up   a  declaration  in  favour  of 
'  the  king.     This  ultimately  led  to  a  cause  celebre,  in 
which  Williams  was  indicted  for  a  Hbel  on  the  clergy 
of   Durham,    and   Mr.    Brougham   made   one   of   his 
greatest  foreusic  efforts.  These  circumstances  brought 
him  into    sharp    colHsion    with   Lord    Grey   and   the 
*' Edinburgh  Review."     In  one  of  these  legal  contests 
Mr.  Brougham  insisted  that  if  Williams  had  committed 
a  libel  on  the  clergy  of  Durham,  they  also  had  com- 
mitted a  libel  upon  Williams.     "  A  Mr.  Phillpotts," 
says  Brougham,   "  pubhshes   a  pamphlet  in  which  he 
describes  Mr.  Williams  as  a  miserable  mercenary  who 
eats  the  bread  of  prostitution,  and  panders  to  the  low 
appetites  of  those  who   cannot  or  who  dare  not  cater 
for  their  own  malignity  ;"  an   early  example  of  that 
peculiar     style    which     Dr.    Phillpotts    subsequently 
brought  to  a  very  high  degree  of  perfection. 

In  1820  he  was  appointed  to  the  rectory  of  Stan- 
hope, we  beheve  (with  the  exception  of  Doddington) 
the  most  valuable  rectory  in  England.  Formerly  the 
prince  Bishops  of  Durham  used  to  hunt  the  adjacent 
forests,  and  the  tenants  were  bound  to  provide  for 
their  huntsmen  and  hounds.  At  the  present  time  it  is 
chiefly  peopled  by  miners,  and  is  best  known  for  the 
value  of  the  hving  and  the  illustrious  men  who  have 
held  it.     The  ancient  church  is  a  very  plain  one  ;  but 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATRS    OP    THE    REIGN.  187 

a  lasting  memorial  of  its  celebrated  rector  is  to  be 
found  in  the  spacious  rectory,  wliicli  he  built  at  great, 
and  his  own,  expense,  Doddington  and  Stanhope  are 
now  both  subdivided  into  parishes.  The  last  three 
occupants  of  the  living  had  all  become  prelates, 
Bishops  Butler,  Keene,  and  Thui'low,  and  there  was 
no  reason  why  the  Bishop  of  Exeter  also  should  not 
arrive  at  this  desirable  consummation.  Each  of  these 
prelates  had  also  held  the  living  in  commendanb  with 
the  see.  In  Dr.  Phillpotts'  case,  however,  this  was 
not  allowed  by  the  government  of  the  day.  The  in- 
habitants presented  a  petition,  the  details  of  which 
will  not  bear  examination  ;  but  in  those  days  it  was 
easy  to  raise,  and  difficult  to  resist,  a  clamour  against 
a  clergyman ;  and  so  when,  ten  years  later,  he  was 
elevated  to  the  bench,  this  appointment  severed  his 
connection  with  the  parish  of  Stanhope.* 

*  The  following  extract  from  a  letter  of  the  Bishop  of  Exeter  to  Arch- 
deacon Goddard,  relating  to  Stanhope,  is  very  interesting,  both  as  a 
specimen  of  the  Bishop's  admirable  epistolary  style  when  not  engaged 
in  a  controversial  correspondence,  and  for  its  brief  but  very  valuable 
notice  of  Bishop  Butler  :  (a) 

"Exeter,  January,  25,  1835. 

"My  dear  Sir, — I  earnestly  wish  I  could  justify  the  report  made  to 
you  by  the  Provost  of  Oriel,  that  I  could  supply  you  with  several 
anecdotes  of  Bishop  Butler.  The  truth,  however,  is,  that  although 
tantalized  by  seeming  opportunities  of  acquiring  some  information 
respecting  the  private  life  and  habits  of  one  to  whom  I  have  been 
accustomed  to  look  up  as  the  greatest  of  uninspired  men,  I  have  been 
mortified  by  my  almost  entire  failure.  In  the  rectory  of  Stanhope  I 
was  successor  to  him  after  an  interval  of  eighty  years,  and  one  of  my 
earliest  employments  there  was  to  search  for  relics  of  my  illustrious 
predecessor.  I  was  assured  that  an  old  parishioner,  who  with  a 
tolerably  clear  memory  had  reached  the  age  of  ninety-three  or  ninety- 
four,  recollected  him  well.  To  him  I  frequently  went,  and  in  almost 
all  my    conversations    endeavoured    to    elicit    something    respecting 


(o)  See  Bartlett's  "  Life  of  Butler,"  p.  76. 


188  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

In  1825  he  produced  the  "  Letters  to  Charles  Butler, 
Esq.,  on  the  Theological  Parts  of  his  Book  of  the 
Roinau  Catholic  Church,"  which  still  continues  to  be 
the  most  important  work  that  he  has  written.  In 
future  days,  when  the  Oxford  movement  had  brought 
forward  the  Boman  Catholic  question  under  a  very 
different  aspect,  the  Bishop  was  able  to  draw  the  at- 
tention of  his  clergy  to  that  work  as  the  true  indica- 
tion of  his  real  sentiments.  The  work  was  written 
during  the  agitation  on  Roman  Catholic  matters,  when 
it  was  the  beginning  of  the  end.  Dr.  Phillpotts  was 
not  prevented  from  entering  on  this  employment  "  by 
an  apprehension  that  I  may  be  thought  desirous  of  sup- 
porting one  side  of  a  great  political  question  by  the  in- 
direct  influence  of  a  theoloo^ical  aro-ument."  The  next 
year  a   further  letter  was   pubhshed   to   Mr.  Butler. 

'  Eector  Butler.'  He  remembered  him  well,  but,  as  I  ought  perhaps  to 
have  anticipated,  could  tell  me  nothing.  For  what  chance  was  there 
that  one  who  was  a  joiner's  apprentice  of  thirteen  years  of  age  when 
Butler  left  Stanhope,  could  fourscore  years  afterwards  tell  anything 
about  him  ?  That  he  was  respected  and  beloved  by  his  parishioners, 
which  was  known  before,  was  confirmed  by  my  informant.  He  lived 
very  retired,  was  very  kind,  and  could  not  resist  the  importunities  of 
common  beggars,  who,  knowing  his  infirmity,  pursued  him  so  earnestly 
as  sometimes  to  drive  him  back  into  his  house  as  his  only  escape.  I 
confess  I  do  not  think  my  authority  for  this  trait  of  character  in  Butler 
is  quite  sufficient  to  justify  my  reporting  it  with  any  confidence. 
There  was,  moreover,  a  tradition  of  his  riding  a  black  pony,  and 
riding  always  very  fast.  I  examined  the  parish  books,  not  with  much 
hope  of  discovering  anything  worth  recording  of  him,  and  was  unhap- 
pily as  unsuccessful  as  I  expected.  His  name,  indeed,  was  subscribed 
to  one  or  two  acts  of  vestry  in  a  very  neat  and  easy  character.  But  if 
it  was  amusing  it  was  mortifying  to  find  the  only  trace  of  such  a  man's 
labours,  recorded  by  his  own  hand,  to  be  the  passing  of  a  parish 
account  authorizing  the  payment  of  five  shillings  to  some  adventurous 
clown  who  had  destroyed  a  fourmart,  or  wood  martin,  the  martin  cat, 
or  some  other  equally  important  matter." 


THE    EMINENT    PKELATES    OF   THE    EEIGN.  189 

These  volumes  belong  to  the  library  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  controversy,  to  which  they  are  a  valuable 
addition.  The  letters  are  entirely  free  from  any  per-, 
sonal  acrimony,  and  Mr.  Butler  sought  the  acquaint- 
ance of  his  opponent. 

A  few  additional  words  may  here  be  said  respecting 
the  literary  character  of  the  Bishop.     It  has  been  said 
that  every  man  is  a  debtor  to  his  profession,  and  the 
saying  is  commonly  supposed   to   mean  that  he  ought 
to  add   something  to  those  stores   of  literature  from 
which  he  has  derived   so  much.     It   cannot,  however, 
be  said  that  this  debt  has  been  adequately  discharged 
by  the  Bishop.     With  the  exception  of  the  letters  to 
Mr.  Butler,  Dr.  Phillpotts,  except  indirectly,  has  not 
contributed  to  the  literature  of  his  profession.     A  very 
remarkable   correspondence    ought,    however,    to    be 
noticed,  which  passed  between   the  Bishop  and  Lord 
Macaulay  after  the  publication  of  the  first  two  volumes 
of  the  history.     It  forms  part  of  the  rather  consider- 
able literature  which  has  grown   up  on  the  subject  of 
Lord    Macaulay's    work,    concerning   which    we   will 
venture    to    say    that   when    the    whole   of   that   ad- 
verse criticism  is  collected  and  sifted   it    will   impose, 
in  the  judgment  of  careful  readers,    a   very  sensible 
check  on   the     popular     view     of     that    remarkable 
history.      We  must  say  that   we   think   the   Bishop 
carries  his  urbanity  to   excess.     We  do  not  think  that 
many  students  of  Macaulay  will  fully  endorse  such  lan- 
guage as  the  following  : — "  Your  highest  merit  is  your 
unequalled  truthfulness.  Biassed  as  you  must  be  by  your 
pohtical  creed,  your  party,  and  your  connections,  it  is 
quite  clear  that  you  will  never   sacrifice  the  smallest 
particle  of  truth  to   these  considerations."     To  those 


190  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

who  know  how  constantly  and  how  unfairly  Lord 
Macaulay  was  biassed  in  all  his  politico-histoi'ical  state- 
ments and  opinions,  this  somewhat  adulatory  sentence 
will  hardly  be  pleasing.  Neither  do  we  like  the  way 
in  which  he  surrenders  Archbishop  Craniner.  "Of 
Cranmer  himself,  I  am  not  much  disposed  to  quarrel 
with  your  character,  severe  as  it  is."  We  trust  the 
Bishop  afterwards  learned  to  concur  ia  Mr.  Froude's 
eloquent  vindication  of  Cranraer.  The  Bishop's  srric- 
tures  mainly  relate  to  Mr.  Macaulay's  view  of  the 
Church  of  England  at  the  time  of  Cranmer.  He  con- 
cludes one  of  his  letters  with  a  personal  inv'taiion  : — 
"  Permit  me  to  say  that  I  should  deem  it  a  high 
honour,  as  well  as  gratification,  if  I  were  ever  to 
receive  under  this  roof,  the  only  one  beneath  which 
will  be  my  home,  a  man  so  distinguished  as  yourself 
by  genius,  and  by  qualities  without  which  genius  is 
contemptible,  and  its  influence  pernicious." 

Mr.  Macaulay  replied  in  a  very  characteristic 
manner  : — "  I  beg  you  to  accept  my  thanks  for  your 
highly  interesting  letter.  I  have  seldom  been  more 
gratified  than  by  your  approbation,  and  I  can  with 
truth  assure  you  that  I  am  not  solicitous  to  defend  my 
book  against  any  criticisms  to  which  it  may  be  justly 
open.  I  have  undertaken  a  task  which  makes  it  neces- 
sary for  me  to  treat  of  many  subjects  with  which  it  is 
impossible  that  one  man  should  be  more  than  su- 
perficially acquainted — law,  divinity,  military  affairs, 
maritime  affairs,  trade,  finance,  manufactures,  letters, 
arts,  and  sciences.  It  would  therefore  be  the  height 
of  folly  and  arrogance  in  me  to  receive  ungraciously 
suggestions  offered  in  a  friendly  spirit  by  persons  who 
have   studied   profoundly  branches  of  knowledge    to 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  191 

which  I  have  been  able  to  give  only  a  passing  atten- 
tion. I  should  not,  I  assure  you,  feel  at  all  mortified 
or  humbled  at  being  compelled  to  own  that  I  had  been 
set  right,  by  an  able  and  learned  prelate,  on  a  question 
of  ecclesiastical  history."  Mr.  Macaulay,  however, 
resembled  those  pious  people  who  are  very  willing  to 
own  that  they  are  miserable  sinners  in  the  aggregate, 
but  who  will  never  confess  to  any  sins  or  errors  in 
detail.  ''  I  really  think  that  it  is  in  my  power  to  vin- 
dicate myself  from  the  charge  of  having  misrepreseoted 
the  sentiments  of  the  Enghsh  Reformers  concerning 
Church  government."  Again,  the  following  is  liighly 
characteristic  of  Macaulay  : — "  I  should  be  most  un- 
grateful if  I  did  not  thankfully  .acknowledge  my  obli- 
gations to  your  lordship,  for  the  highly  interesting 
and  very  friendly  letters  with  which  you  have  honoured 
me.  Before  another  edition  of  my  book  appears  I 
shall  have  time  to  weigh  your  observations  carefully, 
and  to  examine  the  marks  to  which  you  have  called 
my  attention.  You  have  convinced  me  of  the  propriety 
of  making  some  alterations.  But  I  hope  you  will  not 
accuse  me  of  pertinacity  if  I  add  that,  as  far  as  I  can  at 
present  judge,  those  alterations  will  be  slight;  and 
that  on  the  great  point  in  issue,  my  opinion  is  un- 
changed." 

It  was  about  the  year  1822  or  1823  that  a  commu- 
nication was  made  from  high  quarters  to  Dr.  Phillpotts, 
inquiring  whether  there  was  any  see  in  Ireland  which 
he  could  be  induced  to  take.  The  richest  see  in  Ire- 
land was  then  vacant.  The  revenue  was  immense, 
and  generally  set  down  at  £14,U00  a  year.  The  last 
occupant,  the  Honourable  Percy  Jocelyn,  had  recently 
been  deprived  and  deposed.   The  offer  was  understood 


192  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

to  come  from  Lord  Liverpool,  and  tbougli  it  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  an  absolute  offer,  appears  to  have 
been  tantamount  to  such.  Dr.  Phillpotts  was  informed 
that  the  Government  wanted,  not  his  rich  preferment 
of  Stanhope,  but  himself.  The  rector  of  Stanhope  de- 
clined. The  Stanhope  £5,000  a  year  was  quite  suffi- 
cient for  his  modest  needs. 

Between  the  "  Edinburgh  Keview"  and  the  Bishop 
of  Exeter,  there  was  a  permanent  feud.  The 
"Review"  early  singled  out  Dr.  Phillpotts  byname, 
and  Jeffrey  found  an  equal  match  in  the  clergyman 
whom  he  assailed.  His  letter  to  Jeffrey  is  a  fine  ex- 
ample of  invective  : — "  After  an  interval  of  tliree  years, 
being  again  assailed  in  the  same  journal  with  equal 
grossness,  and  as  I  have  proved  with  equal  falsehood, 
I  now  tell  the  editor  before  the  world,  that  on  him  will 
light  all  the  ignominy  of  this  second  outrage.  I  tell 
him,  too,  that  he  would  rather  have  foregone  half  the 
profits  of  his  unhallowed  trade  than  have  dared  to 
launch  against  any  one  of  his  brethren  of  the  gown 
the  smallest  part  of  that  scurrility  which  he  has  felt 
no  scruple  in  circulating  against  Churchmen.  To  you, 
sir,  I  make  no  apology  for  addressing  you  on  this 
occasion.  If  you  are  not  what  the  public  voice  pro- 
claims you  to  be,  the  editor  of  the  '  Review,'  you  will 
thank  me  for  thus  giving  you  an  opportunity  publicly 
to  disclaim  the  degrading  title.  If  you  are,  it  is  hence- 
forth to  me  a  matter  of  indifference  what  such  a  person 
may  think  or  say."  Nevertheless,  the  "  Edinburgh" 
spoke  generously  of  Dr.  Phillpotts  in  reference  to  his 
first  letter  to  Mr.  Canning:.  Of  this  letter  Mr.  Canninsf 
himself  said,  in  a  letter  to  the  late  Lord  Lyndhurst, 
that  it  was  a  "  stinging  pamphlet."  The  "  Edimburgh*" 

*  March,  1827. 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    KEIGN.  193 

declared  of  Dr.  Phillpotts  that  he  had  certainly  always 
been  quite  consistent,  that  he  had   always  stoutly  de- 
livered   his  sentiments    on   one    side,  and   had  justly 
acquired  the  credit  of  being  about  the  ablest  of  those 
who    espoused   that    side.     But  when  Dr.   Phillpotts 
changed,  or  appeared  to  change,  his  sentiments,  it  of 
course  considered  that  all   chances  of  reconciliation 
were  over,  and  that   its    opponent    had  forfeited  its 
praises.     The  enmity  of  the  "  Edinburgh"  attained  its 
culmination  in  1852,  when  an  article  of  deadly  import 
appeared,  characterized  by  great  ability,  and  with  a  set 
purpose  to  take  away  the  Bishop's  good  name  for  all 
time.     The  Bishop   himself  did  not  read  the  article, 
and  all  must  be  glad  that  he  spared  himself  that  pain ; 
but  informed  of  its   purport  he  wrote  a  letter  to   Sir 
Robert  Harry  luglis,  which  must  be  considered  as  his 
formal  apology  for  this  much  disputed  portion  of  his  life. 
Even  with  the  light   which   the   Bishop   has  thrown 
upon  the  transaction,  it  remains  difficult  altogether  to 
explain  or  understand  it.     The  odious  charge  made  by 
the  "  Edinburgh  Review,"  in  all  its  native  coarseness 
and  malignity,  need  not  be  discussed.     "  His  bishopric 
was  not  obtained  without  a  more  arduous  service.  The 
government  which  carried  Catholic  Emancipation  was 
a  Tory  government,  and  Tory  statesmen  naturally  de- 
sired to  avert  the  loss  of  that  clerical  support  on  which 
their  power  had  so  mainly  depended.     Accordingly, 
the  conversion  of  Dr.  Phillpotts  was  effected  at  this 
critical  juncture.     He  wrote  in  favour  of  the  bill,  and 
he  voted  for  the  author  of  the  bill  at  the  memorable 
Oxford  election  of  1829.     Those  who  are  old  enougfh 
to  remember  that  exciting  contest  will  not  have  for- 
gotten that  some  of  its   most  amusing  incidents  were 

VOL.  I.  0 


194  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

connected  with  the  name  of  Phillpotts ;  they  will  re- 
member how  the  print  shops  were  crowded  with 
caricatures  of  the  future  prelate  ;  they  will  remember 
the  indignant  aspect  of  the  rustic  pastors  as  they 
crowded  fast  and  furious  to  the  poll ;  and  how,  one 
after  another,  when  he  had  registered  his  vote  against 
'  the  traitor  Peel,'  rushed  off  to  the  engraver's  for  a 
picture  of  '  the  great  rat'  to  carry  home  to  his  parish. 
Nor  can  they  have  forgotten  that  impudent  under- 
graduate who  deliberately  stopped  the  Dean  of  Chester, 
who  was  walking  down  the  High  Street,  accosting 
him  with  extended  right  hand,  and  his  exclamation, 
'  Rat  it,  Phillpotts,  how  are  you  ?'  " 

So  far  the  Edinburgh  Reviewer.  There  can  be  no 
difficulty  in  disposing  of  the  coarser  charge.  It  had 
long  been  Dr.  Phillpotts'  decided  opinion  that  Cathohc 
Emancipation  could  not  be  withheld ;  but  he  insisted 
very  strongly  on  securities,  and  he  republished  a 
very  able  letter  to  Lord  Eldon,  in  which,  with  great 
pohtical  wisdom,  he  sketched  out  what  these  secu- 
rities ought  to  be.  He  was  closeted  on  the  subject 
with  the  Duke  of  WeUington,  and  we  all  know  that 
very  agreeable  results  are  wont  to  flow  from  such  in- 
terview's with  Premiers.  The  candidature  of  Mr.  Peel 
for  re  election  by  the  University  of  Oxford  brought 
matters  to  a  practical  test.  It  was  generally  supposed 
that  a  vote  for  Mr.  Peel  meant  a  vote  for  Catholic 
Emancipation,  and  a  vote  against  Mr.  Peel  meant  a 
vote  against  Cathohc  Emancipation,  Dr.  Phillpotts 
tried  to  combine  these  discordant  views.  He  voted 
for  Mr.  Peel,  and  at  the  same  time  he  declared  that  he 
could  not  support  an  Emancipation  Bill  unless  it  was 
accompanied  by  very  strong  securities.    The  securities 


THE    EMINENT    PKELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  195 

were  never  given,  and  Dr.  Philpotts  explicitly  told  the 
Duke  that  the  measure  in  its  adopted  shape  did  not 
commend  itself  to  his  mind.  Why,  then,  did  Dr. 
Phillpotts  vote  for  Mr.  Peel  ?  He  discarded  the  great 
question  which  was  then  agitating  the  minds  of  all 
men,  and  from  the  most  abstract  considerations  on  the 
general  character  of  a  university  seat,  and  the  general 
character  of  Mr.  Peel,  recorded  his  vote  in  favour  of 
the  attempted  re-election.  Most  religious  men  felt 
that  a  great  national  issue  was  at  stake  far  superior  to 
any  personal  consideration  for  Mr.  Peel,  and  although 
they  might  feel  the  highest  respect  for  the  great  states- 
man's character  and  abilities,  gave  their  votes  against 
him  as  their  way  of  settling  the  great  issue  pro- 
pounded to  the  University.  Dr.  Phillpotts  evaded  this 
direct  issue,  and  tortuously  gave  his  vote  upon  a  side 
wind.  Dr.  Phillpotts,  in  a  published  letter  to 
Dr.  Ellerton  of  Magdalen,  said  that  if  he  was  dis- 
satisfied with  the  terms  of  the  bill,  "  I  shall  not  be 
backward  in  joining  in  any  fit  mode  in  expressing 
dissatisfaction."  We  may  inquire  if  that  promise  was 
ever  redeemed.  Dr.  Phillpotts  distinctly  told  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  that  the  securities  were  not 
sufiicieut,  and  that  he  should  oppose  the  bill.  This 
was  the  statement  made  by  Sir  Henry  Hardinge  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  by  the  Duke  of  Welling- 
ton in  the  House  of  Lords.  A  great  injustice  was, 
therefore,  done  to  Dr.  Phillpotts ;  that,  whereas  he 
had  formerly  opposed  the  measure,  he  had  now  ratted 
and  supported  it.  A  false  issue  had  in  fact  been 
raised.  The  popular  cry  of  ratting  was  a  wrong  one, 
and  the  Bishop  reaped  the  benefit  which,  sooner 
or  later,  meets  the  man  who  has  been  persecuted  by 

0  2 


196  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEAN'S. 

a  mistaken  cry.  But  when  qualified  and  stated  in 
difi'erent  terms,  there  still  remains  a  specific  charge 
against  the  Bishop,  which  we  at  once  say  we  do  not 
see  can  be  met,  and  which  afibrded  some  justification 
for  the  outcry  raised  against  him.  Did  he  oppose  the 
bill  in  the  only  way  in  which  the  bill  could  effectually 
be  opposed,  by  voting  against  the  author  of  it  ?  Did 
he  agitate  against  the  bill,  as  he  declared  to  Dr. 
Ellerton  that  he  was  prepared  to  do  ?  or  did  he  not 
altogether  desist  from  that  agitation  in  which  he  had 
borne  so  great  a  part,  while  he  was  on  the  same  side 
with  the  Duke  and  Sir  Robert  ?  He  ceased  to  write 
and  speak  against  a  measure  which  he  condemned, 
and  the  public  not  unnaturally  assumed  that,  having 
received  a  deanery  for  his  agitation,  he  subsequently 
received  a  bishopric  for  his  quiescence.  Some  stress 
has  been  laid  upon  the  opinion  of  Lord  Eldon,  and 
certainly  the  judgment  of  that  wise  and  venerable 
mag-istrate  would  be  of  the  greatest  value  on  con- 
temporary  events.  Here  again,  in  the  heat  and  un- 
fairness of  controversy,  the  simple  facts  are  lost  sight 
of,  and  the  common  result  is  obtained,  that  each  side, 
by  trying  to  prove  too  much,  does  in  reality  prove 
too  little.  We  believe  that  the  case  stands  thus. 
Lord  Eldon  did  not  approve  of  Dr.  Phillpotts'  pro- 
cedure. It  has  been  stated  that  this  was  notorious  at 
the  time  ;  the  Bishop  appears  to  admit  it.  "  For  a 
year  or  two,"  says  the  Bishop,  "  no  intercourse  did  in 
fact  take  place.  I  was  in  the  country,  and  he  did 
not  write  to  me.  When  I  became  a  bishop,  and 
therefore  resided  in  London,  in  1831,  I  have  no 
recollection  of  actual  estrangement."  On  the  other 
hand,    it  is   quite  clear  that  the  illustrious  kinsmen 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REICx^.  107 

became   fully  recoDcilecl,    and    at    tlie   last    were    on 
affectionate  and  intimate  terras. 

In  1830  Dr.  Phillpotts  was  appointed  Bishop  of 
Exeter.  His  episcopal  letters  were  mostly  dated  from 
Bishopstowe,  a  handsome  and  well-placed  Italian 
villa,  a  few  miles  from  Torquay,  close  to  the  famous 
Anstis  Cove.  This  is  still  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
portions  of  the  Devonshire  coast,  and  suggests  still 
that  seclusion  of  woods,  and  waters,  and  downs  in 
which  poets  and  painters  so  greatly  delight.  The 
Bishop  laid  out  the  glen  with  paths,  and  furnished  it 
with  seats  and  steps  on  which  he  would  himself  often 
sit  and  watch  the  sea.  Dr.  Phillpotts  stated,  in  one 
of  his  letters  to  Lord  Macaulay,  that  Bishopstowe  is 
the  only  place  which  he  considered  his  home.  Three 
months  of  the  year,  also,  the  Bishop  made  his  resi- 
dence at  Durham,  as  Canon  Residentiary. 

In  1833,  he  delivered  his  primary  charge.  He 
commenced  by  alluding  to  the  gloom  and  darkness 
overhanging  all  established  institutions.  It  was  the 
year  which  witnessed  the  first  meeting  of  the  reformed 
Parliament,  when  political  expectations  of  sweeping 
changes  had  reached  the  highest  point,'  and  when  it 
was  well  understood  that  the  legislature  was  about 
to  deal  wdth  the  temporalities  of  the  Church.  The 
Bishop's  visitation  tour,  however,  inspired  more 
cheering  views  than  those  which  we  meet  in  the 
charge  itself.  In  a  note  to  his  published  charge,  the 
Bishop  has  a  sharp  remark  on  Earl,  then  Lord  John, 
Russell,  who  had  been  speaking  at  Teignmouth  of  the 
necessity  of  a  more  equitable  distribution  of  Church 
revenues.  "  I  cannot  but  refer  to  the  case  of  the 
vicarage   of  Tavistock.     It    is   well  known  that    the 


198  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

tithes  and  other  ecclesiastical  revenues  of  the  parish 
— nay,  by  a  rare,  perhaps  singular  assumption,  the 
vicarage  itself — are  impropriated  to  the  noble  lord's 
father,  who  enjoys  them  as  part  and  parcel  of  the 
vast  possessions  which  once  belonged  to  the  rich 
Abbey  of  Tavistock,  granted  by  Henry  YIII.  to  the 
same  Lord  John  Russell,  and  which  are  thus  the 
means  of  enabling  the  noble  lord  to  hold  up  to  the 
indignation  of  the  freeholders  of  the  county  of  Devon 
the  enormous  abuses  of  Church  revenues."  Plurali- 
ties was  another  subject  on  which  the  Bishop  spoke, 
speaking,  to  a  certain  extent,  leniently  on  the  subject, 
and  then  again  using  a  measure  of  severity  which  was 
very  edifying  in  the  case  of  one  of  the  greatest 
pluralists  of  the  age.  In  his  next  charge,  the  Bishop 
uttered  a  truly  Johnsonian  sentence  about  the  measure 
affecting  English  ecclesiastical  revenues,  which  he 
characterized  as  "  a  bill  for  seizing  on  the  revenues  of 
the  Protestant  Church  in  Ireland,  and  applying  them 
,io  some  undefined  purpose  of  teaching  morality  with- 
out religion,  and  religion  without  a  creed." 

In  the  affair  of  the  nomination  of  Dr.  Hampden  to 
the  see  of  Hereford,  the  Bishop  of  Exeter  took  a  very 
prominent  and  memorable  part.  On  the  9th  of  Decem- 
ber, 1847,  the  Bishop  received  Lord  John  Russell's 
pert  answer  to  the  memorial,  signed  by  thirteen 
prelates,  remonstrating  against  the  contemplated 
appointment.  The  very  next  day  the  Bishop  wrote 
his  celebrated  letter  to  the  Premier.  The  letter  is  a 
perfect  model  in  the  literature  of  controversy  and 
invective.  Against  Dr.  Hampden  stood  the  stain  of 
the  recorded  judgment  of  the  University  of  Oxford  on 
the  unsoundness  of  his  doctrine.     Dr.   Hampden  had 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP   TUE    REIGN.  199 

never  altered  the  views  on  which  that  judgment  was 
founded.  "  I  retract  nothing  that  I  have  written,  I 
disclaim  nothing,"  was  the  language  which  ho  used. 
The  Bishop's  famous  peroration  was,  "  Forbear, 
my  lord,  while  you  have  yet  time;  persist  not  in  your 
rash  experiment.  The  bands  of  your  vaunted  statute 
will  snap  asunder  like  withes,  if  you  attempt  to  bind 
with  them  the  strons^est  of  all  strono;  men — the  man 
who  is  streno-thened  with  inner  migrht  ao^ainst  the 
assailant  of  his  Church," 

In  the  year  1851,  the  Bishop  adopted  the  plan  of 
issuing  a  pastoral  letter,  a  course  which  he  also 
adopted  in  1854  and  1857.  "  I  venture  to  think," 
he  wrote  in  1854,  "  that  you  will  not  think  any  ex- 
planation necessary.  It  will  enable  us  to  enjoy  what 
every  Bishop  meeting  his  clergy  must  wish  to  enjoy, 
the  comfort  and  blessing  of  partaking  together  of  the 
Holy  Eucharist.  In  another  particular  I  do  not  follow 
the  precedent  of  my  last  visitation.  I  do  not  invite 
you  to  follow  it  with  a  diocesan  synod.  My  reason  is 
a  personal  one,  consideration  of  my  own  physical 
inability  to  encounter  the  fatigue  of  such  a  meeting. 
Permitted  to  reach  the  advanced  age  of  seventy-six, 
I  must  not  only  be  thankful  for  the  measure  of 
strenofth  still  vouchsafed  to  me,  but  I  must  also  be 
cautious  not  to  overtask  it.  Certainly  nothing  in  the 
experience  of  our  last  synod  could  have  made  me  less 
anxious  to  repeat  what  can  no  longer  be  called  an 
experiment,  but  a  great  success." 

That  which  will  most  and  longest  affect  the  reputa- 
tion of  the  Bishop  of  Exeter,  that  which  shook  the 
Church  of  England  to  the  foundation,  and  is  one  of 
the  great  landmarks  of  its  history,  is  unquestionably 


200  OUR   WSHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

the  Gorham  case.  The  Bishop  of  Exeter  adopted  a 
strongly  marked  line  on  behalf  of  the  Oxford  party, 
in  which,  according  to  the  judgment  of  some,  he  may 
have  advanced  a  step  too  far  in  the  debateable  ground 
which  lay  between  the  extreme  Tractarian  and  the 
Ultrmontanism  of  Roman  Catholicism.  The  Bishop 
himself  unquestionably  sought  to  abide  in  the  via 
media,  and  was  ever  ready  to  notice  and  check  any 
deviation  on  the  right  hand  or  the  left  from  the  path 
defined  by  the  Church  of  England.  Without  a  doubt, 
the  sympathies  of  an  impetuous  and  high-souled  man 
were  very  thoroughly  on  the  side  of  the  High  Church 
party,  and  enlisted  very  thoroughly  against  the  Low 
Church.  But  this  sympathy  never  resulted,  as  in  so 
many  lamentable  instances,  in  any  disloyalty  to  our 
mother,  the  Church  of  England.  He  moreover 
sought  to  do  justice  with  an  even  hand.  In  the  case 
of  Mr.  Maskell,  to  whom  he  appears  to  have  been 
bound  by  strong  affection  and  by  close  ties,  the 
Bishop  admitted  and  took  action  on  his  errors  ;  and 
Mr.  Maskell  vindicates  the  justice  of  the  Bishop's 
procedure  by  his  unhappy  perversion  to  the  Church 
of  Rome.  The  Bishop's  actions  were  guided,  without 
favour  or  partiality,  by  rigid  justice.  In  one  of  his 
letters,  in  the  very  outset  of  the  Gorham  troubles, 
the  Bishop  says  : — "  Looking  back  on  more  than 
seventeen  years,  during  which  I  have  been  permitted 
to  be  your  bishop,  while  I  have  rarely  had  reason  to 
lament  any  want  of  kindness  or  respect  on  the  part 
of  any  of  my  clergy — never  before  of  such  an  instance 
as  Mr.  Gorham's, — I  at  the  same  time  hope  that  I 
may  with  confidence  appeal  to  your  experience  of  me, 
whether  it  be  likely  that,  in  my  conduct  towards  any 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    EEIGN.  201 

of  you,  I  should  show  myself  imperious,  unkind, 
jealous  of  office,  eager  to  lay  bold  of  involuntary  or 
light  delinquency  ;  above  all,  forgetful  of  what  is  due 
to  those  whom  1  am  bound  to  regard  as  my  equals, 
many  as  my  superiors,  in  all  respects,  excepting  that 
which  invests  me,  however  unworthy,  with  authority 
over  them  in  the  Lord."  Our  own  notion  is,  at  the 
same  time,  that  Dr.  Phillpotts  considerably  over- 
stepped the  line  and  example  exhibited  by  Bishop 
Blomfield,  who  encountered  in  his  time  the  wildest 
storm  of  reproach  and  obloquy,  but  whose  conduct 
will  cause  his  name,  as  Mr.  Gladstone  has  truly  said, 
to  be  blest  to  the  latest  generation.  Mr.  Maskell 
affords  an  instance  of  the  manner  in  which  the  Bishop 
dealt,  certainly  most  tenderly,  with  extremes  on  the 
one  side ;  and  Mr.  Gorham  how  he  dealt,  certainly 
most  rigidly,  with  extremes  on  the  other  side. 

It  is  both  beyond  our  space  and  our  province  to 
enter  into  the  details  of  the  Gorham  case,  the  judg- 
ment on  which,  combined  with  the  later  cases  of 
Archdeacon  Denison  and  Messrs.  Wilson  and  Wilhams, 
clearly  establishes  that  the  Church  has  no  proper 
tribunal  in  matters  of  heresy,  and  that  her  sons  may 
wander  from  Dan  to  Beersheba  within  her  border. 
The  absolute  necessity  for  the  Bishop  to  refuse  to 
institute  Mr.  Gorham,  in  consequence  of  his  denial 
of  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration,  may  best 
be  illustrated  by  the  language  of  Bishop  Blomfield, 
who  was  not  at  first  disposed  to  consider  that  Mr. 
Gorham  had  overstepped  the  latitude  permitted  by 
the  Church.  '•  When  in  obedience  to  Her  Majesty's 
commands,"  said  the  Bishop  of  London,  "  I  attended 
the  first   meeting  of  the  Judicial  Committee,  I  had 


202  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

not  read  Mr.  Gorhara's  published  account  of  his  ex- 
amination by  the  Bishop  of  Exeter,  nor  was  I  aware 
of  the  extreme  opinions  he  avowed.  I  went  into  the 
inquiry  with  the  expectation  tliat  he  had  not  trans- 
gressed the  bounds  of  that  latitude  which  had  been 
allowed  or  tolerated  ever  since  the  Keformation.  Had 
such  proved  to  be  the  case  I  could  have  acquiesced  in 
a  judgment  which,  while  it  recognized  that  latitude, 
should  have  distinctly  asserted  the  doctrine  of  bap- 
tismal regeneration,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  words, 
to  be  the  doctrine  of  our  Church.  But  having  read 
with  great  attention  Mr.  Gorham's  publication,  I 
found  that  it  contained  assertions  wholly  irreconcila- 
ble, as  it  appears  to  me,  with  the  plain  teaching  of 
the  Church  of  England  and  of  the  Church  universal 
in  all  ages."  A  wide  consternation  overspread  a 
great  part  of  the  country  when  the  decision  of  the 
Privy  Council  was  made  known.  The  Bishop  of 
Exeter  issued  his  famous  pamphlet.  Of  this,  no  fewer 
than  four  editions  were  sold  in  a  single  day.  He 
formally  renounced  communion  with  the  Archbishop. 
He  accompanied  his  excommunication  with  language 
of  satire  and  disrespect  which  it  is  not  pleasing 
to  peruse,  and  which  did  not  serve  his  own  or  the 
Church's  cause.  From  individuals,  from  deaneries, 
from  dioceses  protests  poured  in  ;  St,  Martin's  Hall 
and  the  Freemasons'  Tavern  were  crowded  with 
monster  meetings  of  dismayed  and  excited  Church- 
men. Many  wavered  in  their  allegiance  to  the  Church, 
and  sought  to  make  the  judgment  a  pretext  for  going 
over  to  Rome.  No  one  would  have  felt  more  keenly 
than  the  Bishop  of  Exeter  the  bad  logic  and  the  bad 
faith  of  this  last  step.     "  To  leave  a  Church,"  wrote 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP    THE    EEIGN.  203 

Bishop  Blomfielrl,  "  which  is  defective,  it  may  be,  in 
discipUne,  for  one  which  is  notoriously  heretical  in 
doctrine,  is  a  strange  and  indefensible  inconsistency." 
Bishop  Phillpotts,  while  acquiescing  in  the  declared 
law  of  the  land,  has  lent  the  whole  weight  of  his 
influence  and  power  of  his  office,  to  cleanse  his  diocese 
of  what  he  considers  evil  leaven. 

The  administration  of  his  diocese,  indeed,  has 
afforded  great  scope  to  his  energies,  and  correspond- 
ing employment  to  local  and  general  critics.  That 
part  which  it  is  most  difficult  to  reconcile  w^ith  the 
received  ideas  on  such  subjects  is  the  course  which 
the  Bishop  has  pursued,  very  much  upon  a  system, 
of  allowing  the  legal  time  to  pass  away  before  con- 
firming institutions,  and  then  claiming  the  patronage 
for  himself  by  reason  of  lapse.  A  colourable  pretext 
was  not  wanting  for  each  of  these  occasions.  The 
insulting  language  used  towards  the  Bishop  in  the 
House  of  Lords,  and  elsewhere,  has  been  quoted  as 
an  ex  cathedra  judgment  on  his  character.  We  cannot 
so  regard  it.  There  is  a  sort  of  practical  justice  in 
the  fact  that  the  Bishop  who  in  his  time  has  ad- 
ministered so  many  hard  knocks  should,  in  return, 
have  experienced  so  many.  Anything  more  unfounded, 
unjust,  and  ungentlemanlike  than  some  of  these 
attacks  cannot  be  conceived.  Especially  it  is  diffi- 
cult to  read,  without  the  strono^est  feeliuof  of  indio-na- 
tion  being  stirred  up,  of  the  uncandid,  contemptuous, 
and  selfish  treatment  pursued  towards  him  by  the 
then  Lord  Seymour.  Unable  to  punish  him  by  law, 
the  Bishop  took  the  ill-advised  course  of  proceeding 
against  Latimer,  the  publisher,  in  which  an  adverse 
verdict  was   recorded  against  the  Bishop.     A  great 


204  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

deal  of  stress  has  been   laid   upon  the  verdict  of  the 

jury   in   the   case  of   the  King  verms  Latimer.     The 

Edinburgh  Reviewer   (supposed  to  be  Mr.  Conybeare) 

was   very    exultant    on   that  verdict,    and   still  more 

exultant  on  the  fact  that  the  Bishop  did  not  dare  to 

go  before   a  jury  of   his  own  cathedral  city  of  Exeter. 

It  is  unnecessary  on  the  present  occasion   to   descend 

to  any  bathos  on  the  subject  of  a  British  jury,  and  we 

are  sure  that  any   person   acquainted  ahke  -with  law 

procedure  and  popular  passions  would  attach  much 

greater  weight  to  the  opinion  of  a  judge   than  to  the 

verdict   of  the  local  jury.      The   following   was   the 

remark  of  the  judge   when  an   apphcation  was  made 

for  the  defendant's  costs,  and   by  the  judge  refused. 

"  I  do  not  think  you  would  like  a  new  trial;  you  were 

exceedingly  lucky   in    getting   the  verdict.     How   it 

was  given  I  do  not  understand  quite.     I  thought  it 

was  a  very  wrong  verdict,  I  assure  you.     Unless  the 

jury    were   misled,  one  cannot  understand   it.      You 

have  a  right  to  keep  all  you  get,  and  no  more." 

The  remarks  of  the  Bishop  of  Exeter  on  the  jury 
were  very  interesting,  as  must  be  the  remarks  of  such 
an  astute  observer  on  all  points  of  law.  The  jury  has 
been  the  palladium  of  liberty,  but  now  we  have  more 
danger  to  fear  the  tyranny  of  the  mob  than  the 
tyranny  of  the  Crown.  His  words  point  strongly  in 
this  direction.  "  If  a  new  trial  should  be  granted, 
was  I  prepared  to  go  again  before  an  Exeter  jury  ? 
Had  I  reason  to  hope  that  another  set  of  jurors  there 
would  be  found  less  prejudiced,  less  ignorant,  or  less 
wilful  than  those  who  had  pronounced  against  me  on 
the  trial  ?  The  very  plain  and  glaring  strength  of  my 
case — the  very  strength   of  the  observations   of  the 


TUE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OP    THE    EEIGN.  205 

judge  upon  it,  showed,  unhappily,  how  httle  confidence 
could  be  placed  in  such  a  jury.  Let  me  not  be  mis- 
understood. I  should  be  sorry  to  be  supposed  to  be- 
lieve that  the  majority  of  the  citizens  of  Exeter  are 
unfit  to  be  entrusted  with  the  sacred  duty  of  adminis- 
tering the  best  and  highest  privilege  of  the  subjects  of 
a  free  State.  But  this  I  say,  that  in  the  present  state 
of  society  in  England,  the  English  trial  by  jury,  in  any 
case  in  which  party  spirit  can  enter,  is  one  of  the  very 
worst  expedients  for  eliciting  a  true  judgment." 

In  tliat  unhesitating,  unswerving  adherence  to  a 
rigid  system,  in  that  direct  following  out  of  dogma  to 
its  practical  and  logical  conclusions,  in  the  keen  impa- 
tience of  the  results  arrived  at  by  other  minds,  the 
Bishop  appears  to  us  to  have  exhibited  not  those 
statesmanlike  qualities  which  we  would  desire  to  see 
associated  with,  the  episcopal  character,  nor  yet  that 
comprehensiveness,  toleration,  and  catholicity  which 
we  humbly  conceive  to  have  been  set  before  us  in  the 
words  and  the  actions  of  our  Lord  and  His  apostles. 
But  he  was  true  to  the  ideal  set  before  himself,  and, 
through  evil  report  and  good  report,  has  steadfastly 
pursued  what  commended  itself  to  his  mind  as  holy 
and  righteous  ends.  In  some  respects  he  appears  to 
have  modified  his  views,  and,  like  all  men  who  have 
lived  a  crowded  existence  on  a  busy  stage,  would  at 
last,  perhaps,  acknowledge  some  errors,  retract  some 
opinions,  regret  some  actions.  In  his  venerable  old 
age  his  life  and  example  shone  with  peculiar  and  win- 
ning- lustre.  His  care  for  his  diocese,  the  surrender 
of  a  large  part  of  his  savings  to  the  Ecclesiastical 
College,  the  gift  of  his  noble  library,  were  practical 


206  OUR   BISHOPS  AND   DEANS. 

deeds  of  which  the  most  worldly  and  callous  will 
acknowledge  the  worth. 

Those  who  abandon  ease  and  learned  leisure,  and 
the  placid  dignity  of  place  and  power,  to  vindicate  a 
shaken  cause,  and  write  their  name  on  the  memories 
of  a  Church  and  nation,  may,  indeed,  experience  some 
stain  in  that  fierce  heat  and  conflict,  and  bear  a  more 
chequered  fame  than  men  of  meek  and  holy  memory, 
but  they  have  at  least  greatly  suffered,  greatly  dared, 
greatly  achieved,  and  may  attain,  even  here,  to  a  happy 
sunset  from  a  stormy  life,  and  may  find  that  both  their 
evil  and  their  good  have  been  cleansed  and  overruled 
to  the  accomplishment  of  what  was,  through  all,  their 
highest  and  purest  aspirations. 

We  will  rapidly  refer  to  three  representative  bishops. 
Broad,  Low,  and  High ;  Bishop  Lonsdale,  however, 
rather  belonged  to  the  very  small  party  of  those  who 
have  no  party  at  all. 

He  was  one  of  the  best  scholars 
Bishop  Lonsdale,  that  Eton  ever  possessed,  and  to  the 
last  he  could  not  hear  any  insinuation 
against  that  immaculate  institution.  Dr.  Goodall  said 
he  was  the  best  scholar  he  ever  had,  and  his  academic 
reputation,  especially  for  his  Latin,  would,  without  a 
mitre,  have  been  permanent.  He  was  a  man  of  a  fine, 
broad,  healthy  mind,  full  of  kindness,  simplicity,  and 
cheerfulness.  He  owed  his  elevation  at  the  hands  of 
Sir  Robert  Peel,  a  statesman  to  whom  he  was  deeply 
attached,  entirely  to  the  high  character  he  had  gained 
in  previous  employments.  Sir  Robert's  letter,  offering 
him  the  employment,  was  handed  up  to  him  one  Sun- 
day morning  while  preaching  at  the   Savoy  Chapel. 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  207 

He  used  to  laus^h  at  his  rigrht  reverend  brethren  who 
owed  their  seats  to  political  connexion,  and  had  to 
hurry  down  to  the  House  because  they  received  notes 
from  the  Treasury.  No  notes  from  the  Treasury  ever 
came  to  him. 

lo  early  life  the  Bishop  was  fond  of  shooting ;  to 
the  last  year  of  his  life  he  continued  to  fish.  He 
relished  a  theatrical  entertainment,  and  saw  no  reason 
why  clergymen — and  even  bishops — should  not  enjoy 
it.  "  But  so  long  as  the  world  thinks  it  safer  for 
young  ladies  than  for  bishops  to  take  their  chances  of 
being  corrupted  by  the  theatre,  he  would  by  no  means 
offend  the  world."  When  he  studiously  entered 
memoranda  at  the  end  of  his  pocket-book,  these  were 
chiefly  the  names  of  flowers  which  he  had  seen  in  his 
visits,  and  meant  to  order  for  his  own  garden.  He 
was  a  man  with  great  capabilities  for  enjoyment,  and 
who  always  looked  upon  life  on  its  sunny  side,  with  a 
keen  sense  of  humour ;  one  who  liked  and  could  tell  a 
good  story.  And  yet  he  was  a  man  of  boundless 
charity  and  self-denial;  a  man  of  deep  and  real 
sanctity  of  character. 

His  work  was  enormous.  His  son-in-law,  who 
wrote  his  biography,  calculates  that  he  wrote  some 
one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  letters  during  his 
episcopate.  They  relate  to  all  kinds  of  subjects. 
One  clergyman  writes  to  him  repeatedly  concernino- 
his  scruples  about  the  Baptismal  service.  Another 
clergyman,  living  in  a  rectory,  wrote  six  sheets  of 
paper  to  complain  that  the  rector  had  not  left  sheets 
for  his  bed  as  he  had  promised.  The  specimens  of 
correspondence  given  in  the  biography  are  remarkably 
meagre.     We  are,  however,   by  no  means  surprised  at 


208  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

this.  Comparatively  speaking,  in  very  few  of  these 
letters  would  he  ever  turn  over  the  first  page  of  his 
sheet  of  note-paper.  We  ourselves  have  seen  various 
of  the  Bishop's  letters ;  they  have  a  common  cha- 
racter, and  when  one  or  two  are  printed  we  really  see 
them  all.  The  Bishop  excelled  in  writing  a  particular 
kind  of  letter.  It  was  the  short  letter,  semi-friendly, 
semi-official,  always  terse  and  definite  to  the  matter 
in  hand,  and  expressed  in  a  graceful,  complimentary, 
and  even  touching  way.  He  seems  to  have  had  a  kind 
of  gratification  in  writing  letters  of  this  kind,  similar 
to  the  gratification  of  penning  longs  and  shorts  in  his 
Eton  days.  The  letters  at  last  became  a  tremendous 
drag  on  him,  but  he  could  not  be  persuaded  to  relin- 
quish them,  although  we  should  think  that  they  were 
just  the  kind  of  letters  which  a  secretary  would  dash 
off"  by  scores  at  his  dictation.  He  was  a  man  of 
singularly  catholic  and  tolerant  views  ;  he  was  free 
from  party  spirit  himself;  and  this  was  also  very 
much  the  case  with  his  diocese.  He  conciliated  an 
immense  amount  of  personal  esteem  and  affection. 
One  of  his  last  public  acts  was  his  presiding,  with 
singular  efficacy  and  good  taste,  at  the  Wolverhamp- 
ton Church  Congress  ;  and  one  of  his  last  conversations 
with  his  son-in-law  related  to  the  controversy  between 
the  Bible  and  Science.  The  Bishop  was  not  a  scientific 
man  ;  in  fact,  he  carried  his  disregard  of  science  to  a 
regrettable  extent;  but,  as  Mr.  Denison  truly  says, 
"  though  he  did  not  profess  to  understand  science,  no 
man  knew  better  than  he  did  the  difference  between 
sound  and  unsound  reasoning." 

Lonsdale    was  originally   intended  for   the   bar,  of 
which  there  are  other  extant  episcopal  instances.     He 


THE    EMINENT   TRRLATES    OF    THE    EEIGN.  209 

had  some  friendships  with  great  lawyers,  and  he  was 
often  to  be  seen  at  the  high  table  at  Lincoln's  Inn. 
He  was  a  sound  lawyer  ;  not  such  a  keen  lawyer  as 
the  Bishop  of  Exeter,  who  might  have  been  lord  chan- 
cellor, but  probably  a  much  sounder  one.  Even  among 
the  lawyers  he  often  showed  himself  the  best  man  in 
company,  socially.  Here  is  a  story  which  he  particu- 
larly enjoyed.  "  A  blustering  man  in  a  railway  carriage 

said,  '  I  should  like  to  meet  that   Bishop  of ,  I'd 

put  a  question  to  him  that  would  puzzle  him.'  '  Very 
well,'  said  a  voice  out  of  another  corner,  '  then   now 

is  your  time,  for  I  am   the  Bishop   of '  [it  may 

easily  be  guessed  who].  The  man  was  rather  startled, 
but  presently  recovered,  and  said,  '  Well,  my  lord,  can 
you  tell  me  the  way  to  heaven  ?'  '  Nothing  is  easier,' 
answered  the  Bishop ;  '  you  have  only  to  turn  to  the 
right  and  go  straight  forward.'  " 

We  will  ourselves  mention,  from  our  own  resources. 
a  fragment  of  episcopal  ana  which  may  be  taken  as  a 
contribution  to  the  biography  of  the  unnamed  prelate. 
We  guarantee  the  anecdote,  which  we  could  give  with         ^ 
names  and  locality.   One  day  the  Bishop  and  his  Arch-    ^  ^  L'XjJju^ 
deacon,  in  the  course  of  an  episcopal  tour,  came  to  the    /At^  >|lm^ 
house  of  a  country  gentleman,  where  they  were  most      <    ' .    ,- 
hospitably  received.     We  are   sure  of  the  hospitality, 
for  our  own  legs  have  reposed  beneath  that  excellent 
mahogany.     At  dinner  the  Archdeacon  was  to  be  ob- 
served engaged  in   a  little    cosy  chat  with  the  lady 
of  the  house.     The  Bishop,  with  the  complaisant  and 
graceful  badinage  of  which   he  was  a  master,  insisted 
on  being  allowed  to  participate  in  the  apparent  secret. 
The  Archdeacon  informed  the  Bishop  that  their  good 
hostess,  Mrs.  R- ,  was  famous  for  the  composition 

VOL.  I.  p 


210 


OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 


of  cake,  and  that  she  generally  furnished  him  with  one 
when  he  came  upon  his  travels.  Whereupon  the  pre- 
late, with  most  winning  smiles,  professed  himself  to 
be  a  great  lover  of  cake,  and  begged  to  be  allowed  to 
become  a  petitioner  for  the  same.  That  most  kindly 
lady  assented  with  the  greatest  pleasure,  and  she  and 
her  maidens  were  busied  in  preparing  one  of  their 
choicest  cakes  for  the  illustrious  diocesan.  The  next 
morning,  as  the  Bishop's  carriage  rolled  away  from  the 
ancient  residence,  the  right  reverend  foot  came  into 
colhsion  with  a  parcel  in  the  carriage.  "  What's  this  ?" 
cried  the  bishop ;  "  that  woman's  cake,  I  suppose." 
And  leaving  the  unknown  language  to  the  imagination 
of  .the  reader,  I  can  only  say  that  the  unlucky  cake 
was  contemptuously  hurled  through  the  window  to 
the  earth.  It  so  happened  that  the  park  was  not 
cleared  at  the  time  when  this  act  was  done,  and  the 
hospitable  lady  was  able  to  ascertain  the  fate  of  the 
kindly-meant  present.  I  need  scarcely  say  that  there 
were  no  more  hospitahties  there  for  the  Bishop,  and 
the  story  will  hardly  ever  be  forgotten  in  that  part  of 
the  country. 

His  biographer  discusses  the  subject  of  good  Bishop 
Lonsdale's  exercise  of  his  patronage.  He  greatly 
praises  it,  and  yet  withal  he  takes  exception  to  it.  The 
Bishop  laid  down  a  rigid  rule  not  to  promote  any  man 
who  had  not  served  in  his  diocese.  The  result  of  this 
was  that  he  was  unable  to  promote  a  man  who  was 
worthy  of  being  promoted,  and  whose  promotion  he 
desired.  This  was  a  mistake.  To  wise  men  rules  are 
aids  and  helps,  but  they  do  not  make  themselves  the 
unreasoning  slaves  of  rules.  In  other  respects  the 
Bishop's  patronage  seems  to  us  to  have  been  unsatis- 


THE    EMINENT    PRELATES    OF    THE    RETGX.  211 

factory.     He  liad  a  weakness  for  men  of  family  and 
Avealth.    We  remember  a  case  where  the  Bishop  passed 
over  the  laborious  and  poor  curate  of  a  parish  to  give 
the  incumbency  to  a  young  man  of  great  social  qualifi- 
cations.    The  latter  became  a  regular  absentee,  and  all 
the  work  was  done  by  the  poor  curate.     Dr.  Lonsdale 
probably  had  the  notion,  which  is  said  to  be   strong 
with  some  bishops,  that  they   support  the   church  by 
giving    their    preferment    to    wealthy    men.     Bishop 
Lonsdale  most  completely  illustrated   the  wise  motto 
of  his    predecessor,    Hacket :    "  Serve    God,    and  be 
cheerful." 

"  Little    do    they     guess,"     wrote 
Bishop  Stanley.    Bishop   Stanley,    "  how    engrossed   I 
am  altogether  on  one  sole  object — the 
spiritual   and    temporal   welfare  of  the  diocese.     By 
night,  in   my   many   working  hours,  the  work  of  my 
mind  is  how  and  what  can  be  done  by  us  to  promote 
the  end  for  which  I  accepted  a  situation  for  which,   in 
every  other  point,  1  feel  myself  so  unqualified  and  unfit. 
I  accepted  it  with  a  determination  not  to  make  it  a 
source  of  profit  to  myself,  or  patronage  for  others,  it 
being  my  unshaken  determination  to   expend  not  only 
the  whole  proceeds  of  the  emoluments  on  the  diocese, 
but  the  greater  part  of  my  private  fortune  also  ;  saving 
little  or  nothing  more  than  it  was  my  wish  to  do  at 
Alderley  :  that,  with  regard  to  patronage,  no  motives 
of  private  interest,  or  mere  connexion  or  formal  friend- 
ship, should  sway  me  in  giving  preferments;  and  that 
the  names  hitherto    on  my  list  consist   of  individuals 
known  to  me  only  by  respectability  and  fitness  for  the 
situations  to   which  I  could  appoint  them.     Such  are 

p  2 


212  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

the  feelings  witli  which  I  accepted  the  office  of  a 
bishop,  on  such  I  have  acted  hitherto  ;  and  God  grant 
that  nothing  may  induce  me  to  depart  from  principles 
which  will  alone  justify  me  in  entering  on  a  line  of  life 
and  arduous  responsibilities,  drawing  me  away  from 
pursuits  and  tastes  with  which  my  habits  were  far 
more  congenial." 

Such  were  the  views,  now  happily  more  common 
than  they  were  forty  years  ago,  with  which  Bishop 
Stanley  entered  upon  the  labours  of  his  enormous 
diocese.  Many  still  recollect  the  demoralized  con- 
dition of  things  that  prevailed  during  the  rule  of 
Bishop  Bathurst.  Bishop  Bathurst  had  left  a  great 
deal  of  special  work  as  an  inheritance  to  any  eccle- 
siastical Eeformer,  but  beyond  that  Bishop  Stanley 
went  in  for  special  work  as  a  Liberal  bishop.  "  I 
came  into  the  diocese,"  he  said,  "  not  with  the  expec- 
tation of  finding  it  a  bed  of  roses,  but  rather  a  bed  of 
thorns ;  but  my  greatest  trials  arose  from  those  of  the 
clergy  who  are  loudest  in  their  cry  of  '  The  Church 
in  danger,'  but  who  never  do  anything  to  keep  it 
from  danger."  Bishop  Stanley  truly  said  that  his  heart 
was  in  his  diocese,  and  he  used  to  say  that  a  bishop 
should  always  be  at  his  post  in  the  chief  city  of  his 
diocese.  He  refused  to  take  a  pleasant  retreat  a  few 
miles  from  Norwich,  and  was  always  working  away 
among  the  schools  and  poor  of  the  great  city.  He 
would  go  amid  the  back  yards  and  alleys  and  talk  with 
the  poorest  of  the  poor.  Lord  Shaftesbury  says  that 
he  was  the  first  bishop  who  took  up  the  cause  of  the 
Ragged  Schools.  One  night  there  was  a  gathering  of 
ragged  children  in  the  depths  of  Lambeth,  and  the 
Bishop  of  Norwich  came  in  and  sat  down  by  his  side. 


THE    EMINENT   PRELATES    OF    THE    REIGN.  213 

"  I  saw  your  name,"  he  said,  "  on  a  placard,  and  I  in- 
stantly determined  to  attend — for  wherever  you  go  I 
will  go  too."  The  Bishop  made  himself  famous  by 
entertaining  Jenny  Lind  when  she  came  to  sing  at  a 
Norwich  concert.  When  Jenny  Lind  retired  from  the 
operatic  stage  it  was  generally  asserted  that  she  had 
been  induced  to  do  so  by  Dr.  Stanley.*  It  was  a 
great  instance  of  his  liberality  when  he  preached  a 
funeral  sermon  in  Norwich  Cathedral  on  the  unbap- 
tized  Quaker,  Joseph  John  Gurney.  "  The  funeral 
service  of  the  chief  of  English  Quakers  was  virtually 
celebrated,  not  at  the  time  or  place  of  his  interment,  in 
the  retired  burial  ground  of  the  Gilden-croft,  but  on 
the  preceding  Sunday,  in  the  stately  cathedral  which 
he  never  frequented,  and  with  the  mufSed  peals  and 
solemn  strains  of  which  he  condemned  the  use.  And 
his  funeral  sermon  was  preached  on  the  same  day,  not' 
by  any  favoured  minister  amongst  his  own  admiring 
disciples,  but  by  a  prelate  of  that  Established  Church 
which  he  had  through  life,  so  far  as  his  gentle  nature 
permitted  him,  opposed  and  controverted." 

We  hardly  know  a  more  beautiful 
Bishop  Hamilton,  portraiture  than  that  which  Canon 
Liddon  gives  us  of  the  late  Bishop 
Hamilton  of  Salisbury.  "  Our  Bishop,  sir  !"  said  a 
resident,  "  lived  here  so  long  that  he  is  less  like  a 
bishop  than  one  of  ourselves."  In  troubled  times  the 
Bishop  used  to  say  that,  however  men  might  speak  of 
him  elsewhere,  the  Salisbury  people  would  never  mis- 
understand him.  By  a  natural  gradation  which  has 
more  of  practical  justice  about  it  than  generally  falls  to 

*  "  Musical  Recollections  of  the  Last  Half  Century." 


214  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

such  arrangements,  from  canon  and  bishop's  chaplain 
he  became  bishop  himself.  A  friend  of  his  says, 
"  Once  before,  taking  leave  for  a  longer  time  than 
usual,  I  remember  going  with  him  by  moonlight  into 
the  cathedral  and  there  praying  that  God  would 
supply  what  was  wanting  in  the  Church  among  us, 
and  preserve  her  from  the  perils  that  must  beset  her." 
It  was  his  practice  on  Sunday  to  invite  six  or  eight 
poor  people  to  dinner.  About  a  hundred  poor  people 
were  invited  to  dinner  on  some  day  near  to  the  Feast 
of  the  Epiphany,  an  occasion  to  which  the  Bishop  and 
his  family  looked  forward  with  delight,  as  they  rejoiced 
to  wait  upon  these  humble  guests.  He  was  essen- 
tially the  bishop  of  the  poor.  He  recognized  that  they 
had  the  first  claim  upon  the  servants  of  Christ,  and 
he  considered  that  the  aristocratic  character  of  the 
Church,  was  in  truth  one  of  her  misfortunes.  He 
never  left  his  cathedral  city,  unless  for  a  short 
Autumn  hoHday,  except,  of  course,  when  called 
away  by  diocesan  business.  The  Bishop  was  occa- 
sionally very  much  perplexed  as  to  the  degree  in 
which  he  ought  to  allow  his  diocesan  work  to  be  in- 
terfered with  by  duties  in  the  House  of  Lords.  It  is 
unnecessary  to  say  that  he  regarded  the  temporal 
decorations  attached  to  his  See  by  the  State,  as  a 
mere  adjunct  to  the  great  spiritual  commission  which 
he  held  under  Christ  our  Lord  ;  and  that  his  imagina- 
tion was  never  for  one  moment  dazzled  by  the  social 
and  wor\dlj  prestige  which  may  attach  to  a  seat  in 
the  Legislature.  But  it  was  a  vexed  question  with  his 
conscience  how  far  he  ought  to  sacrifice  other  claims 
to  the  opportunities  which  were  thus  placed  within 
his  reach.     As  a  matter  of  fact  he   seldom  or  never 


THE    EMINENT   PEELATES    OF   THE    EEIGN.  215 

appeared  in  the  House  of  Lords,  except  when  the 
interests  of  rehgion  or  morals  appeared  to  him  to  be 
at  stake.  There  was  no  danger  of  mistaking  his 
house  for  a  nobleman's  residence.  People  thought  he 
showed  an  excessive  indifference  to  the  social  respect 
of  his  position.  After  the  first  year  or  two  of  his 
episcopate  he  gave  up  his  carriage.  His  hospitable 
door  always  stood  open  to  clergy  and  laity.  While 
the  Bishop  abstained  most  carefully  from  making  any 
outlay  upon  objects  which  might  savour  of  personal 
ostentation,  he  carried  his  simple  unrestricted  hospi- 
tality to  the  very  verge  of  imprudence,  if  not  beyond 
it. 

Very  touching  is  the  account  of  the  way  in  which 
high  preferment  came  to  him.  Before  he  passed 
away.  Bishop  Denison  dictated  a  message  to  Lord 
Aberdeen,  who  was  at  that  time  Prime  Minister,  to 
the  effect  that  in  the  judgment  of  a  man,  now  almost 
in  the  act  of  dying,  Mr.  Hamilton  would  be  of  all 
others  best  able  to  carry  on  the  work  of  Christ  in  the 
diocese.  Lord  Aberdeen  felt  that  to  yield  at  once 
might  create  a  precedent  which  would  interfere  with 
the  free  exercise  of  the  Crown's  choice  as  patron. 
He  passed  a  sleepless  night ;  it  was  impossible  to 
entertain  Bishop  Denison's  petition.  The  See  was 
accordingly  offered  to  the  Rev.  J.  H.  Blunt,  the 
eminent  Margaret  Professor  of  Divinity  at  Cam- 
bridofe.  Professor  Blunt  was  three  times  uro-ed  to 
accept  the  position,  but  he  declined  on  the  ground 
that,  although  then  in  fair  health,  he  was  too  old  to 
make  an  eflBcient  bishop  for  more  than  a  short  while. 
The  Premier  then  felt  himself  at  liberty  to  do  that 
which  he  would  have  done  in  the  first  instance,  if  his 


216  OUR   BISHOPS  AND    DEANS. 

sense  of  duty  to  the  Crown  had  permitted  it ;  and 
Bishop  Denison's  dying  message  was  obeyed.  "  Cer- 
tainly to  no  one  did  that  summons  cause  surprise 
more  complete,  or  more  unaffected  and  keen  distress, 
than  to  the  man  who  was  concerned.  The  interval  of 
painful  deliberation — the  determination  to  say  '  No ' 
at  once — the  influences  which  were  brought  to  bear 
on  him — that  agonizing  walk  up  and  down  in  front 
of  Lord  Aberdeen's  house — the  final  yielding;  all 
these  he  has  often  described,  even  with  tears,  to 
friends  who  could  sympathise  and  understand." 

We  now  come  to  one  more  prelate,  whose  work  and 
position  in  the  Church  were  so  remarkable  that  he 
claims  a  chapter  to  himself. 


217 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP   WINCHESTER. 

THE  future  historian,  who  shall  endeavour  to  give 
some  conception  of  the  career  and  character  of 
the  most  celebrated  Anglican  bishop  of  the  last  two 
centuries,  will  assuredly  be  embarrassed,  not  by  the 
scantiness,  but  by  the  multiplicity  and  variety  of  the 
materials.  Bishop  Wilberforce  was  in  truth  a  many- 
sided  man.  In  that  active  and  crowded  career 
several  distinct  careers  are  virtually  comprised. 
In  the  management  of  two  very  important  dioceses 
he  exhibited  an  administrative  ability  and  an  energy 
of  character  which,  as  a  rule,  have  not  often  been 
paralleled  in  the  English  episcopate.  In  the  House 
of  Lords  he  gave  an  attention  to  politics — using 
the  word  in  the  highest  and  most  favourable  sense — ■ 
which  has  been  exceeded  by  few  of  our  hereditary 
legislators,  and  not  by  many  of  our  trained  and 
veteran  statesmen.  As  a  writer,  his  active  and  ver- 
satile pen  was  constantly  challenging  the  attention  of 
the  English  public.  As  one  of  the  most  prominent 
members  of  our  English  society,  whether  on  the 
public  platform  or  in  the  private  drawing-room,  he  was 
a  great  social  power.    Corresponding  to  this  variety  of 


218  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

cliaracters,   are   those  multiplied  departments  of  cur- 
rent public  life  in    which   men  continually  recognised 
his   presence.     He  published  more   than  one  volume 
of  sermons  preached  before  the  Queen,  in  those  early 
days   after  her   accession,    when  his    influence   must 
have   been    considerable    on    the     royal    mind.      He 
preached  many  sermons  before  the  University,  where 
many  hundred    men,  the  very   crown   and    flower  of 
English  youth,  hung   upon  his  lips.     If  you   make  a 
point  of  studying  Hansard,  or   even  of  running  over 
the  Parliamentary  reports,  you  see  how  large  a  space 
he  occupied  in  the  government  of  the  country.     Now 
he  was  speaking  at  great  public  entertainments,   such 
as  the  dinners  of  the  Literary  Fund  or   of  the  Royal 
Academy.     Again,  as   the    Squire    of    the    village    of 
Lavington.  he  was  pleasantly  haranguing  the  rustics 
on  the  green  or  in  the  tent.     Now  he  was  addressing 
on  a  week-day  crowds  of  labourers  in   a  church   or 
under  a  railway  shed.     Presently  he  was  away  in  the 
north,  in  Yorkshire,   opening  that  gorgeous  fane  with 
which  the  zeal  and  piety  of  Mr.  Akroyd  have  adorned 
Halifax.    Again,  he  was  down  in  Kent,  preaching  twice 
on   a   Sunday,  at    the    opening   of  a   humble   district 
church.    Again,  he  was  busy,  with  superhuman  energy, 
in  his  diocese,  learning  the   details  of  every   parish, 
studying  the  character  of  every  clergyman,  entertain- 
ing them  at  Cuddesden,  or  meeting  them  in  Conference 
at  Oxford.     He  was  the  lion  of  the  great  dinner  party. 
He  was  the  leading  speaker  at  the  public  meeting.    He 
was  the  ruling  member  of  a  Church  Congress.    He  was 
the  most   active   member    of  the  Convocation  of  his 
province.     He  was  holding  a  confirmation  in  Paris. 
He  was  consecrating  a  church  in  Brussels.    In  the  prin- 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  219 

cipal  uewspapers,  in  the  reporbs  of  societies,  in  blue- 
books,  in  correspondence,  in  pamphlets,  in  current 
literature,  in  all  contemporary  history,  we  again  and 
again  meet  him.  That  comprehensive  mind  was  equally 
familiar  with  the  greatest  principles  and  the  slightest 
details.  At  one  time  he  was  aidiug  in  the  attempt  to 
uphold  or  destroy  a  ministry,  or  stamping  the  impress 
of  his  character  on  the  debates  and  legislation  of  his 
country ;  at  another  time  he  was  objurgating  dull-headed 
churchwardens,  or  demolishing  a  libellous  alderman. 
He  was  a  kind  of  universal  Bishop,  an  untitled  metro- 
politan. His  labours  in  correspondence  were  of  a 
truly  tremendous  character.  All  kinds  of  people 
wrote  to  him,  and  every  correspondent  seemed  to 
receive  a  full  and  careful  answer.  He  would  dictate 
seven  letters  at  a  time,  resembling  the  marvellous 
chessplayers  who  can  play  seven  games  at  once  blind- 
folded. Few  men,  speaking  metaphorically,  lived  more 
in  the  open  air  than  Bishop  Wilberforce.  He  was 
essentially  a  public  man,  and  his  history  is  to  be  read 
in  public  documents.  Wherever  Christian  work  was 
most  animated  and  intense — wherever  the  conflict  of 
opinions  was  keenest — wherever  debate  was  most  ex- 
cited— wherever  bold  and  burning  speech  and  prompt 
action  were  most  needed,  there  the  form  of  this  bril- 
liant prelate  was  most  prominently  to  be  discerned. 

It  would  be  difiicult,  with  facts  at  will,  to  invent  a 
more  illustrious  pedigree  for  the  Bishop  than  that  to 
which  he  was  heir.  We  all  remember  the  noble  lines 
of  the  poet  Cowper,  a  man  of  splendid  lineage — 

"  My  boast  is  not  that  I  deduce  my  birtli 
From  loins  enthroned  and  rulers  of  the  earth, 
But  higher  far  my  proud  pretensions  rise. 
The  son  of  parents  passed  into  the  skies." 


220  OUE  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

No  accidental  distinction  of  birth  could  be  so  grate- 
ful and  honourable  as  to  be  descended  from  a  man 
whose  memory  will  evermore  be  venerated  and  beloved 
throughout  Christendom,  William  Wilberforce.  The 
student  of  the  "  Life  of  Wilberforce  "  will  remember 
some  touching  letters  addressed  to  his  sons,  among 
which  a  comparison  of  dates  will  enable  us  to  recog- 
nize those  to  the  future  prelate.  Thus,  on  one 
occasion,  does  the  "old  man  eloquent"  express  his 
aspirations  : — "  Mj  course  must  be  nearly  out ;  though 
perhaps  it  may  please  God,  who  has  hitherto  caused 
goodness  and  mercy  to  follow  me  all  my  days,  to 
allow  me  to  see  my  dear  sons  entered  upon  the  ex- 
ercise of  their  several  professions,  if  there  are  several. 
But  how  glad  shall  I  be,  if  they  all  can  conscientiously 
enter  the  ministry,  the  most  useful  and  honourable  of 
all  human  employments."  His  father  gave  him  a 
name  designing  that,  in  the  fullest  sense,  he  should 
be  dedicated  to  the  Master's  service.  At  least  in 
respect  to  one  of  these,  howbeit  for  a  season  there 
rested  a  darkness  over  the  career  of  others,  this 
wish  received  an  ample  accomplishment.  At  all 
seasons  the  gifted  son  was  true  to  the  memory 
of  his  illustrious  and  holy  father.  Ever  and  again  in 
the  spoken  words  of  that  son  we  meet,  as  well  we 
may,  with  exultant  allusion,  which  is  allowable 
enough,  and  the  absence  of  which  would  be  passing 
strange.  Who  else  was  there  in  England  who  could 
say  amid  the  testifying  acclaims  of  an  excited  audience 
— "He  who  then  led  in  every  such  question  of 
humanity  and  of  truth — my  own  honoured  and  be- 
loved father  ;"  or  again  in  the  pulpit  of  his  University 
— "  History  must  speak  what  a  son's  reverence  would 


THE    LATE    P-ISHOP   OF   WINCHESTER.  221 

rather  muse  upon  in  silence — wlio  had  learned  to  live 
for  others,  and  had  received  from  God's  hands  the 
clientship  of  tortured  Africa."  It  is  an  association  to 
be  added  to  the  Pitts  and  Cannings,  those  fathers  and 
sons,  worthy  of  the  glorious  hall  and  of  the  sacred 
abbey ;  his  father  the  great  ornament  of  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  the  son  the  great  ornament  of  the 
House  of  Lords. 

We  have  mentioned  the   "  Life   of  Wilberforce  by 
his  Sons,"  and  those  who  would  desire  to  learn  those 
particulars  of  family  and  ancestry  which   are  proper 
to  a  regular  biography,  such  as  we  do  not  profess  to 
furnish,  will  find  some  interesting  particulars  in  that 
work,  e.g.,  that  the  line   was   one   of  an  old    untitled 
Euo-lish  stock   settled  for   centuries  at  the  village  of 
Wilberfoss,    in    Yorkshire.     And  though  Sussex  be- 
came the  county  of  his   adoption — where  his  private 
estate  was  situated — the  Bishop  still  claimed  to  be  a 
son  of  that  mighty  county  which  is  no  inconsiderable 
kingdom  in  itself     "  It  is  a   great  pleasure  to  me," 
once  said   the   Bishop  at   Brighton,  after  distributing 
the  prizes  at  a  university  local  examination ;  "  it  is 
a  great   pleasure  to  me,  as,   through  the  dispensation 
of  Providence,  I  am  by  adoption  a  Sussex  man,  to 
know  that   in    these    examinations  Sussex  has  been 
once  at  the  top  of  the  tree,  and  has  been  three  times 
second  in  the  order  of  merit.     But  yet  you  must  let 
me  have  a  Yorkshireman's  feelings    when    you   talk 
about  Sheffield.      I  am  a  Yorkshireman,  bred  from 
generations    of    Yorkshiremen,    and    can     therefore 
sympathize  with  those  sharp,  struggling,  hard-work- 
ing,   masterly   Yorkshiremen."      He     was    a    native 
neither  of  Sussex  nor  of  Yorkshire,  but  was  born  at 


222  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

Clapham.     It   would  be  tempting  to   speak  of  what 
may  be  called  that  really  great  and  historical  Clapham, 
in  which  his  youthful  days  were   cast,  but  Sir  James 
Stephen    has   fully    done    all    that   in    his    admirable 
"  Essays  in   Ecclesiastical  Biography."      At  Oxford, 
w^hen  a  young  man,    he  took   high  double   honours, 
and  became   Fellow  of  Oriel  at  a  time  when  to  be 
Fellow  of  Oriel  was  one  of  the  sublimest  of  University 
distinctions.     Among   those   unacknowledged   orders 
of  eminence  of  which  the   University  takes  no   official 
cognizance,    but  which   are    none   the   less   real  and 
acknowledged  by  University  society,   Wilberforce   of 
Oriel  took   also    foremost  rank.     He  was   one  of  the 
great  lights  of  the  Union,  in   those  palmy  days  which 
have  become  historical.     In  the  reports  of  that  noble 
society  you  see  the  subjects  on   which   he   spoke  and 
those  which  he   brought  forward,  and  the  training  in 
eloquence  obtained  at  Oxford   seldom  fails  a  man  in 
more  advanced  life.     His  father  had  carefully  prepared 
him  for  public  speaking  in  much  the  same  way  as  the 
elder  Pitt  had  prepared  the  younger  Pitt.     There  is 
no   subject  that  crops   up  oftener  in  University    de- 
bating clubs  than  the  question  of  the  Great  Rebellion, 
and    of  the    execution    of    Charles    the    First.     The 
Oxford  feeling,    as   I  well  recollect,  was  always  un- 
mistakeably  loyal.     William  Wilberforce,  against  the 
popular  feeling,    spoke   in   favour   of  Hampden    and 
against  Charles  the  First.     He  also  became  a  member 
of  that  debatino;  club   which  Mr.   John   Stuart  Mill 
formed  on   the  model  of  the   Speculative   Society   at 
Edinburgh,   which   became  a  great  arena  for   "  Tory 
lawyers"  and  "  philosophic  Radicals."     In  those  days 
Wilberforce  would  rank  as   a  "  philosophic  Radical," 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP    WINCHESTER.  223 

although  ultimately  his  practical  genius  moved  him 
far  from  any  alhance  with  doctrinaires.  A  brilliant 
political  career  might  have  been  possible  for  one  of 
so  many  talents,  and  of  such  powerful  connections. 
But  he  entered  the  Church,  and  so  satisfied  the 
longing  of  his  aged  parent.  He  was  ordained  by 
Bishop  Lloyd  of  Oxford,  and  his  first  curacy  was 
thus  in  his  own  future  diocese,  at  the  remote  village 
of  Crittenden,  "  where  his  name  is  still  remembered 
with  affection  by  the  aged  poor."  It  so  happened 
in  this  exceptional  case  that  the  path  of  duty  and 
devotedness  was  compatible  with  some  of  the  most 
splendid  human  distinctions. 

While  with  the  great  mass  of  our  clergy  life  is  very 
much  a  matter  of  unvarying  routine,  removed  far 
from  the  large  hopes  and  large  excitement  of  the 
senate  and  the  bar,  often  enough  a  struggle  on  petty 
means  for  petty  interests,  of  course  considered  apart 
from  those  supreme  interests  and  supreme  considera- 
tions which  dignify  the  littleness  and  console  the 
unhappiness  of  a  laborious  and  harassed  life,  other 
Churchmen  there  are  who  meet  with  as  sudden  and 
splendid  gradations  of  fortune  as  can  be  encountered 
in  any  path  of  secular  Hfe.  They  rapidly  become 
Very  Reverend,  Right  Reverend,  and  Most  Reverend ; 
happy,  indeed,  if  such  a  one  is  prospering  as  his  soul 
prospers.  It  is  a  consoling  thought,  it  is  a  sign  that 
the  Holy  Catholic  Church  is  ruled  and  governed  in 
the  right  way,  that,  as  a  general  rule,  in  this  our 
age  of  our  Church,  those  attain  her  wealth  and  rank 
who  seem  best  fitted  to  withstand  the  heat  of  that 
fierce  sunshine.  The  subject  of  this  remark  is  an 
instance  of  such  rapid  advancement.     Passing  from 


224  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

the  living  of  Brightstone  in  the  Isle  of  Wight  he 
obtained  the  wealthy  living  of  Alverstoke ;  he  became 
Canon  of  Winchester,  Archdeacon  of  Surrey,  then 
Dean  of  Westminster,  and  then  Bishop  of  Oxford. 
Prescription  made  him  Chancellor  of  the  Most  Noble 
Order  of  the  Garter,  and  the  favour  of  his  Sovereign 
Lord  High  Almoner.  His  University  made  him 
Bampton  Lecturer  and  Select  Preacher.  But  he  first 
comes  very  prominently  before  us  as  a  public  man 
when  he  relinquished  his  country  living  for  the 
Deanery  of  Westminster,  to  be  exchanged  in  the 
course  of  a  few  months  for  the  Bishopric  of  Oxford. 

His  early  work  in  the  diocese  of  Winchester 
was  very  interesting,  and  it  is  remarkable  how  in 
his  last  days  he  gathered  up  the  broken  thread  of 
his  earhest.  His  Alverstoke  work,  though  least 
before  the  public,  was  that  which  was  most  fertile  in 
effort  and  most  remarkable  in  his  own  history.  He 
had  just  lost  his  wife,  Emily  Sargent,  the  heiress  of 
Lavington,  and  fresh  from  this  loss  he  threw  himself 
with  intense  earnestness  into  his  parish  work,  and 
his  public  duties  as  Archdeacon.  On  Sunday  after- 
noons crowds  of  people  would  pour  into  Alverstoke 
Church  to  hear  the  eloquent  rector.  The  old  colours 
of  the  44th  regiment,  cut  to  pieces  during  the  AfFgha- 
nistan  war,  now  hang  upon  the  monument  where  his 
pen  has  recorded  the  sufferings  of  the  regiment,  and 
in  his  last  years  he  held  an  ordination  here  as  bishop. 
New  churches  rose  in  his  neighbourhood ;  there  was 
a  great  church  revival  in  Portsmouth,  Portsea,  and 
Gosport ;  men  were  anxious  to  become  his  curates ; 
he  had  two  future  archbishops  among  them,  and 
candidates  for  holy  orders  came  around  him  to  watch 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF    WINCHESTER.  225 

his  work.  Amongst  many  memorials  of  bim  the 
painted  east  window  of  Alverstoke  church  will  have 
a  peculiar  interest. 

On  the  occasion  of  his  nomination  to  the  Deanery 
of  Westminster,  he  delivered  a  parting  charge  to  the 
clergy  of  the  Archdeaconry.   The  relationship  between 
them  had  lasted  for  six  years.     He  drew   a  contrast 
between  different  churches  which  it  had   fallen   to  his 
lot  to  visit.     "  It   is  indeed  a  cheerino^  sio;:ht   to   find, 
as   we    may   in    some   parts    of    this   country,  in  the 
midst  of  the  deep  recesses  of  agricultural   seclusion, 
a   village  church,  which  itself  the  inheritance  received 
from    early   piety,    has   been    duly    prized    and  cared 
for    by  succeeding  generations.     Never  does   such  a 
monument    of  present   care   stand   alone;    in   such   a 
parish   the  village  school  ever  borders  on  the  church- 
way  path,   and  the  surrounding  cottages   are   still  fit 
to  be  the   dwelling-places   of  an   English   peasantry." 
But  in  opposition  to  this  was  the  unfavourable  state 
of  matters  which  prevailed   in   other   portions   of  the 
diocese,  especially  in    Lambeth,   and  Archdeacon  Wil- 
berforce   dwelt   practically  and  earnestly  on  the  need 
of  Church  extension  in   these   districts.     It  is  gratify- 
ing to  hear  that  after  the  charge  the  Southwark  clergy 
assembled  and  took  steps  for  carrying  on  a  good  work 
in  the   direction  indicated.     It  was  the   same    g-reat 
work  that  he  took  up  with  renewed  energy  a  quarter  of 
a  century   later.     He  had  not  intended  to   have  de- 
livered his   charge   this  Spring,   as  the  Bishop  would 
that  year  address  them,  and  he  had  also  charged  them 
as  Archdeacon  so  late  as  the  preceding  Autumn.     He 
now  took  on  this   occasion  an  aff'ectionate   adieu,  and 
could  speak  gratefully  of  the   universal  kindness  and 

VOL.  I.  Q 


22G  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

sympathy  which   he   had  received  at  the  hands  of  his 
brethren  the   clergy.     It   is   from  this   point  of  time 
that  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  strides  prominently  into 
the   arena,   and  makes    his   hereditary   honours   most 
truly  his  own.     It  is   said   that   this  rapid  promotion 
was  owino^  to   the  favour  in  which   he  stood  with  the 
youthful  Queen  and  Prince  before  whom  he  preached, 
so  frequently  and  so  faithfully,  at  Claremont,  at  Wind- 
sor, and  at  the  Palace.     We  have  heard  it  said  that  he 
originally  attracted   the   notice  of  the  Prince  by  the 
speeches  which,   at   different    times,   he   delivered   on 
educational  subjects.     And  the  Prince  who   thus,  ac- 
cording to  his  keen   wonted  vision,  appreciated   the 
preacher,   was    in    turn    understood    and    appreciated 
arig^ht.     And  although  in  the  course  of  time  his  name 
for  years  was   much  more  rarely  brought  into  con- 
nection with  the  Court,  yet  there  are   two  remark- 
able  sermons   published    which   renew  the    old   rela- 
tionship,   one  of  which    was  preached    in  the   Hoyal 
chapel  of  Windsor   on   the    Sunday  previous  to  the 
marriage  of  the  Prince    of  Wales,    and    one,    a   few 
months  later,  at  the  consecration    of   the  chapel  at 
Wellington  College,  in  which  the   Prince  Consort  had 
taken  such  careful  interest.     Thus  affectingly  does  the 
Bishop  speak  of  that  second  memory  now  entwined  in 
the  memorials  of  the   College  with  that  of  the  great 
Duke : — 

"  He  who  so  justly  realised  the  original  design  ;  he 
who  was  its  first  president ;  who  nourished  with  such 
a  royal  magnificence  and  such  a  wise  care  its  first 
beginnings ;  who  planned  all  the  details  of  its  execu- 
tion ;  who  selected  even  the  statues  which  were  to 
look  down  from  its  niches ;  who  designed  its  avenues 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF   WINCHESTER.  227 

and  planted  the  trees  which  are  to  grow  in  them ;  he, 
too,  is  taken,  and  the  College  of  his  care,  and  espe- 
cially this  chapel,  the  foundations  of  which,  as  one  of 
the  last  acts  of  his  life  of  ceaseless  beneficence,  he  him- 
self laid,  have  become  a  commemoration  of  the  great 
and  good  Prince,  for  whom  this  land  has  wept,  as  it 
weeps  most  seldom,  and  for  very  few." 

From  the  lips  of  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  these  words 
would  fall  with  peculiar  meaning,  and  have  been  in- 
stinct with  many  memories ;  for  his  knowledge  of  the 
Prince  had  ran  parallel  with  all  his  high  preferments, 
and  was  indeed  well-nigh  co-extensive  with  the  period 
of  his  episcopate ;  he  had  been,  too,  his  private  chap- 
lain, and  had  been  selected  by  him  to  supervise  the 
education  of  his  child  heir.  It  is  from  that  time,  then, 
when  the  favour  of  royalty  sent  him  to  Westminster 
and  to  Cuddesdon,  that  the  public  career  of  the  Bishop, 
as  one  of  the  most  potent  voices  in  Church  and  State, 
begins,  and  henceforth  his  name  is  hanging  on  the 
lips  of  men.  In  his  case  the  words  of  the  poet  are 
true  : — 

"  Fame  with  men 
Being  but  ampler  means  to  serve  mankind. 
Should  have  small  rest  or  pleasure  in  herself, 
But  vrork  as  vassal  to  the  larger  love 
That  dwarfs  the  petty  love  of  one  to  one. 
Use  gave  me  fame  at  first,  and  fame  again 
Increasing,  gave  me  use." 

It  is  on  that  prolonged  and  versatile  career  we  now 
proceed  to  comment.  We  do  so  neither  as  censors 
nor  as  apologists.  God  forbid  we  should  judge  it, 
least  of  all  a  father  of  the  Church,  whose  office  is 
rather  to  judge  others.  That  career  has  been  com- 
mented on  with  the  most  extravagant  admiration  and 

Q  2 


228  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

the  most  unblushing:  invective.  To  urs^e  as^ainst  this 
prelate  mistakes,  blunders,  wiliness,  faults,  is  only  in 
concrete  terms  the  abstract  proposition  that  he  is 
a  mortal;  but  we  do  not  envy  the  man  who  can  be 
familiar  with  his  writings  and  his  presence,  and  not 
acknowledge  that  a  great  and  a  good  man  is  here. 
We  believe  that  there  has  been  much  miscomprehen- 
sion concerning  the  public  character  of  the  Bishop. 
He  has  been  called  the  leader  of  the  High  Church 
party;  and  such  an  expression,  though  open  to  criti- 
cism and  objection,  has  a  rough  general  value  of  its 
own.  It  is  often  truly  said  that  the  leader  of  a  party 
is  not  necessarily  himself  a  zealous  partisan.  And  the 
Bishop  was  often  marked  by  a  catholicity,  and  tole- 
rance and  charity,  which  we  sometimes  desiderate 
among  those  who  seek  to  approximate  to  his  standard. 
He  has,  in  his  time,  exhibited  as  much  spirit  and  pas- 
sion as  most  men  in  the  strife  of  parties  and  opinions ; 
but  in  his  most  deliberate  moments,  and  in  his  most 
careful  pubhcations,  and  in  his  latter  and  best  years, 
there  seemed  to  be  a  wider  charity  of  wisdom,  an 
increasing  tenderness  of  love.  His  old  Oxford  repu- 
tation had  been  greatly  strengthened  by  his  Bampton 
Lectures.  His  sermons  at  St.  Mary's  had  been  as  re- 
markable in  their  way  as  those  of  Newman  himself. 
When  Dr.  Wilberforce  had  been  appointed  Bishop,  in 
the  interval  between  the  nomination  and  conse- 
cration, Mr.  Newman  and  Mr.  Oakley  had  been 
received  by  Dr.  Wiseman  into  the  Communion  of  the 
Koman  Catholic  Church.  The  great  Evangelical 
party  had  been  thoroughly  aroused  by  the  frequency 
and  facility  of  the  remove  from  Oxford  to  Rome,  and 
also  by  Sir  Robert    Peel's   grant   in    aid    of  Roman 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  229 

Catholic  education  at  Maynooth.  He  became  the  great 
leading  High  Church  bishop,  watched  by  the  Evan- 
gelical party  with  an  incurable  and  not  altogether 
unnatural  suspicion,  especially  as  they  witnessed  the 
repeated  perversions  in  his  own  family.  The  Bishop 
had  perhaps  a  greater  toleration  for  the  Evangelicals 
than  the  Evangelicals  had  for  him.  A  young  man 
was  once  on  the  eve  of  ordination  at  Cuddesdon. 
"  And  to  what  party  in  the  Church,"  said  the  Bishop, 
blandly,    "  do    you   propose   to  attach    yourself,    Mr. 

P ?"     "To  the  Evangelicals,   my  Lord,"  stoutly 

replied  the  young  man.  "  Ah,  how  nice,"  said  the 
Bishop.  I  do  so  love  the  Evangelicals.''''  The  Evan- 
gelicals gave  him  credit  for  a  design  of  eliminating 
them  from  his  diocese,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact,  they 
increasingly  disappeared,  and  those  who  remained 
never  gave  him  their  confidence.  One  of  them  tells 
us  that  the  Bishop  once  came  to  him  and  said  softly, 
"  My  dear  sir,  are  your  people  simple-minded?"  The 
country  parson  thought  that  perhaps  his  people  might 
ask,  "Is  your  Bishop  simple-minded?"  And  what  answer 
would  he  have  to  give  ?  Bishop  Wilberforce's  notion 
w^as  that  he  would  make  his  diocese  a  model  diocese; 
and  to  a  very  great  extent  he  certainly  succeeded. 
The  diocese  itself  had  only  recently  been  formed  into 
its  present  state,  Berkshire  having  been  taken  from 
the  diocese  of  Salisbury,  and  Buckinghamshire  from 
Lincoln.  Of  this  enlarged  diocese  Cuddesdon  was  the 
real  centre  from  which  radiated  an  enormous  personal 
influence  over  clergy  and  laity  alike.  He  probably 
restrained  a  great  many  young  men  from  going  over 
to  Rome.  As  Sir  Robert  Peel  advised  brilliant  young 
men   to  work  on  committees,   so  Bishop  Wilberforce 


230  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

iDduced  his  lively  curates  to  stick  to  parish  work. 
The  astute  Bishop  knew  that,  when  the  mind  is 
occupied  with  theological  problems,  there  is  nothing 
like  hard  work  for  clarifying  the  thought  and  getting 
rid  of  mental  fumes.  The  Bishop,  however,  placed 
himself  in  close  sympathetic  relationship  with  all  his 
clergy,  and  there  were  those  among  them  who  clung 
to  him  as  chivalrously  as  ever  did  the  Old  Guard  to 
Napoleon.  He  did  as  much  by  his  personal  tact  as 
by  his  wise  rule  and  splendid  eloquence.  In  1860 
about  five  hundred  of  the  clergy — there  were  then 
about  six  hundred  parishes  in  the  diocese — signed  an 
address  of  confidence  to  him.  There  was,  indeed, 
something  Napoleonic  about  the  Bishop — at  least,  to 
the  extent  that  his  was  a  kind  of  autocracy,  however 
beneficent — but  the  working  of  the  diocese  under  him 
appears  to  have  depended  rather  upon  "  personal" 
than  "constitutional"  government.  He  always 
thoroughly  identified  himself  with,  and  stood  up  for, 
his  work.  Once  when  they  were  attacked  at  the  York 
Church  Congress,  he  defended  the  "  boys"  most 
heartily.  At  the  same  time  he  gave  them  sound  ad- 
vice and  admonition.  Passages  from  the  Bishop's 
writings,  might,  without  difficulty  be  multiplied, 
in  which  he  has  given  emphatic  warnings  against 
injudicious  zeal,  and  forcibly  protests  against  "  the 
falsehood  of  extremes."  Take  matters  of  cere- 
monial, how  he  speaks  of  Ritual  before  the  days  of 
Ritualism  : — 

"  Vestments  in  the  sanctuary,  and  the  adoption  in 
our  service  of  rites  which,  however  they  may  be  jus- 
tified by  the  letter  of  long-sleeping  laws,  are  strange 
and  novel  in  the  eyes  of  our  people.     I  have  no  hesi- 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP    WINCHESTER.  231 

tation  in  saying  to  you,  that  it  is  better  in  this  matter 
to  acquiesce  for  a  while  in  a  long-established  custom 
of  deficiency  than  to  stir  our  people  up  to  suspicion 
and  hostility  by  the  impetuous  restoration  of  a  better 
use.  More  harm  has,  I  beheve,  been  done  amongst 
us  by  such  attempts  to  restore  bits  of  a  ritual  to  which 
our  people  are  unaccustomed  than  by  any  other  single 
error.  Depend  upon  it,  ray  brethren,  we  must,  as  to 
these  matters — so  trifling  m  themselves,  so  momentous 
as  indications  of  a  drifting  current — inwardly  and  out- 
wardly manifest  ourselves  to  be  men  of  quietness  and 
peace." 

And  again  : — "  Many  a  young  clergyman  who  might 
have  preached  Christ,  and  spread  the  life  of  his  Church 
throughout  a  parish  around  him,  has  marred  all  his 
usefulness,  and  raised  a  host  of  enemies,  by  the 
straightness  of  his  collar  or  the  length  of  his  skirt." 

This  moderate  and  sensible  language,  if  universally 
attended  to,  would  do  away  with  an  infinity  of  preju- 
dice in  the  popular  mind,  and  is  one  index  of  a  certain 
comprehensiveness  of  mind,  to  which  we  shall  probably 
asfain  find  occasion  to  revert. 

In  the  crowded  and  active  career  of  the  Bishop  of 
Oxford,  literature  has  occupied  a  considerable  space. 
The  list  of  the  Bishop's  works  is  of  some  length,  and 
includes  subjects  of  different  kinds  and  varying  im- 
portance. With  his  wide  accomplishments  and  in- 
herent genius  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Dr.  Wilber- 
force  might  so  have  written  something  to  after  ages 
that  they  would  not  willingly  let  it  die.  But  as  a  rule 
literature  is  not  satisfied  with  a  half-service.  From 
those  who  would  attain  to  her  foremost  ranks,  and 
permanently  mould  a  nation's  thought   and  language, 


232  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS.    • 

she  requires  a  concentration  of  energy  and  purpose. 
Two  paths  lay  before  Bishop  Wilborforce.  He  might 
become  a  great  writer,  or  he  might  become  a  great 
actor  on  the  busy  stage  of  the  world  and  church.  To 
that  active  and  brilliant  mind  it  appeared  that  the  two 
careers  might  be  compatible.  They  can  only  be  so  to 
a  limited  extent.  The  point  is  soon  reached  when  the 
two  paths  diverge.  For  a  time  the  Bishop  could  be 
both  a  man  of  action  and  a  man  of  speculation,  prompt 
on  the  platform  with  his  tongue,  and  in  the  study  with 
his  pen,  endowed  with  a  restless  activity  for  all  the 
possibihties  of  practical  good,  and  at  the  same  time 
with  thought,  observation,  and  wide  grasp  of  mind 
gathering  in  the  materials  for  some  future  oi[)'\i8  mag- 
r.'Um.  But  no7i  omnia  possumus  omnes.  This  is  a  truth 
in  which  the  eager  spirit  of  man  is  forced  reluctantly 
to  acquiesce.  How  large  a  margin  must  we  allow  to 
the  wear  and  tear,  the  worry  and  friction,  of  human 
life  !  How  few  are  those  aspiring  natures  who  can 
count  on  attaining  to  one-tenth  of  the  objects  which 
they  propose  to  themselves  !  A  man  entertains  ideas 
respecting  many  plans,  which  his  powers  and  educa- 
tion render  perfectly  feasible  and  justifiable,  but  as 
time  rolls  on  he  feels  that  he  must  confine  his  election 
to  a  few,  and  this  narrow  circle  is  again  narrowed, 
and  it  often  happens  that  of  two  careers  only  one  must 
be  taken,  and  the  other  left. 

We  think,  then,  that  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  might 
have  been  a  great  writer.  But  slowly  and  surely  he 
unfitted  himself  for  such  a  consummation.  He  came 
essentially  to  belong  to  the  order  of  those  who  live 
history,  and  not  to  those  who  write  it.  That  great 
administrative   ability,    that   great    oratorical   ability, 


THE    LATE    BTSHOl'    OP    WINCHESTER.  233 

that  great  political  ability,  were  all  fatal  to  his  literary 
renown.  And  yet  the  case  might  have  been  so  dif- 
ferent. Those  very  powers  which  might  have  made 
him  a  great  author,  diverted  into  other  channels,  refuse 
to  be  at  the  service  of  his  pen.  The  brilliancy  and 
cogency,  the  pathos  and  humour,  the  imagination  and 
eloquence,  which  have  made  him  a  prince  among  the 
great  talkers  of  the  age,  comparatively  desert  him  in 
the  solitude  of  his  study  when  he  quietly  addresses  the 
world  through  pen  and  ink.  Run  over  in  your  mind 
the  list  of  the  volumes  which  he  has  edited  or  com- 
posed. Two  charming  little  volumes  are  first  called 
to  mind.  We^  of  course,  remember  '*  Agathos,  and 
other  Sunday  Stories,"  followed  afterwards  by  the 
companion  volume  of  "  The  Rocky  Island."  But  be 
it  remembered  that  these  were  composed  at  the  outset 
of  Bishop  Wilberforce's  career,  when  it  was  still  pos- 
sible to  hope  that  th6ir  author's  great  powers  might 
produce  some  permanent  additions  to  our  literature, 
and  his  restless  and  crowded  public  career  had  not  yet 
opened  fully  before  him.  Were  ever  Sunday  stories 
more  beautiful  than  these  ?  The  youngest  child  may 
hang  in  breathless  interest  over  the  narratives,  and 
the  oldest  man,  sadly  looking  back  upon  the  story  of 
his  well-nigh  closed  life,  might  find  consolation  and 
instruction  in  their  sweet  and  serious  wisdom.  We 
know  Canon  Kingsley's  "  Greek  Fairy  Tales  for  my 
Children,"  an  admirable  work  of  its  kind,  and  which 
approximates  most  nearly  to  these  Sunday  stories. 
They  are  indeed  more  elaborate,  more  of  a  work  of 
art,  but  as  respects  direct  serviceableness,  and  teach- 
ing, expanding,  kindUng  the  mind  of  Christ's  little 
children,  they  do  not  enter  into  the  comparison.     The 


234  OUK    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

bappy  father  himself  told  these  stories  to  his  children 
at  his  own  hearth ;  "  the  eldest  has  been  fully  in- 
terested by  the  simplest  narratives,  and  the  youngest 
has  understood  the  most  difficult."  The  answers  to 
the  questions  are  in  some  cases  the  very  answers 
which  he  received  from  his  children.  The  powers 
shown  in  these  stories  are  not  inferior  to  those  ex- 
hibited by  the  great  masters  of  Allegory,  and  which 
are  perhaps  found  in  the  highest  perfection  in  the 
"  Vision  of  Mirza."  What  a  beautiful  allegory  is  that 
of  the  boys  playing  in  the  garden  on  a  Spring  morning, 
and  that  classification  of  the  names  Ap^ape,  Edone, 
Argia,  Astathes ;  how  well  they  map  out  human  hfe 
and  character !  Is  not  this  imagery  worthy  of  Ad- 
dison and  Bunyan  : — 

"  Just  at  this  time  Agape  was  reaching  the  golden 
gates  ;  the  sun  had  not  quite  set,  but  it  hung  just  over 
the  top  of  the  far  hills,  and  shot  a  red,  golden  bright- 
ness over  everything.  Rich  and  beautiful  did  these 
gates  shine  out  before  the  glad  eyes  of  happy  Agape. 
Now  he  could  see  plainly  multitudes  of  heavenly  crea- 
tures passing  about  within  ;  wearing  light  as  a  garment, 
and  crowns  that  looked  like  living  fire.  At  times,  too, 
he  could  hear  bursts  of  ravishing  music,  which  the 
garden  seemed  always  to  be  sending  up  on  high,  and 
some  few  notes  of  which  strayed  out  even  into  the 
pathway  of  the  plain.  And  now  he  stood  before  the 
gates  ;  full  was  his  heart  of  hope  and  fear  ;  a  pleasant 
happy  fear,  as  if  too  much  joy  lay  close  before  him. 
Now  all  the  troubles  of  the  way  were  over,  and  as  he 
looked  back,  it  seemed  but  a  little  moment  since  he 
left  the  beautiful  but  deceiving  in  the  morning,  and  all 
his  troubles  seemed  light.     The  scorching  of  the  sun, 


THE    LATE    BISnOP    OF    WINCEESTER.  235 

the  weary  bill-side,  the  gin-set  forest,  and  the  lion's 
paws,  all  these  seemed  little  now;  and  he  only  thought 
of  them  to  thank  the  Kinsr  who  had  broug-ht  him  so 
safely  through  all.  As  he  lifted  up  his  eyes  to  the 
door,  they  lighted  upon  a  golden  writing,  which  was 
hung  over  the  gate.  So  he  read  the  writing,  and  it 
was  '  Knock,  and  it  shall  be  opened  !'  Then  did  he 
indeed  draw  in  a  deep  breath,  as  one  does  before  doing 
some  great  thing,  and  knocked  with  all  his  force  ;  and 
so,  as  soon  as  he  knocked,  the  golden  door  began  to 
open,  and  the  happy  boy  entered  the  garden.  What 
awaited  him  there  is  not  given  rae  to  tell,  but  from 
the  blessed  sounds  which  fell  upon  my  ear  as  the  gate 
rolled  back,  I  may  not  doubt  that  he  was  entirely 
happy,  for  it  was  as  if  the  sound  of  a  sea  of  heavenly 
voices  suddenly  swept  by  me." 

One  work,  and  one  work  only,  can  be  fairly  com- 
pared with  this,  "  The  Addresses  to  Candidates  for 
Holy  Orders,"  in  many  respects  a  work  of  matchless 
value.  The  Bishop  never  appears  to  greater  advan- 
tage than  when  associating  with  those  young  clergy- 
men and  those  candidates  for  the  ministry  to  whom 
his  kindly  counsel  and  countenance  are  of  the  utmost 
value.  The  Bishop  by  no  means  concurred  in  the 
general  complaint  that  a  sufficient  number  of  men 
from  the  Universities  cannot  be  found  for  the  ministry, 
and  has  stated  that  in  his  own  diocese  the  number  of 
candidates  has  not  appreciably  been  diminished.  "  If 
the  standard  of  our  Church's  love  and  faith  is  main- 
tained high  and  pure,  we  shall  not,  I  am  persuaded, 
lack  candidates  for  her  ministry  of  the  right  sort.  The 
more  abounding  temptations  of  the  world,  its  large 
bribes  of  riches  and  luxuries,  will  draw  off  some  who 


236  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

would  have  joined  us,  hut  we  can  hear  the  loss  of  such." 
We  are  afraid,  however,  that  the  prevalent  complaint 
is  w^ell  founded,  and  that  the  Bisliop  of  Oxford's  case 
was  an  exceptional  case.  Other  things  being  equal, 
there  were  multitudes  of  young  men  who  would  have 
preferred  being  in  the  diocese  of  Oxford  to  being  in  any 
other  diocese.  There  were  manv  such  who  entertained 
an  enthusiastic  admiration  for  the  character  of  the 
Bishop  of  Oxford,  and  who  would  have  willingly  and 
anxiously  put  themselves  under  his  pastoral  care.  All 
that  the  Bishop  did  for  Cuddesdon  College  in  its  foun- 
dation and  constant  supervision,  shows  how  well  he 
understood  the  peculiar  needs  and  cares  of  his 
younger  brethren  of  the  clergy,  and  the  interest  and 
affection  with  which  he  watched  over  them.  The  prac- 
tical value  of  the  "  Ordination  Addresses"  is  very  great. 
The  effect  which  they  must  have  had  upon  the  minds 
of  those  who  originally  listened  to  them  must  have 
been  vast  and  enduring.  We  have  heard  at  least  of 
one  affecting  instance  of  the  results  with  which  they 
have  been  attended,  and  that  effect  is  scarcely  modified 
on  a  perusal,  or  rather  on  that  repeated  perusal  which 
the  merits  of  the  work  demand.  These  merits  consist 
not  only  in  the  religious  value  and  devotional  tone  of 
the  work,  but  in  the  broad  wisdom,  the  ripened  expe- 
rience, and  the  very  considerable  degree  of  literary 
talent  which  it  represents.  Looking  back  upon  those 
books  which  are  the  memorable  books  of  one's 
reading,  there  are  not  many  which  we  would  classify  in 
the  same  list  with  this,  not  many  which  we  would 
with  equal  hope  and  cheerfulness  place  in  the  hands 
of  one  we  love,  and  bid  him  study  it  and  think  over  it. 
But  passing   away  from   these,  and  looking  down 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF   WINCHESTER.  237 

the  list  of  the  Bishop  of  Oxford's  other  pubhcations, 
our  recollections  are  mainly   disappointing.      Let  us 
faithfully  recall  our  impressions.     Take  the   "  History 
of  the  American   Church."     How   singularly  dry  and 
unattractive    does    a    great    arid   interesting    subject 
become  !  There  is  no  greater  testimony  to  the  intrin- 
sic interest  of  this   most  worthy  theme   than   the  fact 
that  the  Bishop's  work  has  attained  a  third  edition. 
He  has  singularly  failed  both   in   the   conception  and 
the  execution  of  an  historical  work.     He   has  neither 
background  nor  foreground.     It  is  difficult  to  say  to 
what  historical   school  he  belongs.     In  fact,  he    be- 
longs to  no  school  at  all.     He  does  not  belong  either 
to  the  pictorial  school  of  Macaulay  or  the  philosophi- 
cal school  of  Guizot.     There  is  no  broad  conception 
of  the  history,  or   vivid  development  of  details ;  no 
pictures     which     haunt    the    imagination,     no    happy 
phrases  which  linger  in  the  memory.     It  may  also  be 
very   much    questioned    whether   the    Bishop's    book 
would  have  seen  the  light  if  it  had  not  been  for  Dr. 
Caswall's  work  on  the  same  subject.     The  one  work 
almost  subsisted  on  the  other.     Take  again  the  volume 
of  *' Replies  to  Essays  and  Reviews,"  where  his  name 
is  on  the  title  page,  and  the  publishers  speak  of  the 
Bishop  as  the  editor.     Those  who  have  examined  the 
work  will  note  the  vast  general  inferiority,  both  in 
tone    and    treatment,    of    this    volume    as    compared 
with  the  "  Aids  to  Faith."     In  what  sense  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford  is  spoken   of  as  the   editor  of  this  volume 
it  would,  in  fact,  be  very  hard  to  determine.     The 
Bishop    had   contemplated    writing  something   which 
should  be  caretul  and  critical,  but  he  found  no  time. 
The  publishers  selected   the   different  writers   of  the 


238  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

different  contributions.  The  Bishop  did  not  even 
revise  them.  When  he  wrote  his  preface  to  the 
different  articles  he  had  not  even  read  the  articles. 
This  is  certainly  the  most  unworkmanlike  fashion  of 
editing  with  which  we  are  acquainted.  But  when 
the  work  was  published,  the  Bishop  had  ceased  to  be 
an  independent  author,  and  generally  confined  him- 
self to  writing  little  prefaces  to  little  books.  The 
Bishop's  fate  with  his  publishers  was  singular. 
From  the  hands  of  Mr.  Seeley,  the  representative  of 
one  extreme  school,  he  passed  into  the  hands  of  Mr. 
Burns,  who  represented  another  extreme  school,  and 
became  a  Roman  Catholic  pervert;  his  publications 
are  now  in  the  safe  and  orthodox  care  of  Mr.  Parker. 
Again,  take  his  preface  to  Mr.  Carter's  (of  Clewer) 
biography  of  Bishop  Armstrong.  It  is  difficult  to 
say  what  that  preface  contains,  or  why  that  preface 
was  written,  unless  for  the  simple  purpose  of  bring- 
ing the  Bishop  of  Oxford's  name  into  the  title  page, 
where  it  occupies  a  space  out  of  all  proportion  to  the 
merits  of  the  performance.  Again,  take  his  editor- 
ship of  the  "  Life  of  Mrs.  Godolphin."  Though  the 
preface  is  of  no  importance,  yet  the  valuable  frag- 
ment thus  edited  is  of  the  hio^hest  deg:ree  of  interest. 
But  that  interest  would  have  been  greatly  and  indefi- 
nitely increased  if  the  Bishop's  historical  knowledge 
had  enabled  him  to  add  something^  to  our  notions  of 
the  state  of  religion  in  English  society  in  the  days  of 
Charles  the  Second.  The  ordinary  notion,  which, 
speaking  roughly,  is  accurate  enough,  represents  the 
age  as  one  of  unbounded  profligacy  and  unbelief,  and 
yet  there  were  many  thousands  "who  had  not  bowed 
the  knee   unto  Baal ;"  personal  religion  shone  most 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP    WINCHESTER.  239 

brightly  in  most  numerous  instances,  and  it  is  re- 
markable that  Charles's  own  ecclesiastical  appoint- 
ments may,  on  the  whole,  contrast  very  favourably 
with  those  of  most  other  reigns.  Lastl}^  the  "  Life 
and  Correspondence  of  Mr.  Wilberforce,"  though  a 
popular  and  successful  work,  by  more  careful  hand- 
ling might  have  been  rendered  still  more  popular,  and 
still  more  successful.  Moreover,  in  the  opinion  of 
those  competent  to  judge,  it  is  liable  to  the  imputa- 
tion of  a  most  serious  blemish.  For  it  is  contended 
that  this  life  is  hardly  a  fair  transcript  of  the  life  and 
opinions  of  the  great  opponent  of  the  slave  trade  and 
the  great  reformer  of  manners,  and  that  facts  or 
documents  were  so  treated  as  to  give  not  so  much 
Mr.  Wilberforce's  own  point  of  view  as  the  point  of 
view  from  which  his  son  and  biographer  wrote.  We 
believe  that  the  "  Lives  of  the  Archbishops  of  Canter- 
bury," now  undertaken  by  Dean  Hook,  were  origi- 
nally undertaken  by  the  Bishop.  We  only  add 
further,  we  believe  one  or  two  little  poems  of  his  are 
to  be  found  in  the  "Lyra  Apostolica,"  under  the 
signature  of  Epsilon. 

To  these  must  be  added  the  series  of  Essays  which 
he  contributed  to  the  *'  Quarterly  Review."  That 
renowned  periodical  states  that  he  was  "  a  frequent 
and  regular  contributor."  He  began  to  write  in 
1869,  on  a  subject  on  natural  history,  and  his  last 
article,  a  few  months  before  his  death,  was  on  a 
similar  subject.*     He  dropped  writing  after  his  first 

*  One  of  these  Essays,  a  very  characteristic  one,  "  The  Church  of 
England  and  her  Bishops."  He  there  does  not  hesitate  to  cover  him- 
self with  praise,  which,  since  Dr.  McNeile  called  himself  "  a  great  and 
good  man,"  has  hardly  been  paralleled.     He  says  of  Bishop  Blorafield 


240  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

paper,  for  rnany  years,  and  resumed  it  in  I860  by  a 
review  of  Darwin's  "  Origin  of  Species."  The  volume 
of  Essays  gives  a  heightened  view  of  the  Bishop's 
literary  works  ;  but  the  reviewing  of  books  is  generally 
journeyman's  work  preparatory  to  the  writing  of  books. 
That  life  of  restless  and  almost  fevered  activity,  the 
flying  from  house  to  house,  from  engagement  to  en- 
gagement, even  writing  letters  in  a  railway  carriage, 
conveying  the  impression  that  he  was  to  be  seen  temper 
ubique  et  ah  omnibus,  and  making  his  friends  draw  up 
admiring  diaries  of  his  performances,  unfitted  him  for 
the  prolonged  study  and  quiet  thought  which  should 
characterize  any  great  work  by  a  great  Christian 
bishop. 

Has,  then,  the  Bishop  so  scanty  a  title  to  perma- 
nent literary  renown  ?  We  believe  that  renown  will 
in  some  measure  be  his,  certainly  not,  however,  by 
reason  of  his  literary  undertakings,  but  in  spite  of 
them.  No  one  can  diligently  peruse  the  oral  efforts 
which  have  been  committed  to  publication  without 
being  impressed  by  the  conviction  that  they  frequently 
attain  the  highest  point  of  literary  excellence. 
The  misfortune  is  that,  though  broadcast  over  the 
land  for  a  day,  these  wonderful  speeches  frequently 
die  in  their  birth,  and  their  first  breath  is  their  last. 
Here  is  a  magnificent  specimen  of  Christian  oratory, 
from  a  speech  delivered  in  Manchester  : 

"  Will  you,  by  your  Church's  own  instrument,  ac- 

that  "  he  bad  not  indeed  the  tenacious  grasp  and  iron  logic  of  the 
Bishop  of  Exeter  or  ilie  sustained  eloquence  and  varied  resources  of  the 
Bishop  of  Oxford.  The  words  are  omitted  from  the  collected  edition  of 
the  Essays.  They  were  probably  inserted  to  draw  away  attention  from 
the  real  authorship  of  the  article.  He  wrote  of  himself  in  the  same  way 
that  Sir  Walter  Scott  once  reviewed  himself. 


THE    LATE    BTSnOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  241 

company  the  march  of  your  nation's  civilization  with 
the  blessed  seed  of  the  Word  and  the  Sacraments  of 
the  Church  of  God  ?  Can  you,  as  a  people,  expect  to 
be  maintained  in  your  greatness,  if  you  are  unfaithful 
to  your  trust  ?  Can  that  which  you  so  give  to  God  by 
any  possibility  be  lost  or  wasted  ?  You  will  tell  me, 
perhaps,  that  the  results  are  not  commensurate  with 
your  expectations,  and  that  they  justify  your  coldness. 
If  the  time  would  serve,  I  think  I  could  answer  those 
charges.  Instead  of  being  less  than  anything  we 
had  a  right  to  expect,  I  think  I  could  prove  to  any 
thoughtful  man  that  the  blessing  of  God,  as  given  to 
our  labours,  is  infinitely  greater  than  anything  we 
had  a  right  to  expect,  if  we  measure  those  labours 
by  the  true  measure  of  their  simplicity,  their  single- 
ness, and  their  self-denial.  Men  are  led  astray,  so 
far  as  that  argument  goes,  in  this  way.  They  see  the 
spread  the  gospel  has  made  throughout  the  earth ; 
they  see  it  does  not  make  the  same  spread  now ;  but 
they  forget  that  they  are  comparing,  perhaps  an 
interval  of  ten  to  fifty  years  with  an  interval  of 
eighteen  hundred  years,  through  which  the  gospel 
has  been  spreading  on  the  earth.  So  far  from  its 
having  been  a  slow,  I  believe  that  in  many  parts  of 
India,  for  instance,  it  has  been  an  unexampled  spread, 
and  that  if  men  at  the  beginning  had  judged  by  the 
same  standard,  they  would  have  turned  back  from 
barbarian  Phrygia,  and  never  visited  distant  Britain 
with  the  heaHng  sounds  of  Christ's  truth.  But  even 
if  it  was  not  so — if  we  did  not  see  the  result — that 
should  make  no  difference  in  our  work.  We  work 
not  for  the  results,  but  we  work  for  God,  and  we 
leave  the  results  in  His  hand.     And  when  man,  in  his 

VOL.  I.  R 


242  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

littleness,  looks  out  and  says,  '  I  do  not  see  the 
fruit,  and  so  I  will  give  up,'  it  reminds  me,  my 
friends,  of  what  we  see  even  in  nature.  We  look  at 
some  miglity  estuary  wliicli  the  retiring  tide  has  left 
bare  of  the  water.  We  go  to  one  of  your  own  Lan- 
cashire shores,  and  we  see  there  a  vast  expanse  of 
sand  and  mud,  with  little  trickling  rivulets  wearing 
their  scarcely  appreciable  way  through  the  resisting 
banks  of  that  yielding  ooze ;  and  the  man  who  knew 
not  the  secrets  of  the  tide,  and  the  influences  by 
which  God  governs  nature,  would  say.  '  How  can 
you  ever  expect  to  see  that  great  expanse  covered  ? 
Look  at  those  sand-banks — those  mud-heaps  ;  how, 
possibly,  by  any  contrivance  are  you  to  cover  them  ? 
You  had  better  give  up  the  thought,  and  acquiesce 
in  the  perpetual  sterility  and  the  enduring  ooze." 
But  high  in  the  heavens  the  unseen  Ruler  has  set  the 
orb  which  shall  swarm  in  her  time  the  tides  of  the 
surrounding  ocean,  and  when  the  appointed  moment 
comes — noiselessly  and  unobserved,  but  suddenly  and 
sufficiently — the  whole  is  covered  by  the  rejoicing 
water ;  and  again  it  is  one  argent  surface,  sandless 
and  mudless,  because  the  Lord  hath  willed  it.  And 
by  the  self-same  power,  when  the  appointed  hour 
comes,  His  work  shall  be  wrought  in  the  heathen 
mind,  and  these  trickling  rills  of  a  struggling  Chris- 
tianity which  we  have  scarcely  maintained  through 
the  mighty  ooze  of  the  opposition  of  fallen  humanity, 
shall,  under  the  unseen  influences  of  the  heavens 
above,  so  spring  into  a  rejoicing  tide,  and  cover 
with  the  wave  of  God's  truth  the  regenerated  earth. 
Blessed  in   that  day  above   men   shall  the   servant  be 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF   WINCHESTER.  243 

whom  liis  Lord,  when  He  cometh,  shall  find  working 
for  the  result." 

Well  might  the  Times  speak  of  this  speech  as  "  such 
eloquence  as,  in  former  days,  roused  nations  to  a 
sense  of  their  independence,  or  sent  myriads  across 
the  habitable  world  to  the  rescue  of  a  shrine."  There 
are  often  in  these  speeches  an  abundant  imagery,  a 
wealth  of  energy  and  phrase,  an  energetic  logic,  an 
impassioned  rhetoric,  which  may  compare  favourably 
with  the  efforts  of  the  greatest  masters  of  ancient  or 
modern  eloquence.  Careful  editing  might  produce  a 
volume  which  would  find  a  permanent  place  in  English 
literature. 

Let  us  now  endeavour  to  attain  a  view,  necessarily 
rapid  and  imperfect,  of  the  Parliamentary  career  of 
the  Bishop  of  Oxford.     It  will  be  observed  how  the 
follower  of  Sir  Robert  Peel  gradually  became  an  ally 
of  the  Earl  of  Derby.     In  the  memorable  session  of 
1846  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  first  made  his  appearance 
in  the  Imperial  Parliament.     It  was  the  year  in  which 
Sir  Robert  Peel  abolished  the  Corn  Laws,  and  thereby 
for  ever  abdicated  political  power.     The  maiden  speech 
of  the  junior  Bishop   was  made  early  in  the  session. 
Maiden   speeches   form  in  themselves  an   interesting 
kind  of  literature,  and  to  be  really  successful  require 
much  thought  and  care.     It  is  a  great  mistake  for 
such  a  speech  to  be  ambitious ;  it  will  be  recollected 
how  Mr.  Disraeli  sat  down  speechless  amid  the  jeers 
of  the  House  of  Commons.     On  the  other  hand,  such 
a  speech  ought  to  possess   substantial  merits ;  other- 
wise no  expectations  are  entertained,  and  no  definite 
opinion  formed  of  the  orator.     On  the  present  occa- 

R  2 


244  OUR   BISHOPS    A^^D   DEANS. 

sion  it  was  not  an  Oxford  graduate,  fresh  from  Christ 
Church,  and  with  the  bloom  of  his  college  honours 
fresh  upon  him,  but  a  -man  of  mature  years,  who, 
humanly  speaking,  had  forced  his  way  to  the  House 
of  Lords  by  the  stress  of  superior  ability  and  force 
of  character.  And  the  Bishop's  first  address  was 
marked  by  characteristics  which  his  speeches  never 
lost.  Here  was  one  who  was  not  speaking  for  any 
purely  political,  still  less  any  merely  personal 
object.  The  love  of  one's  country,  a  zealous  desire 
for  the  interests  of  true  religion,  the  earnest  endeavour 
to  ameliorate  existing  states  of  unhappiness  and  sin, 
are  always  discernible  in  these  remarkable  speeches. 
Their  manifest  sincerity,  the  manifest  feeling  that 
thev  are  delivered  under  an  awful  sense  of  iustice  and 
responsibihty,  beyond  any  effect  of  eloquence  heighten 
their  impressiveness,  and  must  raise  the  character  of 
the  debates  in  the  House  of  Lords.  He  spoke  on 
this  occasion  against  the  existing  system  of  transport- 
ation, and  forcibly  depicted  the  evil  state  of  matters 
in  Australia.  The  venerable  Marquis  of  Lansdowne, 
who  succeeded  him  in  the  debate,  spoke  in  words  of 
courteous  welcome  of  the  new  arrival  in  the  House  : 
he  was  extremely  happy  to  have  in  support  of  his 
views  the  testimony  and  arguments  of  the  Right 
Reverend  Prelate  who  had,  with  so  much  eloquence 
and  force,  and  in  a  manner  so  becoming,  adverted  to 
the  topics  of  the  debate.  The  first  little  warmth 
in  controversy  was  not  long  in  displaying  itself. 
The  Government  had  introduced  the  Religious 
Opinions  ReUef  Bill.  The  object  was  to  sweep 
away  from  the  statute-book  the  remnants  of  the 
penal    laws    affecting    the    Roman    Catholics.      The 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP   WINOHESTEU.  245 

Bisliop  of  St.  David's  liad  complained  that  his  Right 
Reverend  friends  had  received  the  measure  coldly, 
reluctantly,  and  unworthily.  Somewhat  indignantly, 
the  Bishop,  on  behalf  of  himself  and  others,  repulsed 
this  imputation.  He  would  rejoice  heartily  in  the 
passing  of  the  just  and  salutary  parts  of  the  Bill,  but 
was  staggered  at  some  of  the  details.  In  the  mean- 
time the  House  of  Commons  was  being  torn  by  the 
fiercest  political  storms  which  had  happened  since  the 
days  of  the  Reform  Bill.  In  due  season  the  minis- 
terial measure  was  carried  up  to  the  House  of  Lords. 
In  the  course  of  the  debate  on  the  Corn  Importation 
Bill,  the  question  was  discussed  how  far  the  interests 
of  the  clergy  would  be  affected  by  Sir  R^obert  Peel's 
legislation.  The  Bishops  of  St.  Davids  and  Exeter 
both  spoke  on  this  subject.  The  Bishop  of  Oxford 
rose  later,  and  both  spoke  on  the  special  subject  and 
addressed  himself  to  the  general  merits  of  the  Bill. 
He  showed  himself  a  vehement  Free  Trader.  It  was 
as  a  working  clergyman  that  he  was  for  the  abolition 
of  the  Corn  Laws.  I  know  that  the  clergy  of  this 
country  believe  that  the  state  of  the  great  mass  of  the 
labouring  population  and  the  peasantry  of  England  is 
such  that  they  cannot  desire  it  long  to  continue  as  it 
is.  They  do  not  wish  to  see  them  and  their  families 
suffering  from  physical  want,  and  from  moral  and 
religious  destitution  ;  they  do  not  wish  to  see  them 
living  in  cottages  from  which  the  decencies  of  domestic 
life  are  necessarily  banished,  and  where  their  children 
are  looked  at  in  their  up-growth  only  with  the  anxious 
feehng  that  there  are  so  many,  while  the  difficulties  of 
obtaining  food  are  daily  increasing.  Now  the  clergy 
see  these  things  practically,  and,  looking  round  for  a 


246       -     OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

remedy,  they  believe  it  will  be  found  in  anything  that 
increases  the  prosperity  of  the  country."  His  remarks 
on  the  condition  of  the  agricultural  labourer  have  an 
important  bearing  on  the  present  condition  of  things. 
His  picture  of  the  labourers  drinking  the  landlord's 
health  out  of  empty  glasses  was  very  good. 

The  following  was  the  peroration  to  this  remarkable 
speech  : — 

"  Beware,  my  lords,  of  disappointing  those  just  and 
righteous  expectations.  Show  the  people  of  this 
country  that  your  decision  of  this  question  is  based 
on  the  broad,  enduring  principle  of  justice  to  all,  not 
on  the  narrow  and  uncertain  one  of  advantage  to  the 
few.  In  coming  to  this  decision  on  these  grounds, 
you  will  establish  on  the  firmest  foundations  the 
authority  of  this  assembly.  In  this  assembly,  I  be- 
lieve, is  laid  the  main  groundwork  of  religious  liberty. 
Let  not,  I  beseech  you,  the  sure  foundation  be 
shaken  by  your  decision  here.  Show  that  you  are 
ready  to  make  any  sacrifice — if  sacrifice  there  be — of 
that  which  has  been  only  given  to  classes  for  the 
benefit  of  the  people  around  them.  Your  power  is 
indeed  great;  but  there  are  some  things  which  it 
cannot  effect.  It  cannot  stand,  my  lords,  against  the 
rising  tide  of  a  great  nation's  convictions.  Do  not  be 
deceived,  therefore,  by  the  whispers  of  flatterers  to 
think  that  even  you  can  set  your  curule  chairs  on  the 
edge  of  the  rising  waters,  and  bid  them,  on  a  prin- 
ciple of  hereditary  prescription,  recede  and  fall  back- 
wards from  your  feet.  Do  not,  my  lords,  let  it  be 
said  of  the  House  that  the  same  body  which  repre- 
sents the  hereditary  wealth,    prosperity,    and   rank. 


TIJE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  247 

does  not  also  represent  the  hereditary  justice,  wisdom, 
and  virtue  of  this  mighty  people." 

In  the  course  of  this  debate,  some  personalities 
in  execrable  taste  were  directed  against  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford.  Some  noble  Lord  was  indis^nant  that 
the  junior  bishop,  in  his  opinion  a  very  junior 
bishop  indeed,  should  thus  powerfully  enter  the 
armed  lists  of  debate.  The  Bishop  tersely  de- 
clared, if  he  was  old  enough  to  be  a  bishop,  he  was  old 
enough  to  form  and  explain  his  opinions  on  the  im- 
portant subjects  which  came  before  him  as  a  legislator. 
On  various  other  occasions  he  spoke  that  session,  and 
the  session  did  not  close  without  its  becoming  perfectly 
clear  that  the  new  spiritual  peer,  by  his  statesmanlike 
views,  his  breadth  of  mind,  and  his  parliamentary  in- 
fluence, was  becoming  a  new  influence  and  power 
in  the  House  of  Lords.  From  that  time,  in  the  pages 
of  "  Hansard,"  his  name  is  continually  to  be  met  in 
the  debates  of  the  House.  At  that  date  the  Earl  of 
Derby  was  unquestionably /ac^76  princeps  among  the 
debaters  of  his  day,  and  perhaps  the  second  place  was 
due  to  the  Earl  of  Ellenborough.  But  probably  there 
was  no  one  who,  in  parliamentary  eloquence,  ap- 
proached nearer  to  them  than  the  Bishop  of  Oxford. 

We  can  only  rapidly  glance  at  a  few  of  the  many 
particulars  of  this  parliamentary  career.  He  acquiesced 
in  the  removal  of  the  political  services  of  the  Church 
of  England,  but  he  was  sure  they  would  all  "  refuse  to 
entertain  this  motion  if  they  thought  that,  by  so  doing, 
they  in  any  degree  whatever  were  denying,  or  losing 
sight  of,  or  were  ashamed  of  owning,  their  continued 
belief  in  God's  superintending  Providence  over  this 
nation,  or  were  unmindful  of  any  remembrances  of  his 


248  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

mercies  to  tliem  in  times  past,  or  of  humiliation  for 
national  sins  in  times  long  gone  by."  The  measure 
for  admitting  the  Jews  into  Parliament  was  not  passed 
without  final  and  vigorous  opposition.  By  voice  and 
vote  he  steadily  opposed  the  bill  as  heretofore,  and 
gave  the  House,  by  his  own  example,  a  silent  lecture 
on  their  inconsistency.  He  opposed  also,  and 
more  successfully,  the  legalising  of  marriage  with  a 
deceased  wife's  sister.  "  God's  law  is  positive,"  said 
the  Bishop,  at  the  close  of  an  exhaustive  speech  on 
the  subject,  "  and  those  who  take  God's  law  for  a 
guide  can  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  to  the  advo- 
cates of  these  marriages,  '  We  refuse  you  a  fatal  pri- 
vilege, which  may  bring  down  God's  curse  upon  you.'  " 
Among  other  sharp  collisions,  the  Bishop  was  once 
brought  into  direct  conflict  with  the  lay  leader  of  the 
opposite  section  of  the  Church,  the  Earl  of  Shaftes- 
bury, He  spoke  of  "  The  indecency  of  his  endeavour- 
ing to  steal  a  march  upon  us  by  having  the  bill  read 
a  first  time  last  night,  when  no  one  was  here  who 
knew  what  it  was  :  a  bill  which,  I  believe,  will  en- 
tirely set  aside  the  fundamental  principle  of  the 
parochial  system  of  the  Church  of  England.  This  is 
the  way  in  which  the  noble  Earl  thinks  it  perfectly  fit, 
decent,  and  becoming  to  deal  with  such  a  subject  in 
his  own  aristocratic  wisdom."  We  should  have  thought, 
however,  that  Lord  Shaftesbury's  high  character  and 
great  services  to  humanity  might  have  saved  him  from 
so  severe  a  rejoinder.  He  offered  throughout  the 
steadiest  opposition  to  Lord  Westbury's  law  for  mak- 
ing divorce  cheap  and  common.  In  this  speech  he 
made  use  of  a  sentence  which  gives  the  Anglican  view 
of  the  Reformers  :  "  The  minds  of  great  and  honest 


THE    LATE    BISHOr   OP   WINCnESTEE.  249 

men,  in  the  first  mastery  of  new  truths,  were  almost 
intoxicated  by  the  greatness  of  the  draught ;  in  cast- 
ing away  a  multitude  of  errors  they  were  in  great 
dansrer  of  losino;  hold  of  a  multitude  of  truths."  In 
this  debate  a  controversy  arose  between  the  Bishop 
and  Lord  Lyndhurst  respecting  some  passages  iu  St. 
Augustine,  and  the  aged  law  lord  showed  a  remarkable 
familiarity  with  this  important  department  of  patristic 
literature.  The  Bishop  characterised  the  bill  as  a  hap- 
hazard piece  of  legislation,  which  changed  great  insti- 
tutions without  seeing  the  end  of  what  it  proposed. 
He  uttered  ominous  words  which  it  almost  appears 
the  unhappy  current  of  society  will  ratify  and  confirm. 
"  It  might  be  long  before  the  public  would  take  ad- 
vantage of  the  new  law,  for  such  changes  seldom  ap- 
peared in  their  full  effect  all  at  once  ;  but  slowly,  step 
by  step,  it  might  change  the  whole  moral  aspect  of 
the  nation,  and  deteriorate  the  temper  of  the  people." 
He  always  showed  himself  decidedly  in  favour  of  an  in- 
crease of  the  Episcopacy  by  a  sub-division  of  dioceses. 
He  steadily  resisted  Lord  Ebury's  proposed  relaxa- 
tion of  the  Act  of  Uniformity.  He  attempted 
with  some  success  an  improvement  of  the  Law  for  the 
Protection  of  Women.  Hardly  any  speech  is  more 
masrnificent  than  that  ao^ainst  the  Palmerston  Govern- 
ment  on  the  war  with  China. 

We  had  the  pleasure  of  hearing  Dr.  Wilberforce  de- 
liver his  great  speech  on  the  Suspensory  Bill.  It  was 
in  answer  to  the  Duke  of  Argyll,  and  we  remember  how 
characteristically  he  brought  out  the  remark  that  over 
all  there  was  writ  large  the  word  Presbyterian.  The 
Bishop  and  the  Duke  constantly  were  pitted  against 
each  other,  and  were  foemen  "  worthy  of  each  other's 


250  ODE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

steel."  This  may  be  considered  the  last  great  speech 
that  the  Bishop  ever  delivered.  His  speech  next  year 
in  committee  was  brief  and  languid  in  comparison. 
Reading  it  over  in  print — and  you  never  quite  take  in  a 
parliamentary  oration  until  it  appears  in  print — the  tone 
appears  a  little  too  broad  and  farcical  for  such  a  high 
occasion,  in  which  such  solemn  interests  were  con- 
cerned. But  no  one  knew  the  art  of  debating  better 
than  did  the  Bishop,  how  a  pungent  phrase  must 
flavour  an  argument,  or  a  witty  story  illustrate  it. 
It  was  a  lovely  afternoon  at  the  end  of  June,  before 
the  dinner  hour,  that  he  made  this  masterly  address. 
It  was  in  the  true  debating  style,  the  grand  talk  of  the 
man  of  the  world,  who  knew  how  to  make  his  points, 
and  elicit  the  cheer. 

The  attitude  which  the  Bishop  took  up  next  year 
was  very  remarkable.  He  did  not  take  part  in  the 
discussion  on  the  Second  Reading,  "  shut  out  by  the 
accident  of  debate."  A  resolute  and  earnest  opposi- 
tion would  take  care  that  no  accidents  of  debate  should 
prevent  itself  from  being  felt.  The  Bishop  of  Peter- 
borough took  up  the  clientship  of  the  doomed  Church, 
and  its  cause  was  no  loser  from  the  fact  that  he  who 
had  hitherto  been  the  most  eminent  member  of  the 
Episcopal  bench  was  silent.  The  disestablishment 
of  the  Church  was  acquiesced  in  by  the  Bishop  with 
resignation,  not  to  say  alacrity.  It  is,  indeed,  some- 
what difficult  to  reconcile  the  language  of  the  two 
speeches.  In  the  first  speech  the  great  argument  was 
that  the  time  of  endowment  is  the  time  of  a  nation's 
youth,  and  that  you  cannot  expect  in  a  late  period  of 
history  true  temporal  help  will  be  largely  given  to- 
wards a  spiritual  mission.     "  You  might  just  as  well, 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  251 

when  you  see  a  man  cutting  from  off  an  ancient  oak  a 
certain  part  of  its  branches,  tell  him  to  go  and  plant 
it  in  the  ground  and  it  will  grow  up  another  oak  like 
that  which  sprung  from  an  acorn,  as  say  to  me  now 
in  its  age,  '  Disendow  the  Irish  Church,  and  trust  to 
the  vitality  of  your  religion  to  re-endow  it.'  "  It  is 
interesting  to  compare  with  this  speech  the  language 
of  the  Bishop  in  Committee.  "  There  is  one  thing  of 
which  I  am  convinced — that,  while  an  Establishment  is 
to  a  particular  Church  in  many  ways  a  blessing  un- 
speakable, no  Church  which  cannot  stand  without  an 
Estabhshment  is  worth  being  estabhshed.  ...  I  shall 
beheve  she  will  prove  herself  to  be  the  true  Catholic 
Church  of  Ireland,  raising,  in  the  greatness  of  her  love 
and  learning,  more  than  she  has  ever  yet  done,  the 
bulk  of  the  population."  Whenever  we  begin  to 
"  Hansardise,"  not  bishops  themselves  are  exempt 
from  the  consequences.  A  great  deal  must  be  put 
down  to  the  cause  of  perorations.  Whenever  a  man 
begins  to  perorate,  his  periods  lengthen,  the  imagina- 
tion is  fixed,  all  possible  vistas  are  opened  up,  and  the 
orator  who  has  so  far  made  language  his  instrument, 
when  he  perorates,  becomes  its  slave. 

In  Parliament  and  on  the  platform  the  Bishop,  in  a 
popular  point  of  view,  was,  perhaps,  seen  to  the 
greatest  effect  as  one  of  the  most  accomplished,  ver- 
satile, and  eloquent  speakers  of  the  day.  His  Chris- 
tian oratory  probably  attained  its  highest  culmination 
in  the  pulpit,  where  a  very  eminent  measure  of  suc- 
cess is  at  the  same  time  most  diflQcult  and  most  rare. 
Incessant  demands  were  made  upon  the  Christian  kind- 
ness of  the  Bishop  in  multiplied  requests  that  he  would 
officiate  in  various  churches  ;  nor  was  this  to  be  won- 


252  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

dered  at,  since  the  presence  of  the  Bishop  frequently 
had  the  effect  of  doubling  the  amount  of  the  offertory. 
And  these  requests  were  so  frequently  complied  with, 
as  far  as  human  ability  could  extend,  that  most  persons 
have  a  tolerably  clear  conception  of  the  character  of 
these  sermons.  They  do  not  abound  with  those  pas- 
sages which  the  author  of  the  "  Dialogue  on  Oratory," 
perhaps  Tacitus,  calls  lumina  and  sententicB,  bursts  of 
eloquence,  or  carefully  constructed  paragraphs  which 
are  the  different  centres  of  a  discourse  whither  all  the 
other  portions  converge.  But  from  first  to  last  these 
sermons  are  intensely  emotional,  marked  by  intense 
energy  and  feeling,  which  are  suggestive  of  vast  and 
indefinite  energy  and  feeling  beyond  that  manifested, 
only  held  in  leash  by  strong  self-command,  and  a  de- 
sire to  allow  to  argument  a  predominance  over  feel- 
inof. 

The  wonder  is  how  perfectly  Bishop  Wilberforce 
adapted  his  oratory  to  the  various  audiences  he  was 
called  upon  to  address.  His  peers  in  Parliament 
might  be  instructed  and  delighted  by  his  preaching, 
and  assuredly  have  had  to  listen  to  the  most  plain- 
spoken  language  of  reproof,  to  the  most  emphatic 
warnings  against  sensuality  and  selfishness,  and  indo- 
lence and  pride,  all  that  fungous  growth  of  sin  which 
is  the  accompaniment  of  a  high  state  of  civilization. 
Again,  the  Bishop  was  a  favourite  preacher  before  the 
University.  That  wonderful  power  of  suasion,  which 
is  the  true  secret  of  true  rhetoric,  is  as  visible  here 
as  elsewhere,  but  rhetoric  alone  will  never  rivet  the 
attention  of  a  University  audience  unless  it  rests  upon 
the  substantial  support  of  sound  learning  and  sound 
sense.     We   wish  those  who   so  often  harshly  judge 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP   WINCHESTER.  253 

and  speiik  of  the  Romanizing  tendencies  of  the  Bishop, 
would  study  those  sermons  which  he  has  expressly 
preached  against  the  errors  of  Romanism.  One  of 
these  is  on  the  "  Blessings  of  the  Reformation,"  which 
we  would  commend  to  those  English  clergymen  who 
speak  of  Protestantism  with  contempt,  and  lament 
the  Reformation  as  the  schism  of  the  sixteenth  century. 
Read  also  that  remarkable  sermon  on  the  last  Roman 
dogma  of  the  "  Immaculate  Conception."  Read  these 
noble  words — 

"  We  must  protest  anew  against  this  monstrous 
effort  to  corrupt  by  man's  additions  the  revealed 
truth  of  God.  We  may  not  lawfully  accept  such  new 
dogmas.  On  us,  in  our  day,  as  having  inherited  the 
pure  deposit ;  on  us,  as  witnesses  and  guardians  of  the 
ancient  faith ;  on  us,  as  solemnly  set  to  interpret 
God's  Word  as  from  of  old  it  hath  been  interpreted, 
the  duty  is  imperative  to  declare  that  this  is  not  what 
God's  Word  reveals ;  that  it  is  not  what  apostles 
taught;  that  it  is  not  what  the  Church  hath  learned; 
that  it  is  another  gospel.  And  so  this  day,  from  the 
bosom  of  this  ancient  University,  as  the  Bishop  of 
this  Church,  set  in  trust  with  this  guardianship,  in 
God's  name,  and  with  you  all  as  witnesses,  I  solemnly 
denounce  it." 

Surely  this  is  a  magnificent  passage.  We  can 
hardly  recall  any  passage  of  any  sermon  that  exceeds 
its  magnificent  simplicity  and  energy.  Again,  once 
more,  there  was  no  one  who  was  more  emphatically  the 
poor  man's  preacher  than  the  Bishop  of  Oxford.  On 
one  occasion  at  least,  a  poor  man  having  heard  him 
preach,  "  made  so  bold "  as  to  ask  him  to  come  to 
Derby  and  preach  to  a  number  of  poor  men,  which 


254  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

the  Bishop  promised  to  do,  and  was  accordingly  as 
good  as  his  word. 

"  We  were  ourselves  present,"  writes  a  friend,  "on 
one  occasion  in  St.  Pancras  Church,  at  a  special 
Wednesday  evening  service  for  the  working-classes. 
The  intimation  that  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  would 
preach  of  course  crammed  the  church.  The  whole  of 
the  spacious  floor  was  filled,  mostly  with  the  class  for 
whom  the  service  was  intended ;  the  galleries  were 
set  apart  for  others.  Men  in  their  working  dresses 
were  there  by  hundreds,  and  in  all  it  was  calculated 
that  there  were  more  than  three  thousand  people  in 
St.  Pancras  that  evening.  The  Bishop  ascended  the 
pulpit ;  there  was  evidently  a  feeling  of  curiosity  on 
the  part  of  his  rough  audience,  but  the  result  was 
one  of  the  greatest  triumphs  of  real,  simple,  hearty 
eloquence  that  it  has  ever  fallen  to  our  lot  to  witness. 
For  about  an  hour  and  a  quarter  did  the  Bishop 
continue  his  address,  and  during  the  whole  of  that 
long  time  one  might  literally  have  heard  a  pin  drop  in 
that  vast  church.  His  language  was  as  plain  and 
simple  as  could  be  ;  there  was  not  a  word  that  the 
most  uneducated  could  have  had  a  difliculty  in  under- 
standing ;  but  the  secret  of  his  powerful  charm  we 
have  already  stated — it  was  evident  earnestness,  the 
manifest  heartiness  and  sincerity  with  which  he 
preached  to  his  hearers  the  message  which  he  was 
commissioned  to  deliver."  Before  passing  from  the 
sermons  of  the  Bishop,  we  must  be  allowed  to  give  a 
last  extract.  It  is  from  a  sermon  preached  in  the 
chapel  of  Windsor  Castle  on  the  Sunday  before  the 
marriage  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  published  by  the 
command  of    Her    Majesty.     It  both  glanced  at  the 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF   WINCHESTER.  255 

coming  joy  and  dwelt  on  the  grievous  loss.  The  text 
was  (Rom.  xii.  15),  "  Rejoice  with  them  that  do 
rejoice,  and  weep  with  them  that  weep" — 

"  Now,  startling  as  this  may  look  at  first  sight, 
how  deeply  human  is  it  when  we  gaze  into  it  more 
closely  !  For  first,  how  are  these  blended  always  in 
this  world  !  Where  can  we  ever  find  the  one  without 
the  other?  Where  is  the  house  of  feasting  in  which 
there  are  not  in  some  lone  chamber  or  other  the 
bitter  herbs  and  the  unleavened  bread?  Where  is  the 
blessed  sunshine  without  the  dark  neighbourhood  of 
some  weeping  cloud  ?  Even  if  they  seem  in  any  life 
to  be  for  awhile  parted,  how  inevitable  is  the  union  ! 
The  sparkling  cup  of  joy  is  followed  evermore  in  sad 
succession  by  the  cup  of  tears ;  and  it  comes  surely 
round  to  each  one  in  his  appointed  turn.  Where  is 
the  rich  inheritance  of  earthly  love  without  sooner 
or  later  the  deep  anguish  of  separation  ?  Where  does 
not  the  brightness  of  the  festal  dance  change,  even 
as  it  is  lengthened  out,  into  the  slow  procession  of 
the  veiled  mourners  ? 

"  Nor  is  this  all.  Even  beyond  it,  there  seems  to 
be  in  ourselves,  as  we  are  here  on  earth,  a  hidden 
sacramental  union  between  joy  and  sorrow,  even  at 
the  same  time  in  the  same  heart.  This  may  not 
indeed  be  perceived  in  the  frivolous,  who  weep  childish 
tears,  which  dry  as  soon  as  they  are  shed,  and  laugh 
with  an  idle  surface  merriment  in  which  the  soul 
scarcely  seems  to  join.  But  it  is  plainly  marked  in 
the  working  of  deeper  spirits.  In  them  these  highest 
fountain-heads  of  emotion  lie  close  beside  each  other. 
In  them  great  joy  is  a  very  solemn  strain,  and  often 
finds  its  truest  utterance  in  a  sigh  ;  it  is  a  trembling 


256  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

mystery,  wliicli  declares  itself  outwardly  rather  by 
the  welling  over  of  the  tear  of  delight  than  by  the 
shallower  acts  of  a  noisy  laughter.  In  them,  if  God 
lias  given  to  them  the  grace  to  yield  themselves  to  his 
will,  and  to  lie  passive  in  his  hands,  a  deep  abiding 
grief  is,  not  unfrequently,  the  best  possession  which 
life  as  it  advances  has  left  to  them  ;  for  like  the  aroma 
which  is  shed  around  from  the  crushed  leaf  of  the 
spice  plant,  with  the  bruising  of  their  heart  is  mingled 
evermore  in  the  stillness  of  their  resignation  the 
fragrance  of  undying  recollections,  and  the  sweet 
breath  of  expectant  hopes." 

The    Bishop     often    spoke   to    his    clergy    on   the 
subject  of  preaching,  and  he  was  certainly  not  one  of 
those  who  are  likely  to   exaggerate  the  importance  of 
the  ordinance,  and  to  give  it  an  overweening  measure 
of  prominence.     It   must   have   been   interesting   to 
listen  to  the  instructions  of  so  great  a  master  of  the 
sacred  art.     Foolish  preaching  and  the  foolishness  of 
preaching  are  two  very  different  things.     The  Bishop 
forcibly  contrasts  the  too  frequent  dulness  and  mono- 
tony of  the  pulpit   with  the   care  and  vigour  which 
characterize   the   leading   article    of   the   newspaper. 
He  has  expressed  his  opinion  that  simple  idleness  is 
the  principal  cause  of  poor    sermons ;    according   to 
the  caustic  saying,  "  the  sermon  which  has  cost  little 
is  worth  just  what  it  cost."     Idle  preachers  and  idle 
hearers    go    together.      With    the    greatest   leaning 
towards  ex  tempore   preaching  (if  indeed  that  can  be 
called    ex   temiwre  preaching  which  has  exacted  the 
most  careful  preparation)  he  dwells   strongly  on  the 
importance  of  writing  one's  sermon.     For  many  years 
one  sermon  a  week  ought  to  be  written.     It  would  be 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF    WINCHESTEE.  257 

well  to  write  a  sermon  carefully,  and  then  preacli 
from  mere  notes.  The  Bishop  dwells  strongly  on 
those  chief  necessities  of  prayer  and  study ;  on  the 
necessity  of  a  clear  statement  of  any  theological 
formula  involved,  of  reality,  and  of  earnestness.  In 
an  image  of  clear  poetic  beauty,  he  teaches  a  precious 
truth  : — "  In  secret  meditation  and  prayer  that  love 
which  is  the  life  of  ministerial  power  must  evermore 
be  nourished,  as,  on  the  mossy  mountain  top  where 
the  seething  mists  distil  their  precious  burden,  are 
fed  the  hidden  springheads  of  the  perennial  stream 
which  fertihzes  the  lower  vale." 

Some  of  the  Bishop  of  Oxford's  hints  on  preaching 
possess,  in  point  of  fact,  an  autobiographic  interest, 
inasmuch  as  they  are  hints  manifestly  drawn  from  his 
own  experience,  and  he  himself  best  illustrates  their 
use  and  value  : — "  If  any  thoughts  strike  you   with 
peculiar  power,  secure   them   at  once.     Do  not  wait 
till,    having  written   or  composed  all  the   rest,    you 
come  in   order  to  them  :  such  burning  thoughts  burn 
out.     Fix  them  whilst  you  can.     I   would  say,  never, 
if  you  can   help  it,  compose  except  with  a   fervent 
spirit ;    whatever  is  languidly  composed  is  lifelessly 
received.      Rather    stop    and    try   whether    reading, 
meditation,  and   prayer  will   not   quicken    the    spirit, 
than  drive   on   heavily,  when  the  chariot  wheels  are 
taken  off.     So  the   mighty   masters  of  our  art  have 
done.      Bossuet   never    set   himself  to    compose   his 
great  sermons  without  first  reading  chapters  of  Isaiah 
and    portions    of  Gregory  Nazianzen,    to    kindle   his 
own  spirit.     Study  with  especial   care   all  statements 
of  doctrine,    to    be  clear,    particular,    and    accurate. 
Do  not  labour  too   much  to  give  great  ornament  or 
VOL.  I.  s 


258  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

polish    to    your     sermons.      They   often    lose    their 
strength  in   such   refining  processes.     Do  not  be  the 
slave  of  your  manuscript,  but  make  it  your  servant." 
Beyond  the  sermons  there  are  several   other  direc- 
tions in  which   the  Bishop  in  his  episcopal  character 
has  made  religious  addresses  most   deserving  of  con- 
sideration.    Such  as   (a)  Addresses   to  candidates  for 
holy  orders  ;   (b)  Confirmation  addresses  ;   (c)  Charges 
to  the  clergy  of  his   diocese.     Of  the  first   we  have 
already    spoken,    and  expressed  our  opinion    of  the 
great  and    permanent  value  which  belongs  to  them. 
To  us  there  is  something  always  peculiarly  interesting 
in   a  confirmation    address.     We   think   that   this   is 
generally   the    case ;    and    almost   invariably    in    his 
charges  the  Bishop  dwells  on  the  momentous  impor- 
tance of  this    epoch  in  the  life   of  the  young — that 
favourable  sowing  time  which,  haply,  may  yield  here- 
after a  most  abundant  harvest.     In  one  of  his  charges 
the   Bishop  was  able  to  give  an  affecting   proof  of 
this: — "A  Crimean  chaplain  tending,  after  a  battle, 
the  dying  inmates  of  the  army  hospitals,  found  one — 
and  at  that  time  but  one — of  the  wounded  men  whose 
soul  was   manifestly  filled  with   the  love  of  Christ ; 
and  he  traced  all  his  rehgious  life  to  the  labours  and 
the  grace   of  a  confirmation   in  this  very    diocese." 
We  would  especially  direct  attention  to  some  of  the 
confirmation  addresses   delivered  to    the  Eton  boys. 
Once  we  heard  the  Bishop  deliver  a  double  confirma- 
tion  address    in    Paris.     We    say   a   double   address, 
inasmuch    as    the   Bishop    addressed   the    candidates 
both    before    and    after    the    rite — "  my    sons    and 
daughters,"  as  he   called   them  in  earnest  and  aff'ec- 
tionate  terms  which  produced  a  visible  effect.     If  we 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  259 

may  judge  from  the  Paris  instance,  not  only  the 
female  candidates,  who  always  muster  in  goodly 
numbers,  and  seem  sensitively  alive  to  the  solemn 
teachino^  they  then  receive,  but  the  boys  showed 
somewhat  unusual  signs  of  a  good  work  in  them- 
selves. 

The  charge!^  of  the  Bishop  must  have  been  listened 
to  with  peculiar  attention  by  his  clergy,  and  may  be 
turned  to  good  purpose  by  clergy  and  laity  at  large. 
Almost  prophetically,  in  his  primary  charge,  the 
Bishop  guarded  himself  against  future  misapprehen- 
sion, and  besought  a  charitable  construction  of  his 
actions.  The  charge  generally  gives  a  summary  of 
all  diocesan  work,  and  a  clear  unwavering  opinion  on 
the  most  important  subjects  which  at  the  time  were 
arising  in  the  Church.  Each  charge  was  constructed 
on  the  system  that  in  the  first  division  of  it  there 
should  be  a  complete  diocesan  report  of  all  the  work 
done  before  the  usual  discussion  of  controversies  and 
movements  in  the  Church  at  large.  In  all  there  are 
eight  charges.  It  has  been  truly  said  that  if  anyone 
will  compare  these  charges  with,  the  contemporary, 
charges  of  the  Bishop  of  St.  David's  he  will  be  able 
to  gain  a  very  complete  view  of  the  history  of  Church 
movements  and  Church  thought  in  the  present  day.' 
The  final  farewell  charge  was  given  in  1869,  and 
there  the  Bishop  sums  up  his  work.  The  amount 
raised  during  his  Episcopate  in  the  three  archdeacon- 
ries for  churches,  church  endowments,  schools, 
houses  of  mercy,  and  parsonage  houses,  amounted  to 
a  total  of  two  millions  one  hundred  and  thirty -three 
thousand,  six-hundred  and  thirty-tivo  pounds.  The 
total  number  of  churches  restored  during  the  quarter 

s  2 


260  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

of  a  century  was  two  hundred  and  fifty.  The  new 
or  rebuilt  churches  were  one  hundred  and  twenty-one. 
The  number  of  new  or  restored  churches  was  more 
than  half  of  the  whole  number  in  the  diocese.  Nor 
was  the  Bishop  less  active  and  successful  in  other 
kinds  of  work,  which  it  would  be  difficult  to  state 
under  a  statistical  form,  or  display  in  a  balance 
sheet. 

Some    of  the    personal    touches  in   these   charges 
abound  in  interest  and  pathos  : — "  One  other  master 
feeling  is  present,  and   must  find   utterance,  one  of 
deep  thankfulness  to  you,  with  whom  the  providence  of 
God  has  connected  me  in  the  rule  and  government  of 
His  Church,  for  unnumbered  acts  of  kindness.     As  I 
look  around  me  at  these  gatherings  of  laymen  and  of 
clergymen  from  centre  to  centre  in  the  diocese,  I  am 
moved  to  wonder,  and  to  doubt  whether  other  dioceses 
can  yield  to  their  bishops   such  a  body  of  kind  per- 
sonal friends  and  warm-hearted  and  able  coadjutors 
as  God's  goodness  has   granted  to  myself."     At  the 
triennial  November  gatherings  the  voids   made  in  the 
ranks  since  the  previous  visitation  are  carefully  and 
feelingly  noticed : — "  Our  business,  even  more   than 
that  of  other  men,  will  not  brook  delay.     From  our 
hands  surely  '  the  King's  business  requireth  haste.'  " 
Thus  speaks  the  Bishop  on  one  of  these  occasions  : — 
"  With  increasing    earnestness,    if  I  know  anything 
of  myself,  do  I  desire  to  be  a  fellow-helper  of  the  joy 
of  every  one  of  you ;  to  rule,  for  so   God  has  willed, 
as   a   brother   amongst   brethren  ;  to  love   all,    to  be 
loved  and  prayed  for  by  all ;  to  help  you  all  without 
distinction  or  difference  in  your  work  for  Christ,  that 
so,  through   His  grace,  I   and  you   '  may  finish  our 


THE    LATE    BISUOP    OF    WINCHESTER.  2G1 

course  with  joy,'    and   the  ministry   which   we  have 
received   of  the   Lord  Jesus,  to   testify  the  gospel  of 
the  grace  of  God."     In   the  charge  of  18G3,  this  is 
his  solemn   and    affecting   language  : — "  The  greater 
knowledge  which  time  gives  me  of  the  diocese ;  my 
better  acquaintance   with   its    clergy    and    laity ;   my 
largely  increased  affection  for  so  many  of  them  ;  the 
disappearing  from  amongst   us  of  honoured   and  be- 
loved faces  (twenty-eight  of  our  incumbents  gone  since 
last  we  met) ;  the  more  detailed   knowledge  which  I 
have  of  the  difficulties  and  disappointments  as  well  as 
of  the  successes  and  blessings  of  our  common  minis- 
try;   an  increasing    sense   of  personal  imperfection, 
and  a  growing  expectation  of  the  end  of  my  ministry ; 
— all  deepen  greatly  the  broad  lines  of  care,  anxiety, 
and  solemn  reflection  with  which  season  after  season 
I  meet  you." 

One  of  the  Bishop's  greatest  services  to  the  Church 
was  the  revival  of  Convocation.  The  service  would 
have  been  greater  if  he  had  given,  so  far  as  in  him  lay, 
a  fairer  constitution  to  Convocation.  It  is  remarkable 
that  he  never  would  form  diocesan  synods,  probably 
thinking  of  his  own  diocese.  L'etat  c^est  moi. 
Perhaps  he  was  warned  by  the  example  of  the  Bishop 
of  Exeter,  who  had  fought  for  the  diocesan  synod  so 
stoutly  and  abandoned  it  so  readily.  He  was  the 
first  bishop  who  urged  the  revival  of  Convocation, 
and,  as  his  manner  was,  he  one  by  one  brought 
round  the  other  bishops  to  his  opinion.  One  by  one 
Convocation  has  regained  its  rights,  saved  itself  from 
premature  prorogation,  obtained  leave  to  deliberate, 
obtained  "  letters  of  business."  In  the  Upper  Cham- 
ber,  the   drawing-room  where   some   elderly   prelates 


262  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

address  some  half-dozen  reporters,  his  iafluence  was 
supreme;  nothing  was  done  till  he  came,  and  he 
practically  to  a  very  great  extent  guided  the  delibera- 
tions of  the  Lower  Chamber,  He  used  to  hold 
Convocation  breakfasts,  in  which  he  would  gather 
all  sorts  of  people  about  him,  and  talk  them  over  to 
his  opinions.  No  one  better  knew  the  diplomatic 
purposes  to  which  a  breakfast,  that  most  conversa- 
tional of  meals,  could  be  adroitly  turned.  At  the 
same  time  Convocation  was  never  in  favour  in  high 
places.  Lord  Lansdowne  had  denounced  it  as  novel, 
far-fetched,  and  dangerous,  and  the  Court  was  bit- 
terly hostile  and  greatly  excited  against  the  proposal. 
Strong  words  were  used  as  to  persistent  exclusion 
from  preferment  of  all  who  favoured  the  movement. 
The  Bishop  was  probably  aware  that  he  was  sen- 
tencing himself  to  be  nothing  else  than  Bishop  of 
Oxford  all  his  days,  but  he  took  his  stand  on  this 
great  question  and  adhered  to  it  through  good  report 
and  evil  report. 

That  diocesan  work  on  which  the  Bishop  so  re- 
peatedly reports  ought  to  be  glanced  at  in  order  to 
give  any  degree  of  completeness  to  this  chapter.  That 
work  embraces  such  a  multiphcity  of  details,  and  such 
admirable  organization,  as  to  go  far  to  make  the 
diocese  of  Oxford  a  model  one  among  the  dioceses  of 
England.  The  Diocesan  Theological  College  at  Cud- 
desdon  has  attained  so  high  a  character  that  its  mem- 
bers are  eagerly  sought  for  throughout  the  country, 
and  can  only  fractionally  satisfy  more  than  one  half  of 
the  demands  made  upon  it.  The  system  at  Cuddesdon 
is  of  the  best  type  of  an  Enghsh  college,  and,  so  far 
as  we  can  discover,  does  not  merit  that  unfavourable 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF   WINCHESTER.  2G3 

criticism  which   has   sometimes  been  applied  to  these 
theological  colleges.     The  Diocesan  Training,  at   Cul- 
ham,  is  either  all  but  self-supporting  or  altogether  so  ; 
its  standard  is  raised,  its  numbers  are  overflowing,  its 
usefulness  is  generally  appreciated.  The  schoolmasters 
which  it  sends  out,  and  who  are  now  instructing  many 
thousand  scholars  in  difi"erent  parts  of  the  country,  the 
various  Lenten  services  in   Oxford  and  in  other  chief 
towns  of  the  diocese,  have  brought  multitudes  within 
the  teaching  of  the  most  earnest  and  most  enlightened 
of  our  clergy.     Again,  look  at  the   Houses  of  Mercy, 
the  Sisterhoods,  established  in  the  diocese  at  Clewer, 
Wantage,  and  Oxford.     Or  take  the  report  of  the  dif- 
ferent dioceses.  It  would  be  quite  worth  a  man's  while 
to  purchase  and  study  the  "  Diocesan  Calendar,"  pub- 
lished by  Mr.  Parker,  in  order  to  obtain  a  bird's-eye 
view  of   the  vast  machinery   for   good  in    the  three 
counties  of  Berks,  Oxford,  and  Buckingham.     There 
is  the  Church   Building   Society,    the  Spiritual  Help 
Society,  and  an  admirable  society  for  raising  the  in- 
come  of   all    small   livings    to    two    hundred   a-year. 
There  is  a  great  work  of  Church  education  going  on. 
There    ought  also  to  be  mentioned  the  great  assist- 
ance which  the  diocese  renders  to  the  leading  religious 
societies  of  the  empire.     There  is  a  constant  action  of 
the  Ruridecanal  Chapters ;  there  is  an  annual  gather- 
ino-  at  Cuddesdon  of  rural  deans  and  unpaid  school 
inspectors.     The    Lent   Missions   which    he   and   his 
company  of  preachers  established  in  one  place  after 
another  throughout  the  diocese  were  the  precursors, 
the  most  remarkable  precursors  of  the  present  Mission 
system.     For  four  years   there   has    been    an  annual 
gathering  of  the  clergy — first  at  St.  Peter's  College, 


26-i  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

Radley,  and  afterwards  at  Exeter  College,  Oxford — 
"  for  communion,  worship,  brotherly  intercourse,  and 
addresses  upon  some  leading  questions  of  theology,  to 
be  followed  by  free  discussion  on  the  subjects  so 
opened."  The  scheme  worked  admirably,  and  an  annual 
volume  was  published,  with  a  preface  by  the  Bishop, 
giving  a  tolerably  full  account  of  the  sermons  and  ad- 
dresses. The  Church  Congresses  at  Manchester  and 
Cambridge  were  an  expansion  of  this,  in  which  the 
Bishop  of  Oxford  had  his  share,  and  related  his  Con- 
nemara  experiences,  and  thus  has  come  to  pass  the 
established  institution  of  the  Church  Congress. 

One  of  the  pleasantest  souvenirs  of  the  Bishop's 
life  must  have  been  his  connection  with  Robertson,  of 
Brighton.  Robertson  had  known  him  at  Winchester, 
and  coming  back  from  a  stay  on  the  Continent  asked 
him  for  employment.  Bishop  Wilberforce  offered  him 
the  curacy  of  St.  Ebbe's.  It  was  rather  odd  that  a 
man  like  Robertson  should  have  gone  to  a  man  like 
the  Bishop.  He  had  maintained  an  internecine  war 
with  Tractarianism ;  and  at  a  crisis  of  his  spiritual  life 
he  writes,  '*  Even  the  Tractarian  heresy  has  vanished 
from  my  mind,  amid  the  stormy  conflicts  with  worldly 
passions  and  pure  Atheism  !"  It  is  not  to  be  won- 
dered at  that  Robertson  should  go  to  the  Bishop  and 
frankly  tell  him  that  he  did  not  hold  and  could  not 
preach  baptismal  regeneration.  The  Bishop  answered, 
"  I  give  my  clergy  a  large  circle  to  work  in,  and  if 
you  do  not  step  beyond  that  I  do  not  interfere.  I 
shall  be  glad,  however,  to  hear  your  views  on  the 
subject."  After  an  hour's  conversation  the  Bishop 
said,  "  Well,  Mr.  Robertson,  you  have  well  maintained 
your  position,  and  I  renew  my  offer."     Robertson  ac- 


TOE    LATE    BISHOP    OP    WINCHEISTER.  265 

cordingly  went  and  refused  his  promotion  to  Brighton. 
At  last  he  left  the  matter  entirely  in  the  Bishop's 
hands,  and  the  Bishop  told  him  to  go. 

This  restless  activity  of  the  Bishop's  will  long  re- 
main a  tradition  in  the  Church  of  England.  Of  no 
other  public  man  were  the  appearances  so  various  and 
numerous.  As  a  conversationalist  he  was  unrivalled, 
unrivalled  as  a  speaker,  impromptu  or  prepared.  He 
had  all  the  newest  anecdotes,  and  had  read  all  the 
newest  books.  Occasionally  he  seems  to  have  read 
new  books  in  manuscript.  How  often  a  good  anecdote 
would  be  embedded  in  his  remarks ;  we  will  just  cull 
a  few.  He  was  speaking  of  a  man  who  objected  to 
definite  religious  teaching.  "  A  friend  was  walking 
round  this  man's  garden  one  day,  and  he  saw  one  spot 
which  was  eminently  qualified  to  serve  as  a  straw- 
berry-bed, but  it  was  grown  over  with  weeds  nearly  a 
yard  high.  His  friend,  being  of  an  economical  turn 
of  mind,  said  to  him  :  '  Why  do  you  let  that  beautiful 
ground,  which  would  do  so  well  for  a  strawberry-bed, 
lie  waste  !'  Being  a  man  of  conscientious  views  he 
replied  :  '  Because  I  did  not  think  it  right  to  prejudice 
the  ground  in  favour  of  strawberries.  But  not  pre- 
judicing the  ground  in  favour  of  strawberries  led  to  an 
immense  crop  of  perfectly  useless  weeds,  which  took 
great  pains  to  seed  themselves  and  grew  again  time 
after  time.  So  in  all  attempts  to  teach  children,  if 
you  do  not  prejudice  their  minds  in  favour  of  straw- 
berries, weeds  will  come  in  very  great  abundance." 
It  is  impossible  to  read  his  speeches  without  culling 
many  a  golden  saying,  many  a  brilliant  illustration. 

But  as  one  who  knew  him  well  writes,  "  We   do 
not  care  to  quote  hon  mots.     It   was  his  whole   con- 


266  OUR   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 

versation  that  charmed.  There  was  such  an  astonish- 
ing variety  about  it — theory,  argument,  disquisition 
all  poured  out  together,  and  all  transfigured  by  his 
exquisite  diction  and  his  wonderfully  flexible  voice. 
Bishop  Blomfield,  Bishop  Thirlwall,  all  the  best 
Oxford  men,  lions  brought  down  from  London  or 
elsewhere  (once  we  met  Rajah  Brook),  he  drew  out 
all — as  a  conversationalist  he  surpassed  all.  Blomfield 
was  all  but  supreme  as  a  storyteller.  Samuel  Wilber- 
force  added  a  superior  charm  of  grace  which  makes  us 
put  him  first.  Then  those  Cuddesdon  College  anni- 
versaries, and  the  sunshine  which  he  seemed  to 
diffuse  around  him  over  the  hundreds  whom  he 
brought  together."  It  must  be  said,  however,  that 
the  hospitalities  of  Cuddesdon  were  often  diffused 
over  too  wide  a  surface.  Like  other  great  country 
houses,  there  was  often  a  stream  of  visitors  pouring 
through  it,  and  the  life  became  too  much  mere  hotel 
life.  The  guests  had  sometimes  reason  to  complain 
that  they  saw  nothing  of  their  distinguished  host. 
They  might  listen  to  the  stream  of  eloquence  and 
anecdote,  but  they  found  it  impossible  to  penetrate 
beneath  the  glittering,  polished  surface,  into  that 
quiet,  earnest  home-talk  that  they  would  desire  to 
have.  Again  and  again  have  I  met  with  persons  who 
spoke  of  their  intercourse  with  the  Bishop  as  a  great 
disappointment.  I  once  heard  the  story  of  a  young 
lady  whose  whole  nature  had  been  deeply  impressed 
and  moved  by  the  Bishop's  teaching,  whether  by 
speech  or  publication.  It  was  the  darling  wish  of  her 
heart  that  she  might  meet  the  great  Master  in  Israel 
and  receive  from  him  some  measure  of  direction  and 
consolation.     To  her  great  joy,  a  letter  came  one  day 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF    WINCHESTER.  2G7 

from  a  friend,  saying  tliafc  the  Bishop  was  about  to 
stay  at  a  certain  house,  and  inviting  her  to  make  a 
visit  at  the  same  time.  It  was  one  of  the  Bishop's 
flying  visits — one  of  the  pleasantest  sorts  of  visits — 
the  dress  day,  rest  day,  and  guest  day.  He  was  to 
preach  on  the  Sunday,  and  be  gone  on  the  Monday  or 
Tuesday.  He  came,  and  as  usual,  saw  and  conquered. 
All  the  little  society  clustered  round  the  brilliant  orb. 
A  stream  of  anecdote,  repartee,  and  illustration  flowed 
forth  from  a  very  ocean  of  information 

tariv  daXaaaa,  tic  ce  viv  Karaajjeaei ; 

there  was  no  suspicion  of  the  exhaustion  of  such  a 
vein.  He  spoke  on  all  things,  down  to  the  "  hyssop 
on  the  wall,"  and  being  a  great  naturalist,  he  would 
be  particularly  fertile  on  the  subject  of  the  hyssop. 
But  there  was  no  rehgious  reference  in  all  that  con- 
versation, no  opportunity  of  ministering  to  an  anxious 
and  burdened  mind.  Sunday  came,  and  brought  with 
it  a  sermon  of  unexampled  fervour  and  eloquence. 
Still  there  was  no  pause  in  the  restless,  eager  stream 
of  conversation  ;  every  subject  had  its  place  except 
the  one  subject  which  overshadows  all  others.  The 
anxious  lady  thought  she  would  try  one  last  chance. 
The  Bishop  was  leaving  very  early  the  following 
morning,  long  before  the  usual  breakfast-hour,  and 
the  young  lady  arranged  with  her  hostess  that  she 
should  come  down  and  give  him  his  cofl"ee.  She  had 
then  the  great  privilege  of  a  tete-a-tete  with  the  Bishop. 
The  same  meteoric  conversation  streamed  and  flashed 
before  her.  She  strove  to  attain  to  a  deeper  tone,  but 
was  unsuccessful.  There  seemed  to  be  no  opportunity 
of  showing  him  her  burden  of  anxiety  and  care.     At 


268  OUE   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

last  the  Bishop's  horse  was  brought  round  to  the 
door.  With  an  uncontrollable  impulse  she  advanced 
to  the  horse's  head,  and  said,  "  My  Lord,  are  you 
always  thus  ?  Are  you  always  so  brilliant  and  clever 
and  amusing  ?  Is  there  any  time  when  sorrowful 
people  may  speak  to  you  about  their  souls'  troubles  ?" 
The  Bishop  started  back  in  sudden  amazement.  His 
colour  w^ent  from  him.  But  then  leaning  forward,  he 
was  his  best  self  again,  and  in  words  inexpressibly 
touching,  he  gave  her  to  understand  how  in  his  posi- 
tion the  world  was  ever  about  him,  but  gave  her  also 
to  understand,  that,  though  he  might  not  have  shown 
it,  he  was  full  of  deep  sympathy  for  such  a  case  as 
hers.     And  then  he  rode  away.* 

On  one  occasion  I  remember  his  taking^  the  chair  at 
the  annual  meeting  of  that  excellent  institution,  the 
London  Library.  The  ordinary  business  had  been 
transacted  very  rapidly,  and  there  seemed  every  pro- 
bability that  the  proceedings  would  come  to  a  swift 
termination.  Then  a  member  rose  to  bring  forward  a 
motion  to  the  effect  that  the  Society  should  employ  a 
pony  and  cart  for  the  purpose  of  conveying  books  to 
the  residences  of  members.  Apparently  there  was  no 
seconder,  and  the  Bishop  seemed  very  eager  to  close 
a  discussion  on  this  trivial  point.  There  was  almost 
a  look  of  despair  on  his  face  when  somebody  or  other 
said,  "  I  second  the  motion."  Then  ensued  a  long 
and  animated  debate  on  this  important  subject  of 
keeping  the  pony-cart.  The  poor  Bishop  suffered 
dreadfully  during  this  infliction.  He  kicked  his  legs 
restlessly  about,  until  at  last  we  settled  that  we  would 

*  I  give  this  anecdote  on  authority  that  quite  satisfied  me  without 
vouching  for  the  exact  form  I  have  given  it. 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OP   WINOnESTEK.  2G9 

do  without  the  pony-cart.  His  only  way  of  beguiling 
the  time  was  by  taking  stock  of  his  auditory  and  in- 
cessantly inquiring  who  this  or  that  individual  might 
be. 

This  circumstance  was  illustrative  of  the  Bishop's 
wonderful  knowledge  of  faces  and  his  masterly  manner 
of  building  up  personal  influences.  His  knowledge  of 
individuals  was  something  extraordinary.  The  indi- 
viduals themselves  were  often  astonished  by  it.  A 
dear  friend  of  mine,  a  London  curate,  went  down  into 
Berkshire  to  fulfil  a  few  weeks'  duty  as  a  locum  tenens, 
that  kind  of  office  which  has  made  almost  a  new  order 
in  the  Church  of  England.  He  happened  to  go  to  an 
evening  gathering  where  he  met  the  Bishop.  Bishop 
Wilberforce  at  once  took  him  by  the  arm  and  play- 
fully said,  "  Now  what  do  you  want,  coming  here  into 
my  diocese?"  The  Bishop  knew  all  about  him. 
I  remember  once  meeting  the  Bishop  at  a  friend's 
house  in  Paris.  An  American  friend  was  with  me, 
the  late  Bishop  Boone.  Bishop  Boone  asked  me  to 
introduce  him.  The  thouo-ht  of  introducinof  two 
bishops  to  each  other  was  really  too  much  for  my 
feelings.  I  realized  Boswell's  feelings  in  introducing 
Johnson  to  Paoli,  that  he  was  an  isthmus  uniting  two 
great  continents.  I  went  to  our  host,  and  requested 
him  to  make  the  introduction.  When  Bishop  Wilber- 
force advanced  with  his  beaming  eye  and  benignant 
manner  that  would  give  a  friend  the  notion  that  he 
had  been  his  waking  and  sleeping  thought  for  months 
before,  he  greeted  his  Episcopal  brother  as  an  old 
acquaintance.  Bishop  Boone  declined  the  soft  im- 
peachment. Bishop  Wilberforce  appeared  to  insist 
that   he   knew   him  well.      "  My  lord,"   said   Bishop 


270 


OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 


Boone  quickly,  "Hive  in  Chiliad  It  was  impossible, 
however,  to  disconcert  the  Bishop,  who  immediately 
rejoined,  "  Ah,  yes ;  I  know  you  by  correspon- 
dence !'' 

The  Bishop  was,  perhaps,  not  free  from  the  draw- 
backs that  attend  a  great  social  popularity.  To  his 
many  claims  on  the  sympathy  and  kindly  consideration 
of  the  Church,  the  Bishop  added  that  of  the  sanctity 
of  sorrows.  We  intrude  on  them  only  so  far  as  the 
facts  are  before  the  world.  He  lost  the  wife  of  his 
youth.  He  lost  his  son,  dying  where  a  father  might 
least  grudge  such  a  death,  while  fighting  in  the  service 
of  his  country.  He  had  the  keen  unhappiness  of 
seeing  one  beloved  relative  after  another  abandoning 
the  communion  of  the  Church  of  England  for  that  of 
the  Church  of  Rome.  He  himself  spoke  of  flagging 
spirits  worn  down  by  deep  grief.  Incessant  work 
told  upon  his  health  ;  and  in  his  latter  years  he  him- 
self felt  thoroughly  the  insecurity  of  his  tenure  of  life. 
Yet  when  the  Bishop  went  abroad  for  rest,  much  of 
his  time  of  relaxation  was  devoted  to  arduous  work. 
The  Paris  Correspondent  of  the  Guardian  gave  an 
account  of  a  sermon  which  the  Bishop  preached  at  the 
chapel  of  the  Avenue  Marbceuf  :  — 

"  Every  unengaged  seat  was  occupied  nearly  an 
hour  before  the  usual  time  of  service,  and  standing 
room  was  no  longer  to  be  had  at  a  later  period  .... 
Unfortunately,  as  the  preacher's  feelings  rose,  and 
his  voice  with  them,  the  latter  failed,  having  been 
evidently  overtasked,  and  it  seemed  at  one  moment  as 
if  he  would  be  unable  to  proceed.  By  an  effort,  which 
I  fear  must  have  greatly  aggravated  the  evil,  the 
Bishop  forced  himself  to  continue  to  the  end ;  but  the 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OF    WINCHESTER.  271 

edification  gained  by  his  auditors  was  at  the  price  of 
very  severe  exertion  to  himself.  Nothing  could  be 
more  forcible  or  more  in  season  than  the  word 
spoken  on  the  great  subject  of  the  day,  or  than  the 
allusion  to  the  perils  and  distraction  of  foreign  resi- 
dence." 

No  imputation  has  been  more  frequently  made  upon 
the  Bishop  than  the  want  of  personal  sincerity.  Quite 
a  collection  of  passages  might  be  adduced,  in  which 
the  "  courtier-like "  qualities  of  this  distinguished 
prelate  have  been  impugned.  Many  of  these  have 
been  written  with  a  disgraceful  acrimony  and  person- 
ality which  have  rendered  them  as  harmless  as  value- 
less. The  subject  is  not  an  agreeable  one,  but  it  has 
unhappily  acquired  a  degree  of  prominence  which 
requires  some  remark.  We  are  not  certain  that  some 
of  the  Bishop's  own  admirable  qualities — the  suavity 
of  manner,  the  hearty  sympathy,  the  ready  intelli- 
gence— are  not  partially  the  cause  of  this  fundamental 
misapprehension  of  his  character.  The  Rev.  Rusticus 
Expectans  meets  the  Bishop,  and  like  all  the  world  is 
charmed  with  that  frankness,  courtesy,  and  kindness 
of  manner.  He  thinks  he  is  thoroughly  understood 
and  appreciated  in  a  quarter  where  the  appreciation 
may  help  him  towards  that  bettered  clerical  position 
which  is  an  object  of  legitimate  ambition.  And  con- 
sequently when  the  living  of  Foot-in-Clover  falls 
vacant  (val.  "£480  and  ho."),  Rusticus  Expectans 
thinks  that  his  chances  are  better  than  the  chances  of 
other  people,  and  when  these  are  frustrated,  thinks 
that  he  has  a  right  to  feel  neglected  and  injured.  We 
sincerely  believe  that  our  supposed  example,  R.E., 
represents  only  an  infinitesimal  minority  of  his  clergy. 


272  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

Like  many  men  of  generous  and  impulsive  nature,  the 
Bishop  might  at  times  employ  more  kindly  language 
than  he  afterwards,  in  point  of  fact,  found  himself  able 
to  carry  out  practically.  A  parallel  has  sometimes 
been  drawn  between  the  Bishop  and  the  late  Sir 
Hobert  Peel.  We  should  be  sorry  to  suppose  that 
this  parallel  holds  entirely  good.  Sir  Robert  Peel, 
beyond  his  great  historical  fame,  was  a  man  of  great 
virtues  and  great  sacrifices,  yet  seems  to  have  suffered 
from  some  obliquity  of  moral  sense  which  is  likely 
permanently  to  chequer  his  fame.  Some  such  acts, 
as  the  procedure  in  the  case  of  Dr.  Hampden,  which 
the  present  Bishop  of  Gibraltar  so  energetically  con- 
demned at  the  time,  will  remain  a  matter  of  contro- 
versy among  those  who  study  the  character  and  career 
of  Bishop  Wilberforce. 

But  we  are  afraid  that,  on  the  whole,  the  Bishop 
was  a  disappointed  man.  He  was  a  Bishop,  indeed, 
but  he  must  have  felt  and  known  that  he  was  one  who 
deserved  to  be  Archbishop,  and  would  give  a  higher 
character  to  the  see  of  Canterbury  than  a  man  of 
safe  and  golden  mediocrity.  A  sudden  and  extra- 
ordinary flush  of  prosperity  was  succeeded  by  a  sta- 
tionary position,  that  probably  fretted  him  at  times. 
In  the  days  when  he  was  the  most  popular  and  suc- 
cessful of  country  clergymen  two  curates  had  come  to 
him.  Each  of  them  was  a  singularly  accomplished 
and  earnest  man.  Each,  however,  was  destitute  of 
the  higher  honours  of  his  University.  Each  probably 
regarded  it  as  a  point  of  professional  honour  and  suc- 
cess to  be  associated  with  such  a  renowned  rector. 
The  names  of  these  curates  were  Richard  Chevenix 
Trench  and  William  Thomson.     Not  without  a  kind 


THE    LATE   BISHOP   OF  'WINCHESTER.  273 

of  irony  each  curate  became  an  Archbishop,  and  so 
far  distanced  the  famous  rector  and  famous  prelate. 
Dr.  Trench,  after  a  long  interval,  had  succeeded  him 
at  the  Abbey,  and  it  was  sometimes  said  that  in  his 
reading  he  imitated  his  former  rector's  style.  But 
Bishop  Wilberforce,  with  characteristic  generosity,  set 
this  misconception  right,  and  said  he  used  to  consider 
Trench  one  of  the  best  readers  he  had  ever  heard,  and 
had  rather  sought  to  imitate  him.  By  marriage  the 
Bishop  had  become  connected  with  an  enterprising 
Scotchman  whom  a  Snell  exhibition  had  sent  to 
Balliol,  and  whom  he  lived  to  see  Archbishop  of  Can- 
terbury. There  is  no  doubt  that  he  would  have  greatly 
wished  to  have  been  Archbishop  of  York.  Yorkshire 
had  been  his  cradle,  the  county  for  many  years  had 
been  associated  with  his  illustrious  father,  and  many 
of  his  keenest  sympathies  must  have  been  with  the 
masterful  northern  folk.  He  had  reason  to  hope  that 
this  high  preferment  would  have  been  his,  but  he  was 
disappointed.  The  disappointment  must  have  been 
very  general  on  the  part  of  all  his  friends.  He  was 
perhaps  too  brilliant,  too  original,  too  masterful  to  be 
a  safe  Primate  of  All  England,  but  the  northern 
primacy  was  not  more  than  the  due  of  the  foremost 
prelate  on  the  bench,  and  a  new  vast  field  of  labour 
would  have  given  full  scope  to  his  vast  powers  and  a 
welcome  change  from  the  old  well-beaten  paths. 

The  desired  change  was,  however,  years  and  years 
in  coming.  He  did  wonders  during  his  brief  tenure 
of  Winchester,  during  which  Farnham  and  the  full  See 
never  came  to  him ;  but  the  public  had  hardly  learned 
to  leave  off  speaking  of  him  as  the  Bishop  of  Oxford 
when  he  died,  and  as  Bishop  of  Oxford  he  will  always 

VOL.  I.  T 


274  OIJE    EISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

be  best  remembered.     Since    the   time  of  the   great 
Bishop's  death  there  has  been  little  else  than  a  paBan 
of  praises  on  his  history  and  his  work.     About  the  time 
of  his  death  died  also  his  great  opponent  in  the  House 
of  Lords,   Lord  Westbury,  probably  the  keenest  and 
cleverest  lawyer  in  England,  but  whose  legal  wit  did  not 
prevent  him  from  blundering  his  testamentary  arrange- 
ments, leaving  as  chequered  a  fame  as  his  predecessors, 
Verulam    or   Macclesfield.      It    is    remarkable     how 
such  an  event  as  this  was  quite  dwarfed  in  comparison 
with  the  mighty  loss  which  the  country  had  sustained 
in  the  sudden  death  of  the  Bishop  of  Winchester.  That 
brilliant  star  of  Church  and  State  had  been  quenched 
so  awfully  on  the  ill-omened  Evershed  Roughs.     The 
death  of  Sir  Robert  Peel  by  an  accident  almost  pre- 
cisely similar,  a  brute's  careless  tread,  had  not  aroused 
a  greater  sensation  of  astonishment  and  sorrow.     For 
the  moment  the  country  had  little  attention   to  give 
for  any  meaner  loss.     It  was  indeed  a  good  sign  for 
England  that  the  loss  of  so  much  moral  and  spiritual 
power,  such  earnest  intellectual  life,  was  reckoned  as 
something  infinitely  deeper  than  that  of  the  wealthiest 
and  cleverest  lawyer  of  the  age.    A  key-note  was  then 
struck   of  heart-felt    sorrow,   generous   appreciation, 
hearty  condonation  of  errors,   which   has   ever  since 
prevailed,    and   which    almost    makes   it    appear   an 
unmanly  and  sacrilegious  act  to  detract  in  anything 
from  that  supposed  perfection  of  nature. 

The  Bishop  must  have  known  that  he  had  won  his 
place  in  the  history  cf  his  Church  and  land,  and  he 
would  least  of  all  desire  his  niche  to  be  unduly  mag- 
nified or  his  character  exaggerated  by  uncritical 
praises.     His  influence,  intense  and   powerful  while  it 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF   WINCHESTER.  275 

lasted,  was  not  of  the  permanent  type.  His  powers 
were  chiefly  exerted  in  the  society  in  which  he  moved, 
the  pubHc  hfe  in  which  he  played  so  prominent  a 
part,  and  with  the  fading  recollection  and  the  passing 
away  of  that  society  his  fame  will  vanish  into  a  tra- 
dition. In  that  social  life  there  had  always  been  an 
undercurrent  of  stern  criticism  on  the  Bishop,  imput- 
ing to  him  worldhness  and  insincerity.  He  was  one 
who,  in  courtly  polished  speech,  had  often  let  his  yea 
be  more  than  yea,  and  his  nay  be  less  than  nay,  who 
had  made  or  implied  promises  which,  though  sincerely 
made  at  the  time,  were  perhaps  incapable  of  ac- 
complishment. No  great  struggling  cause  will  be  asso- 
ciated with  his  memory.  No  work  of  his,  if  we  except 
the  children's  books  which  he  produced  in  his  country 
cure,  will  permanently  take  its  place  in  our  national 
literature.  Everything  he  did  had  an  immediate  effect, 
and  produced  pleasure  and  praises.  But  little  will 
remain  as  the  permanent  result  of  so  much  feverish 
activity.  He  will  live  for  ever  in  the  hearts  of  those 
who  were  brought  within  the  magic  of  his  eloquence, 
his  courtesy,  his  wonderful  charm  of  address,  that 
combined  the  wisdom  of  innumerable  serpents  with 
the  softness  of  innumerable  doves.  A  still  nobler  and 
more  enduring  effect  will  be  found  among  those  crowds 
who  were  brought  within  the  range  of  his  spiritual 
influences,  whose  hearts  were  warmed,  elevated, 
purified,  and  their  lives  amended  by  his  utterances 
when  most  sacred  and  unselfish,  at  his  highest  and 
his  best.  These  will  endure,  when  the  alloy  caused  by 
incessant  contest  with  the  world  is  forgotten.  But  for 
subsequent  generations  the  legend  will  be  true,  magni 
stat  nominis  umbra.     For  us,  however,  in  our  own  day 

T  2 


276  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

his  name  is  one  of  pathos  and  of  power,  for  the  most 
brilliant  and  thrilling  recollections  of  his  achievements. 
In  the  earlier  part  of  his  career  it  was  plain  sailing, 
comparatively  speaking,  with  the  Bishop.  He  tho- 
roughly understood  the  whole  Roman  Catholic  con- 
troversy, as  it  stands  in  many  a  tome  of  Anglican  and 
Romanist  theology.  But  he  could  not,  in  the  same 
way,  precisely  understand  the  new  signs  of  a  new 
time,  the  new  heavens  studded  with  new  constella- 
tions. The  Rationalist  controversy  and  the  Rituahst 
controversy  had  assumed  new,  vast,  and  imposing 
aspects  since  the  days  when  his  theological  ideas  had 
crystallized  into  their  permanent  shape.  To  combat 
them,  as  he  might  have  combated  them  in  early  life, 
required  new  weapons,  new  armour,  which  he  had  not 
proved.  To  the  last,  in  the  opinion  of  those  who 
knew  him  best,  he  never  fully  understood  the  exact 
character  and  dimensions  of  those  new  phases  of  un- 
behef  which  are  disturbing  the  Church  and  the  world. 
He  would  mistake  men  for  windmills,  and  windmills 
for  men.  He  was  perfectly  satisfied  with  the  great 
objective  truths  of  Christianity,  and  firmly  beheved 
that  Christianity  was  almost  identical  with  Angli- 
canism. He  fought  vehemently,  and  at  times  ran- 
domly, against  the  new  heresies  which  perplexed  his 
soul.  He  was  late  in  making  up  his  mind  about 
Ritualism,  but  at  last  he  took  up  a  firm  and  decided 
attitude.  For  a  time  he  seems  to  have  regarded  it  as 
a  pardonable  efflorescence  of  Anglicanism.  It  might 
even  be  said  that  he  was  not  without  some  degree  of 
sympathy  and  appreciation  for  a  movement  whose 
variegated  blossoms  might  perhaps  indicate  real  fruit. 
In  these  hopes  he  was  bitterly  disappointed,  and  after 


THE    LATE    BISHOP   OF    WINCHESTER.  277 

hoping  against  hope,  he  was  prepared  to  throw  the 
whole  force  of  his  vigorous  nature  into  the  attempt 
to  counteract  the  growing  evil.  The  very  last  words 
that  he  uttered  in  the  House  of  Lords  were  to  the 
effect  that  he  utterly  abhorred  the  attempt  to  Romanize 
the  Church  of  England. 

It  so  remarkably  happened  that  only  a  few  days 
before  his  awfully  sudden  death  there  had  been  a 
meeting  of  Archdeacons  and  Rural  Deans  at  Win- 
chester House.  He  spoke  with  great  freedom  on  this 
Ritualist  question,  and  conveyed  the  impression  that 
the  future  days  of  his  Episcopate  might  present  some 
marked  differences  from  its  earlier  portion.  Several  of 
the  clergy  took  notes,  and  a  collation  of  notes  has 
yielded  pretty  well  the  ipsissima  verba.  The  Bishop 
seems  to  have  spoken  with  the  utmost  plainness  of 
speech,  and  with  interesting  touches  respecting  his 
own  personal  experience.  He  thus  speaks  of  the 
Confessional : — 

"  Then  in  families,  it  introduces  untold  mischief.  It 
supersedes  God's  appointment  of  intimacy  between 
husband  and  wife,  father  and  children ;  substituting 
another  influence  for  that  which  ought  to  be  the 
nearest  and  closest,  and  producing  reserve  and  es- 
trangement where  there  ought  to  be  perfect  freedom 
and  openness. 

"  And  lastly,  as  regards  the  person  to  whom  con- 
fession is  made,  it  brings  in  a  wretched  system  of 
casuistry.  But  far  worse  than  this,  it  necessitates  the 
terrible  evil  of  familiar  dealing  with  sin,  specially  with 
sins  of  uncleanness,  thereby  sometimes  even  tending 
to  their  growth,  by  making  the  horrible  particulars 
known  to  those  who  have  hitherto  been  innocent  of 


278  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

such  fatal  knowledge,  and  so  poisoning  the  mind  of 
priest  and  people  alike.  A  fact  which  has  of  late 
been  very  painfully  brought  home  to  me." 

"  Secondly,  in  regard  to  Ritualistic  observances. 
There  is  a  growing  desire  to  introduce  novelties,  such 
as  incense,  a  multitude  of  lights  in  the  chancel,  and  so 
on.  Now  these  and  such  things  are  honestly  and 
truly  alien  to  the  Church  of  England.  Do  not  hesitate 
to  treat  them  as  such.  All  this  appears  to  me  to  in- 
dicate a  fidgety  anxiety  to  make  everything  in  our 
churches  assimilate  to  a  foreign  usage.  There  is  a 
growing  feeling,  which  I  can  only  describe  as  an 
*  asharaedness'  of  the  Anglican  Church,  as  if  our  grand 
old  Anglican  communion  contrasted  unfavourably  with 
the  Church  of  Rome.  The  habitual  language  held  by 
many  men  sounds  as  if  they  were  ashamed  of  our 
Church  and  its  position ;  it  is  a  sort  of  apology  for  the 
Church  of  England  as  compared  with  the  Church  of 
Rome.  Why,  I  would  as  soon  think  of  apologizing  for 
the  virtue  of  my  mother  to  a  harlot !  I  have  no  sym- 
pathy in  the  world  with  such  a  feeling.  I  abhor  this 
fidgety  desire  to  make  everything  un-Anglican.  This 
is  not  a  grand  development,  as  some  seem  to  think. 
It  is  a  decrepitude.  It  is  not  something  very  sublime 
and  impressive,  but  something  very  feeble  and  con- 
temptible." 

He  thus  speaks  on  the  subject  of  Non-Communicat- 
ing attendance,  on  which  so  much  stress  is  laid  by  the 
Ritualists  : — 

"  Then  what  a  dangerous  consequence  results  in 
non-communicating  attendance.  Pressed  not  even  for 
physical  reasons,  it  brings  us  back  to  the  great  abuse 
of  coming  to  the  sacrament  to  be  spectators  instead  of 


THE    LATE    BISHOP    OP    WINCHESTER.  279 

partakers,  and  so  we  have  the  condition  of  things 
arising  in  our  communion  which  already  prevails  in 
the  Church  of  Rome.  I  heard  of  a  Roman  Catholic 
priest  triumphing  greatly  in  the  fact  that  he  had  tivo 
male  communicants.  I  went  to  the  Church  of  the 
Madeleine,  at  Paris,  at  5.30  a.m.  several  times,  in 
order  to  observe  what  was  the  practice.  It  was  always 
the  same  thing,  the  priest  communicating  alone,  or 
one  or  two  women  occasionally  joining  him — the 
whole  attendant  congregation  satisfied  to  remain  look- 
ing on. 

"  That  this  custom  is  creeping  into  our  Church  is 
not  an  accident ;  neither  is  it  brought  in  for  the  pur- 
pose of  making  children  better  acquainted  with  the 
service.  That  w^ould  be  a  great  help.  I  have  found 
the  benefit  of  it  myself  when  my  own  father  used  to 
take  me  to  church  and  leave  me  in  his  seat  to  read 
hymns  which  he  had  selected  for  me,  while  he  himself 
communicated.  That,  I  say,  was  to  me  a  very  great 
help.  But  this  is  recommended  under  quite  a  different 
impression.  It  is  under  the  idea  that  prayer  is  more 
acceptable  at  this  time  of  the  sacrifice ;  that  you  can 
get  benefit  from  being  within  sight  of  the  sacrament 
when  it  is  being  administered.  It  is  the  substitution 
of  a  semi-materiahstic  presence  for  the  actual  presence 
of  Christ  in  the  soul  of  the  faithful  communicant.  It 
is  an  abomination,  this  teaching  of  non-communicating 
attendance  as  a  common  habit." 

Those  who  are  not  utterly  blinded  by  the  worst 
rancour  of  religious  party  in  looking  back  upon  this 
wonderful  career,  will  acknowledge  that  seldom  a 
good  man  has  been  so  great,  or  a  great  man  has  been 
so  good.     The  public  character  of  a  great  man  ought 


280  OUR   BISHOPS    AND   DEANS. 

to  be  dear  to  all  of  us,  and  rank  among  the  richest  of  a 
nation's  possessions.  Let  us  guard  sucli  jealously. 
Let  us  judge  it  charitably.  Let  us  view  it  generously. 
Differences  of  opinion  must  needs  arise,  but  how  often 
does  an  invisible  unity  underlie  the  visible  difference. 
The  blessed  sunshine  of  heaven  is  heaven's  light  all 
the  same,  although  variously  coloured  according  to 
the  medium  through  which  it  streams,  whether  it 
falls  through  the  oriel  on  the  tesselated  floor  in  the 
hues  of  purple,  orange,  or  gold.  It  has  been  no 
part  of  our  duty  to  concern  ourselves  with  heated 
controversies  or  acrimonious  personalities.  It  has 
rather  been  our  effort  to  bring  clearly  forward  the  in- 
tense realit}^  and  activity  of  this  distinguished  prelate, 
and  the  great  practical  good  which,  under  God,  we  may 
trust  it  has  effected.  No  one  can  follow  the  manifold 
traces  which  the  late  Bishop  of  Winchester  has  every- 
where left  upon  our  current  history,  without  being 
struck  with  his  untiring  energy,  his  devotedness,  his 
great  legislative,  his  great  administrative  ability — the 
power,  the  eloquence,  the  lore.  Such  a  career  will 
earn  for  itself  a  page  in  the  history  of  England — a 
page  in  the  human  history  of  the  Holy  Catholic 
Church. 


281 


CHAPTER  Y. 

THE    ARCHBISHOP    OF    CANTERBURY. 

IN  the  moderation  and  many-sidedness  of  liis  charac- 
ter,   Dr.    Tait   has   the    main    requisites   for   an 
archbishop  of  our  modern  days.     The  days  are  passed 
when  the  Church  required  in  an  archbishop  a  strong 
motive-force  that  would  change  the  aspect  of  society 
and   shape  the  destinies  of  a  country.     She  has  no 
further  need  of  an  Ansehu  or  a  Lanfranc,  a  Beckett 
or  a  Cranmer.     Such  names  indicate    the  steps  and 
stages  by  which  the  Church   has  cHmbed  into    that 
happy  estate  in  which  it  is  "  hurt  by  no  persecution," 
and  its  learned  chiefs  enjoy  the  repose   won  by  more 
powerful  and  less  tranquil  minds.     All   the  elements 
that  make  up  the  "  safe  man"  meet  in  the  Archbishop. 
On  the  solid  groundwork  of  essential  Christian  charac- 
ter he  has  based  the  catholicity  and  toleration  of  a  large 
nature,  the    power  of  sympathy  with  many  varying 
orders  of  mind  and  schools   of  thought,  and  a  liberal 
cast    of    tone     and     taste    which    harmonizes    very 
thoroughly  with    the    modernism    of  the    nineteenth 
century. 

Dr.  Tait  is  one  instance   out  of  many  instances  of 
the   progress  and  prosperity  of  Scotchmen   south    of 


282  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

the  Tweed.  Scotland  at  least  will  never  raise  a  cry 
of  Home  Rule.  She  settles  all  her  own  affairs  in  a 
sort  of  quiet  vestry  in  the  House,  and  is  able  to 
secure  in  every  department  of  public  life  the  best 
prizes  that  England  has  to  offer.  A  little  while  ago  we 
had  together  a  Scotch  Prime  Minister  and  a  Scotch 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  They  occupied  the  seats 
nearest  to  the  throne  itself.  We  expected  very  much 
from  Scotland,  but  we  hardly  expected  to  find  it  a 
nursery  of  archbishops. 

On  one  or  two  occasions  Dr.  Tait  has  shown  him- 
self autobiographical.  He  once  told  the  story  how 
as  a  child  he  was  grievously  lamed,  but  was  cured 
by  a  man  who  might  vulgarly  be  called  a  quack,  but 
in  effect  proved  an  admirable  practitioner.  His  father 
combined  the  character  of  laird  and  lawyer,  being 
both  a  country  gentleman  and  "  Writer  to  the  Signet." 
His  grandfather  was  for  many  years  Lord  President 
of  the  Court  of  Session.  We  are  told,  also,  that  he 
was  brought  up  on  the  paternal  estate  of  Harriestown, 
in  the  picturesque  neighbourhood  of  Stirling  Castle. 
His  boyish  studies- — and  he  was  long  Dux — was  at 
a  school  renowned  throughout  Scotland,  which  has 
furnished  many  good  scholars  to  the  universities,  the 
Edinburgh  Academy.  From  thence,  as  is  often  the 
practice  with  the  most  promising  boys  of  the  High 
School  and  the  Academy,  he  was  transferred  to  the 
University  of  Glasgow. 

It  is  hardly  possible  that  many  of  our  readers 
are  unacquainted  with  Glasgow.  The  first  general 
impression  of  Glasgow  is  a  miscellaneous  one  of 
mist  and  smoke,  and  ignores  the  palaced  terraces 
of  its  west  end,  and  the  interesting  antiquities  of 
the    old     city.       But    anyone     whose     acquaintance 


THE    AECHBrSHOP    OF   CANTERBURY.  283 

with  Glasgow  was  at  all  minute,  knew  well  the  old 
college,  wbicli  extended  its  sombre  frontage  of  im- 
posing length  down  a  considerable  part  of  High 
Street.  Once  the  High  Street  was  opulent  and  im- 
posing enough,  and  some  of  the  tenements  might  still 
befit  merchant  princes  ;  but  society  has  floated  away- 
westward,  there  as  elsewhere,  and  left  some  few  of 
the  respectabilities  stranded  high  and  dry  in  their 
accustomed  habitudes.  The  college  has  followed  the 
example,  and  has  been  rebuilt  in  the  Champs  Elysees 
of  Western  Glasgow.  Let  me  recall  that  old  college  as 
it  once  was.  You  entered  beneath  an  arched  gate- 
way, over  which  was  an  oaken  wainscoted  common 
room,  superior  to  most  o£  those  at  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge. A  wide  balustered  stone  flight  of  steps  led 
to  this.  The  first  quadrangle  was  the  Divinity  Quad- 
rangle, which  led  into  a  second,  where  were  the  class- 
rooms of  Natural  and  Moral  Philosophy,  Logic,  and 
Mathematics.  A  passage  conducted  you  into  a  third 
quadrangle,  if  we  may  so  term  a  space  which  was  not 
entirely  closed,  in  which  were  the  class-rooms  of  Greek 
and  Humanity  (the  last  being  the  quaint  old  name  for 
Latin),  and  one  side  of  which  was  the  fine  Hunterian 
Museum.  The  buildings  also  contained  a  fine  hall  and 
a  library  of  stately  proportions.  On  one  side  was  a 
kind  of  square,  devoted  to  the  residences  of  the  pro- 
fessors. Behind  was  the  college  green,  as  described 
in  Rob  Roy,  of  comparatively  vast  extent,  which 
kept  the  country  alive  in  the  heart  of  the  crowded 
city.  So  early  as  half-past  seven  in  the  morning  in 
those  days  (modern  degeneracy  has  now  made  the 
hour  later),  the  Greek  and  other  class  rooms  were 
open;  and  long  before  that  time,  hosts   of  students 


284  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

were  cutting  their  way  to  the  college  through  the 
palpable  fog.  Their  bright  scarlet  cloaks,  and  the 
eager  faces  of  the  wearers,  might  be  distinguished  by 
the  abundant  gas-light.  It  was  very  striking  to  see 
that  large  assemblage  in  mediaeval  garb,  which 
modern  degeneracy  is  also  going  far  to  abolish, 
waiting  for  the  doors  to  be  opened,  while  night  was 
still  overhanging,  or  the  stars  were  beginning  to  wane 
in  the  first  flush  of  dawn  dimly  breaking  through 
the  mist  and  smoke  of  Eastern  Glassfow. 

Student  life  at  Glasgow  is  wholly  unlike  student 
life  at  the  English  Universities.  The  life  is  totally 
diverse,  both  educationally  and  socially,  and  for  the 
most  part  the  comparison  is  very  much  to  the  disad- 
vantage of  the  Scottish  system.  In  some  respects 
the  Glasgow  system  is  very  like  that  of  continental 
universities.  The  professorial  system  is  exhibited 
with  a  completeness  and  energy  to  which  Cambridge 
can  furnish  no  parallel,  and  Oxford  only  of  late  years 
a  measure  of  parallel.  Lectures  on  similar  subjects 
are  delivered  almost  daily  for  nearly  six  months  every 
year  at  Glasgow  by  scholars  no  less  learned  and  distin- 
guished. But  there  is  no  regular  system  of  periodical 
examination  by  which  the  studies  of  a  period  are 
gathered  into  a  focus,  and  the  men  classified  in  their 
relative  position.  Neither  are  the  students  subjected 
to  any  supervision  or  control ;  they  are  all  of  them 
commorantes  in  mild,  scattered  through  the  great  city 
in  private  lodgings  or  with  their  friends.  They 
decide  the  prizes  by  their  own  vote,  and,  though  a 
flagrant  exception  now  and  then  occurs,  this  custom, 
as  a  whole,  works  very  fairly.  They  also  have 
the   privilege   of  electing    their   Lord    Rector    (why 


THE    ARCHBISHOP    OP    CANTERBURY.  285 

don't  they  elect  Archbishop  Tait  ?)  and  the  long  roll  of 
the  rectors  contains  many  of  the  most  illustrious  men 
whom  the  country  has  produced.  The  Glasgow 
system  works  very  well  for  those  who  purpose  em- 
bracing the  Presbyterian  church,  which  is  the  largest 
element  among  the  students.  The  time  and  attention 
which  they  are  obliged  to  give  to  Latin  and  Greek  are 
extremely  limited,  but  they  have  the  vigorous  intel- 
lectual training  so  congenial  to  the  Scottish  mind,  and 
then  they  pass  through  the  curriculum  of  divinity. 
The  result  of  all  this  training  is  that  Scottish  clergy- 
men are  trained  scientific  divines,  and  that  a  Scottish 
sermon  in  which  there  is  a  want  of  close  thought 
and  biblical  knowledge  is  well  nigh  an  impossibility. 
The  position  of  the  students  indefinitely  varies. 
Some  are  the  sons  of  merchant  princes  of  Glasgow, 
and  a  few  the  sons  of  territorial  magnates  in  the 
country.  Sometimes  there  is  a  great  notable,  and  it 
may  be  told  you  with  conscious  pride  that  the  late 
Marquis  of  Breadalbane  was  a  student  here.  A  great 
proportion  consists  of  those  w^ho  are  striving  to 
struggle  into  a  profession  from  a  lower  stratum  of  the 
social  system.  Young  men  study  through  the  Winter 
who  live  very  much  like  hedge  teachers  in  the  Sum- 
mer, and  we  have  heard  an  odd  story  that  a  learned 
professor  recognised  in  a  coalman,  who  was  depositing 
a  load  at  his  country  residence,  a  student  who  had 
been  exemplarily  diligent  in  attending  his  sessional 
prelections. 

The  University  has  been  comparatively  barren  of 
great  scholars.  Of  Greek  scholars  it  has  had  but  few, 
but  always  a  respectable  body  of  really  good  Latinists. 
Of  late  years  it  has  furnished  Cambridge  with  some  of 


286  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

its  most  distinofulshed  wrano:lers.  There  is,  how- 
ever,  always  a  knot  of  students  who,  differing  from 
the  mass  of  their  contemporaries,  study  Greek  and 
Latin  year  after  year,  and  who  make  the  university 
answer,  as  far  as  it  can,  the  purposes  of  an  EngUsh 
pubhc  school.  ^There  are  certain  glittering  prizes 
which  are  the  great  attractions  to  these.  There  are 
ten  Snell  exhibitions  from  Glasgow  University  to 
Balliol  College,  Oxford.  They  are  of  great  value.  No 
English  school  is  able  to  boast  of  such.  They  are  of 
the  unusual  amount  of  a  hundred  and  thirty  pounds 
a  year.  They  are  tenable  for  the  unusual  period  of 
ten  years.  They  have  given  many  an  able  man  a  lift 
into  fame  and  fortune,  and  enabled  him  to  plant  his 
foot  firmly  on  English  ground.  Such  were  Lockhart 
of  the  "  Quarterly,"  Sir  William  Hamilton,  and 
various  others.  To  this  list  was  added  the  name  of 
Archibald  Campbell  Tait,  the  future  Archbishop. 
We  have  met  with  strenuous  Presbyterians  who 
grievously  bemoan  this  state  of  things.  You  take 
away  the  flower  of  our  youth,  thus  argued  Presbyter 
Amicus  with  us,  and  send  them  to  Oxford  and 
sometimes  to  Cambridge,  where  they  at  once  renounce 
the  church  of  their  fathers  for  your  prelatical  and 
Erastian  institution.  It  was  first  of  all  a  matter  of 
convenience  for  them,  and  they  end  by  really  liking 
and  even  vehemently  espousing  the  Anghcan  system, 
and  I  think  it  very  wrong  and  unfair.  Thus  argued 
Presbyter  Amicus  with  us,  in  the  days  when  Plancus 
was  consul ;  and  we  rejoice  to  think  of  a  certain 
letter  which  P.  A. — when  wiser  and  older  he  was  a 
Presbyterian  minister — wrote  to  us,  and  exhorted 
that   we   should   cling   fast   to    the    dear,  grand  old 


THE    ARCnBISKOP   OP    CANTERBURY.  287 

Church  of  England.  Nothing  is  more  delightful  to 
our  mind  than  to  contemplate  how  the  progress  of 
Christian  love,  and  knowledge,  and  tolerance,  and 
catholicity  is  abolishing  theological  feuds  and  party 
spirit,  and  gradually  bringing  all  Christian  men  on 
each  side  of  the  border  into  real  unity,  and  even 
approximating  them  towards  a  visible  uniformity. 
How  astonished  would  be  the  old  Presbyterians  who 
raised  the  Edinburgh  riots,  which  were  the  first  step 
towards  the  Great  Rebellion,  if  they  could  see  the 
present  state  of  their  churches  in  Glasgow  and  Edin- 
burgh !  The  rich  decorations  are  dimly  visible  in  the 
mellowed  light  of  stained  oriels;  various  preachers 
very  closely  approximate  to  a  liturgy  and  make  no 
scruple  of  afl&rming  the  correctness  of  the  principle ; 
the  abomination  of  a  written  sermon,  for  which  a 
pious  clergyman  would  have  been  "  rabbled"  in  the  old 
days,  is  of  frequent  occurrence,  and  Glasgow  Cathe- 
dral has  been  actually  and  ecclesiologically  restored  ! 

We  do  not  know  whether  in  those  days  the  young 
Greek  prizeman  was  Presbyterian,  or  whether  he 
belonged  to  the  Episcopalian  Church  of  Scotland, 
which,  hardly  reformed  to  the  same  extent  as  our 
own,  flourishes,  a  most  important  body,  in  vigorous 
and  inherent  life.  In  our  point  of  view  it  is  quite 
immaterial  to  inquire.  One  remark  may,  however, 
be  offered.  We  are  all  of  us,  more  or  less,  the 
creatures  of  our  antecedents ;  more  so  than,  with  all 
our  candour,  we  should  like  to  acknowledge,  and 
with  all  our  self-knowledge  we  are  likely  to  be  really 
aware  of.  The  decided  tastes  given  us  in  our  youth 
cling  to  us  with  the  closest  tenacity  through  advancing 
life.     The  High  Church  party  in  London,  or  rather,  we 


288  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

should  say,  sucliofthem  as  have  discussed  this  matter 
with  us,  complained  that  the  Archbishop  does  not  fully 
hke,  or  understand,  or  sympathize  with  them.  This 
was  the  case  before  the  "Archbishop's  Bill,"  and  more 
so  now.  "  For  my  own  part,"  said  the  Archbishop  on 
one  occasion,  "  I  greatly  desire  that  all  might  agree 
with  myself  in  loving  a  very  simple  ritual ;  and  when 
they  undertake  self-denying  works  for  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ's  sake,  in  doing  this  work  in  the  very  simplest 
and  least  eccentric  form.  But  if  there  be  minds  which 
love  those  very  forms  in  things  indifferent,  which  I 
dislike,  and  yet  love  God  and  Christ  far  more,  I  dare 
not  seek  to  make  my  own  tastes  the  measure  of  the 
Church's  liberty."  These  are  noble  words.  But  the 
reflection  certainly  arises,  that  had  Dr.  Tait's  younger 
experiences  been  southern  instead  of  northern,  con- 
tinental instead  of  insular,  or  rather  had  he  been 
brought  up  in  Episcopal  England  instead  of  Presby- 
terian Scotland,  he  would  have  been  able  to  place 
himself  in  the  position  of  the  High  Churchman,  and 
to  realize  the  point  of  view  he  takes,  and  his  tastes 
and  sympathies  and  aspirations,  in  a  manner  and 
degree  which  his  early  associations,  according  to  the 
mental  laws  which  control  character,  have  now  ren- 
dered impossible.  Nothing  is  more  admirable  in 
the  Archbishop  than  the  kindly  and  compre- 
hensive manner  in  which  he  is  able  to  reproduce  for 
himself  the  thoughts  and  position  of  others,  to  under- 
stand their  difficulties,  and  to  make  allowance  for 
their  exaggerations.  With  a  total  absence  of  the 
odium  theologicum  he  can  comprehend  the  feelings  and 
motives  of  rationahsts,  and  while  earnestly  contending 
for  the  faith  against  their    errors,    can    speak  with 


THE   ARCriBTSHOP   OF    CANTERBURY.  289 

tenderness  and  leniency  of  the  men  themselves.  The 
discussion  of  all  kinds  of  intellectual  difficulties  is 
natural  enough  to  one  of  Dr.  Tait's  training.  He  can 
find  abundance  of  common  ground  with  Noncon- 
formists, and  with  regard  to  what  is  at  present  a 
large  section  of  the  Church  of  England,  the  Low 
Church,  were  it  not  for  certain  "  broad"  tendencies, 
he  might,  for  his  intense  sympathy  with  their  earnest- 
ness and  effort,  be  looked  upon  as  their  chief  and 
representative.  It  appears  to  us,  and  we  are  simply 
giving  our  own  impressions,  to  be  taken  at  their 
worth,  that  his  Scotch  training  has  left  a  decided 
influence  upon  his  character,  an  influence  which  in 
many  respects  has  been  happy  and  beneficial,  but 
which  has  gone  some  way  towards  incapacitating  him 
for  a  thorough  appreciation  of  anything  which  at  first 
sight  might  appear  Roraanistic,  however  unjustly 
such  a  term  might  be  reproachfully  applied.  Broad, 
historical  views,  and  a  philosophical  study  of  the 
complex  nature  of  the  human  mind,  more  especially 
of  that  imagination  and  feeling  to  which  Revelation  so 
graciously  condescends,  will  always  aid  in  the  better 
intellectual  comprehension  of  those  whose  system 
differs  materially  from  our  own.  But  the  Venusian 
adage  is  true  how  the  generous  wine  evermore  retains 
the  early  flavour  which  was  accidentally  imparted 
to  it. 

The  names  of  the  professors  under  whom  Mr.  Tait 
•studied  will  always  be  recollected  in  Scotland — Mr. 
Buchanan,  the  late  Professor  of  Logic,  whose  great 
ability  in  his  chair  it  would  be  impossible  to  ex- 
aggerate ;  and  the  late  Sir  Daniel  Sandford.  Sir 
Daniel  K.  Sandford  is  only  not  celebrated  sacro  quia 

VOL.  I.  u 


290  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

vate  caret.  He  used  to  kindle  tlie  enthusiasm  of  his 
student  for  the  Greek  language  to  an  extent  which  it 
would  be  impossible  to  reproduce.  During  his  lectures 
his  class-room  would  be  crowded  with  excited  listeners, 
and  it  was  the  ambition  of  the  Glasgow  ladies  to  know 
something  of  that  declamatory  scholarship.  It  was 
the  ambition  of  Sir  Daniel  to  exhibit  his  splendid 
abilities  in  Parliament.  The  facile  gods  have  over- 
turned whole  houses  at  their  owners'  wish.  He  was 
returned  member  for  Renfrew.  A  great  speech  proved 
a  great  failure.  Sir  Robert  Peel,  the  last  man  to  be 
affected  by  the  eloquence  of  a  Greek  rhetorician, 
vouchsafed  him  a  very  cold  measure  of  attention  or 
regard.  Sir  Daniel  did  not  long  outlive  the  disap- 
pointment of  his  political  hopes.  In  many  respects 
he  reminds  us  of  a  very  clever,  but  also  very  over- 
rated man,  W.  M.  Praed.  Each,  brillant  and  versa- 
tile, sought  and  obtained  a  seat  in  Parliament ;  each 
made  a  great  failure ;  and  each  died  not  very  long 
afterwards.  Sir  Daniel  might  have  rested  content 
with  the  great  and  merited  reputation  he  possessed  as 
Professor  of  Greek  at  Glasgow.  Mr.  Tait  was  one  of 
his  favourite  and  most  distinguished  pupils.  It  is 
impossible  to  over-rate  the  eulogium  which  such  a 
statement  conveys.  The  work  to  be  expended  on  the 
Greek  language  to  one  who  would  do  full  justice  to 
the  Glasgow  course,  is  of  a  very  heavy  description. 
If  my  readers  should  ever  meet  with  a  book,  "  Memoir 
of  Halley,"  he  will  see  how  ardent  young  Scottish 
students,  under  the  influence  of  such  a  professor  as 
Sandford,  will  work  and  work  on  until  they  drop,  and 
learn  a  quantity  of  Greek  and  obtain  a  familiarity  with 
it  which  is  astonishing. 


THE    ARCHBISHOP    OF    CANTERBURY.  291 

Mr.  Tait  obtained  the  valuable  and  much-coveted 
Snell  exhibition.  It  is  not  given  away  as  the  result 
of  a  competitive  examination,  but  is  decided  by  the 
votes  of  the  Professors.  Although  personal  considera- 
tions may  at  times  influence  these,  yet  the  comparative 
merit  of  the  candidates  is  a  consideration  to  which 
great  weight  is  deservedly  attached.  The  young 
scholar  speedily  vindicated  their  choice.  Within  a 
month  of  his  matriculation  he  obtained  an  open 
scholarship.  We  may  briefly  sum  up  that  brilliant 
academic  career  by  stating  that  in  1833  he  took  his 
first,  and  in  1835  became  Fellow  of  Balliol. 

He  was  a  prominent  member  of  the  Oxford  Union 
Club,  and,  if  we  recollect  aright,  became  President. 
At  present  the  debates  of  the  Club  are  held  in  their 
own  magnificent  room,  which,  we  believe,  Mr.  Ruskin 
considers  one  of  the  finest  in  the  world,  the  walls  of 
which  are  nobly  adorned  with  paintings  illustrative  of 
the  Arthurean  cycle  of  romance.  They  were  then 
held,  we  think,  at  the  large  room  at  the  "  Star." 
People  in  the  country  are  sometimes  confused  about 
this  famous  club.  A  local  newspaper  writes  : 
"  Boards  of  Guardians  sometimes  do  strange  things. 
The  Oxford  Union  has  been  discussing  the  financial 
pohcy  of  Mr.  Gladstone."  We  have  heard  it  remarked 
that  the  debates  at  the  Union  are  quite  as  good  as 
those  in  Parliament,  only  much  shorter  and  consider- 
ably more  animated.  The  modicum  of  truth  contained 
in  such  an  exaggeration  is  this,  that  those  who  make 
a  great  figure  at  the  Union  generally  do  very  well  in 
Parhament,  if  they  can  get  there ;  but  in  most  cases 
youthful  enthusiasm  is  replaced  by  the  senatorius  decor. 
Bishop  Tait  illustrates  these  remarks,   as  also  some  of 

U  2 


292  OTJE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

his  compeers  at  the  Union  at  this  time — the  late  Lord 
Herbert,  the  late  Lord  Elgin,  the  Duke  of  Newcastle, 
Mr.  Card  well,  Mr.  Lowe,  Mr.  Gladstone.  It  is  a 
curious  incident  that  he  was  once  fined  for  irregular 
conduct  at  the  Union.  A  jeu  d''es])rit  commemorated 
the  circumstance, 

"  with  thund'ring  sound 
Tait  shook  his  tassell'd  cap,  and  sprang  to  ground, 
(The  tassell'd  cap  by  Juggins'  hands  was  made, 
Or  some  keen  brother  of  the  Loudon  trade, 
Unconscious  of  the  stern  decrees  of  fate, 
What  ruthless  thumps  the  batter'd  trencher  wait), 
Dire  was  the  clang,  and  dreadful  from  afar, 
Of  Tait  indignant,  rushing  to  the  war. 
In  vain  the  chair's  dread  mandate  interfer'd, 
Nor  chair,  nor  fine,  the  angry  warrior  fear'd. 
A  forfeit  pound  th'  unequal  contest  ends, 
Loud  rose  the  clamour  of  condoling  friends." 

In  the  course  of  his  further  details  of  this  curious 
episode  in  the  history  of  the  Union,  we  are  told  that 
next  term  Tait  appealed  to  the  House  against  his 
fine,  but  could  not  obtain  its  remission  ;  and  the  late 
Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  can  boast  to  his  dying 
day  that  he  has  made  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
pay  twenty  shillings  for  disorderly  behaviour. 

What  greatly  raises  the  character  of  the  debates  at 
the  Union  is,  that  men  speak  who  have  completed 
their  academical  course,  often  with  the  highest  honours 
the  University  can  confer.  Mr.  Tait  gave  further 
completeness  to  his  academical  career  by  spending 
some  time  at  a  third  university,  at  Bonn  on  the  Rhine. 
A  residence  on  the  German  ground  can  hardly  fail  to 
give  greater  interest  and  reality  to  the  study  of 
German  theology,  which  has  done  so  much  to  enrich 
our  own  theological  literature,    and    to    furnish  and 


THE    ARCnCISIIOP    OF    CANTERBURY.  293 

equip  the  minds  of  some  of  our  best  writers  in  Divinity. 
Dr.  Tait,  in  his  "  Sucrsrestions  Offered  to  the  Theo- 
logical  Student"  (184G),  protests  against  the  notion, 
which,  though  the  offspring  of  sheer  ignorance,  has 
not  yet  been  altogether  abolished,  that  the  writings 
of  all  German  divines  are  tainted  with  Rationahsm. 
Thus  it  is  he  writes,  years  after  his  residence  at 
Bonn  :  "  The  author  of  the  present  volume  is  deeply 
sensible  of  the  very  limited  range  of  his  own  acquaint- 
ance with  the  divines  who  are  thus  looked  upon  with 
suspicion ;  but  he  has  thought  it  a  duty,  in  order  to 
protest  against  this  prejudice,  as  well  as  for  other 
reasons,  to  refer  distinctly  to  the  few  of  whose  assist- 
ance he  has  availed  himself.  For  it  is  of  much 
importance  that  English  readers,  if  they  do  not  know 
it  already,  should  learn  that  Germany  has  to  boast  of 
writers,  in  almost  every  department  of  theology,  who 
unite  the  deepest  learning  with  a  sound  and  earnest 
Christian  faith  ;  and  that  it  is  to  such  writers  we  shall 
be  mainly  indebted  if  the  infidelity  which  is  commonly 
associated  with  the  name  of  their  country  be  smitten 
and  overthrown." 

Mr.  Tait  had  now  taken  holy  orders  and  a  curacy. 
In  his  case  we  may  be  quite  sure  that  this  was  done 
not  only  with  that  high  resolve  and  sacred  feeling 
which  we  would  fain  hope  is  well-nigh  common  to  all 
candidates  for  holy  orders,  but  after  those  broad  in- 
quiries, and  that  intelHgent  thoughtful  deliberation, 
and  that  acquaintance  with  different  churches,  which 
necessarily  can  only  be  the  case  with  a  comparatively 
limited  number  of  ordained  persons.  A  list  might  be 
drawn  of  illustrious  men,  who,  with  every  inducement 
and  every  desire  to  enter  the  ministry  of  other  religious 


294  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

bodies,  have,   as  tlie    result    of    deliberate  judgment 
and  comprehensive  inquiry,  entered  the  service  of  the 
Church  of  England.     Such  a  list  would  be  headed  by 
those  two  illustrious  school-fellows,  Bishop  Butler  and 
Archbishop  Seeker.     We  understand  that  Dr.  Tait's 
step  of  entering  the  English  Church  some  years  later 
ensured  the  disappointment  of  what  must  have  seemed 
his  fairest  and   most   cherished   hopes   in   life.     Mr. 
Lowe,    when    Chancellor  of    the    Exchequer,    stated 
that  he  experienced    a    similar  disappointment.      In 
1838,  through   the  death  of  Sir  D.  K.  Sandford,  the 
Professorship  of  Greek  at  the  University  of  Glasgow 
became  vacant.     It   is   a   post   of  great  honour  and 
emolument.     The  duties  are  not  heavy,  and  its  value 
must  not  be  very  far  from  fifteen  hundred  a  year.     It, 
moreover,  leaves  the  Professor  at  the  most  absolute 
liberty  for  six  months  of  the  year.     Mr.   Tait  offered 
himself  as  a   candidate  ;  there  was  a  peculiar  appro- 
priateness in  his  so   doing,   and  the  chances  of  his 
election   must  have  been,  if  not  certain,  very   con- 
siderable.    But  the  state  of  the  law  interposed  a  diffi- 
culty.    It  was  questionable  whether  a  Clergyman  of 
the  Church  of  England  could  become  a  Professor  of  a 
Scotch  university.     And  in  this  way  the  candidateship 
came  to  nothing,  and  the  appointment  went  to  a  Cam- 
bridge man  instead   of  to  an  Oxford  man.     This  was 
one  of  those  marvellous  brothers  whose  mastery  over 
Greek  is   so   extraordinary  that  as  babes  they  must 
have  lisped  in   Greek  Iambics.     It  must  be  a  matter 
of  regret  that  this  unrivalled   scholar  has  not  yet  pro- 
duced any  learned   or  original  work  which  would  give 
him  a  wider  and  more   permanent  fame  than  he  now 
enjoys.     It    is    to    Professor    Lushington    that   Mr. 


THE    ARCHBISHOP    OF    CANTERBUEY.  295 

Thackeray  pays  one  of  the  highest  of  his  few  compli- 
ments in  one  of  his  works,  and  of  whom  Mr.  Tennyson 
sings : — 

"  And  thou  art  worthy,  full  of  power, 
Though  gentle,  liberal-minded,  great. 
Consistent,  wearing  all  that  weight 
Of  learning  lightly  as  a  flower." 

His  native  country  being  thus,  in  a  measure,  closed 
against  him,  Mr.  Tait  devoted  himself  anew  to  the 
England  of  his  adoption  :  he  did  manful  work  for  his 
University  and  his  Church.  In  conjunction  with  his 
illustrious  friend,  Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley,  he  issued 
a  pamphlet  on  the  "  Revival  of  the  Professorial  Sys- 
tem." He  had  work  to  do  as  tutor  of  Balliol,  and 
those  who  know  to  what  a  splendid  state  of  efficiency 
the  tutors  of  Balhol  have  raised  their  college,  will  be 
able  to  appreciate  this.  In  ]  841  he  was  Public  Ex- 
aminer. In  1842  he  took  his  D.C.L.,  and  we  are  not 
aware  that  he  has  ever  taken  a  degree  as  Doctor  of 
Divinity.  But  he  was  now  even  more  active  as  a 
clergyman  than  as  a  scholar.  Those  were  the  days  in 
which  the  Oxford  movement  was  busy  and  came  to  a 
culmination,  the  days  of  Newmanism,  as  it  was  first 
rightly  enough  entitled,  although  an  absurd  nickname 
has  since  been  given,  derived  from  a  most  learned  and 
venerable  canon  of  Christ  Church.  The  present  gene- 
ration of  Oxford  men  hardly  realise  the  excitement 
and  controversy  which  shook  Oxford.  It  was  the 
*'  Essays  and  Reviews"  furore  concentrated  in  a  local 
focus.  But  let  Dr.  Arnold  state  the  case  against 
Newmanism  : — "  It  is  because  my  whole  mind  and 
soul  repose  with  intense  satisfaction  on  the  truths 
taught  by  St.  John  and  St.  Paul,  that  I  abhor  the 


296  OUR   BISHOFS    AND    DEANS. 

Judaism  of  the  NewmaDites ;  it  is  only  because  I  so 
earnestly  desire  the  revival  of  the  Church,  that  I  abhor 
the  doctrines  of  the  priesthood.  The  moral  fault,  as 
it  appears  to  me,  is  the  idolatry,  the  setting  up  some 
idea  which  is  most  kindred  to  our  own  minds,  and 
then  putting  it  in  the  place  of  Christ,  who  alone  can- 
not be  made  an  idol  and  cannot  inspire  fanaticism, 
because  He  combines  all  ideas  of  perfection,  and  ex- 
hibits them  in  their  just  harmony  and  perfection.  But 
it  is  clear  to  me  that  Newman  and  his  party  are 
idolators ;  they  put  Christ's  Church  and  Christ's 
Sacraments  and  Christ's  ministers  in  the  place  of 
Christ's  Himself."  Dr.  Arnold  even  thought  that 
some  of  them  deserved  hanging.  By-and-by  New- 
manism  produced  its  numberless  perversions.  "  Alas  !" 
writes  Bishop  Tait,  "the  age. in  which  we  live  has 
produced  miserable  examples  of  very  many  persons 
trained  in  the  pure  gospel  teaching  of  our  Apostolic 
Church,  led  away  by  excited  feeling,  some  in  the  vigour 
of  health,  some  in  the  languor  of  sickness  and  ap- 
proaching dissolution,  to  a  miserable  worship  of  human 
saints,  and  of  the  Lord's  human  mother,  into  which  in 
their  sober  moments  they  could  not  have  believed  they 
could  ever  fall." 

Mr.  Tait,  we  believe,  was  one  of  the  four  Oxford 
tutors  who  pointedly  drew  the  attention  of  the 
University  to  Tract  90  and  procured  the  con- 
demnation of  its  doctrines.  Ever  earnest  in  his 
defence  of  the  truth,  Mr.  Tait  was  always  the  most 
courteous  of  opponents,  and  for  him  controversy  was 
deprived  of  its  normal  bitterness.  Dr.  Arnold  relaxed 
towards  the  last  something  of  the  vehemence  with 
which  he  opposed  these  errors.     It  is  the  inevitable 


THE    AEOPJBISHOP    OF    CANTERBURY.  297 

misfortune  of  controversialists  that,  while  keenly 
analysing  the  errors  of  the  party  they  oppose,  they 
are  apt  to  overlook  that  measure  of  the  truth  and  good 
which  is  mixed  up  with  or  underlies  that  error.  We 
are  persuaded  that  had  Dr.  Arnold's  valuable  life  been 
spared  he  would  materially  have  modified  the  language 
which  we  find  in  his  Gorresioondence.  The  so-called 
High  Church  party  have  outgrown  many  of  their 
extravagances.  Before  the  Rituahstic  phase  com- 
menced there  had  been  an  elimination  from  their  ranks 
of  those  who  could  not  conscientiously  remain  in 
the  communion  of  the  Church  of  England.  If  we 
have  now  many  more  churches,  and  in  those  churches 
many  more  services ;  if  there  has  been  an  increase  of 
clergy,  and  an  increase  of  the  episcopate  ;  if  patristic 
literature  is  more  thoroughly  and  generally  studied  ; 
if  there  has  been  a  growing  return  to  primitive  faith, 
reverence,  and  obedience ;  if  men  have  cheerfully 
given  the  best  of  their  lives  and  substance  in  the 
lavish  and  unselfish  adornment  of  the  House  of  God, 
rather  than  of  their  own  habitations,  all  these  have 
been  essentially  evolved  by  the  Oxford  movement. 
But  all  these  are  quite  consistent  with  the  simplest 
forms  of  Christian  faith,  and  dependent  on  them  and 
sanctioned  by  them.  Surely  it  is  not  impossible  that 
minds  of  comprehensive  Christianity  may  arbitrate 
between  conflicting  and  apparently  irreconcilable 
difficulties. 

On  the  morning  of  the  12th  of  June,  1842,  Dr. 
Arnold  died.  The  account  of  his  death  is  the  most 
striking  chapter  in  the  most  perfect  biographical  work 
which  this  century  has  produced.  He  had  been  four- 
teen years  the  head-master,  and  raised  Rugby  to  the 


298  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DRANS. 

height  of  its  reputation,  and  created  for  himself  a 
pure  fame,  which  time,  as  it  rolls  on,  strengthens  and 
confirms.  Mr.  Tait,  by  the  excellence  of  his  testi- 
monials, the  one  thing  which  originally  procured  the 
appointment  of  Dr.  Arnold,  was  appointed  head- 
master by  the  trustees.  The  lamented  death  of 
Arnold  had  happened  just  at  the  conclusion  of  the 
half  year.  On  the  first  Sunday  of  the  next  half  year, 
the  school  re-assembled  in  the  chapel  under  the  new 
head-master,  and  that  inaugurating  Sunday  was  fit- 
tingly observed  with  funeral  service.  It  was  only 
a  few  Sundays  before  that  the  most  illustrious  of 
English  schoolmasters  had  been  stricken  down  by 
sudden  death.  That  chapel  is  especially  associated 
with  his  revered  memory.  He  had  claimed  the  right 
to  minister  there  on  the  most  precious  and  real  of  his 
duties,  he  had  contributed  to  it  its  richest  adornments, 
and  he  is  the  only  head  master  who  is  there  interred. 
E/Ugby  sermons  are  now  an  integral  part  of  our  theo- 
logical literature.  Dr.  Arnold's  sermons  rank  first 
and  highest.  Dr.  Tait  has  also  published  his  Rugby 
sermons.  Dr.  Goulburn's  various  volumes  of  sermons 
have  doubtless,  to  a  considerable  extent,  a  Rugby 
origin.  Lastly,  Dr.  Temple's  Rugby  sermons  have  a 
special  interest  and  value.  Dr.  Tait  has  an  interesting 
allusion  to  his  predecessor  under  *'  Gospel  Facts  and 
Doctrines."*  "  As  it  is  sometimes  implied  that  Dr. 
Arnold  favoured  such  a  view  of  the  unimportance  oj 
correct  belief y  I  think  it  right  to  record  my  conviction 
that  had  that  great  man  been  now  living,  he  would 
have  been  in  many  ways  admirably  suited  to  destroy 
this  most  mistaken  system.     Few  men  who  ever  lived 

*  See  "  Dangers  and  Safeguards,"  p.  121. 


THE    ARCHBISHOP    OF    CANTERBURY.  299 

have  had  a  more  ardent  faith  in  those  doctrines  which 
he  deemed  essential,  or  have  more  clearly  understood 
or  illustrated  how  Christian  doctrine,  if  really  beheved, 
must  affect  practice.  Any  one  who  reads  his  sermons, 
or  follows  the  record  of  his  daily  life,  must  see  that 
his  whole  soul  would  have  revolted  from  a  Christianity 
which  was  to  furnish  no  positive  Christian  truth."  In 
the  year  1846,  he  published  the  book  from  which  this 
is  an  extract,  with  a  preface  dated  from  the  school- 
house,  Rugby.  The  great  school  flourished  under  his 
days  far  more  than  under  the  days  of  his  immediate 
successor.  The  incessant  duties  of  the  school,  com- 
bined perhaps  with  a  somewhat  anxious  temperament, 
brought  on  a  serious  illness,  which  led  to  a  termina- 
tion of  his  connection  with  Rugby.  There  were  some 
remarkable  scenes  at  the  time.  It  is  not  often  that  a 
master  leaves  his  school  with  such  marks  of  affection 
and  honour  as  Dr.  Tait  received  in  1849. 

Dr.  Tait  is  now  Dean  of  Carlisle.  Lord  John 
Russell  conferred  the  appointment  on  the  promotion 
of  Dr.  Hinds  to  the  see  of  Norwich.  Dr.  Tait  has 
subsequently  stated  in  the  House  of  Lords  that  he 
was  a  certain  number  of  years  in  finding  out  what  the 
duties  of  a  dean  of  the  Church  of  England  might 
happen  to  be.  The  "  Saturday  Review  "  glibly  pro- 
ceeded to  give  a  full  explanation  of  the  duties  of  a 
dean — mainly  to  study  hard,  and  write  great  books. 
But  it  is  hardly  supposable  that  some  forty  deans 
would  simultaneously  become  illustrious  authors.  It 
is  certainly  desirable  enough  that  learned  clergymen 
should  be  advanced  to  that  position  of  ease  and  inde- 
pendence which  would  enable  them  to  continue  those 
studies  which  have  already  earned  them   fame,    and 


300  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

occupied  the  best  part  of  life.  Such  persons,  how- 
ever, as  often  miss  as  hit  the  mark  of  a  deanery.  But 
the  appointment  of  distinguished  scholars  is  not  in 
every  case  enough.  A  dean,  from  his  position  of 
dignity,  ease,  and  affluence,  may  be  of  inestimable  use 
among  the  clergy  of  a  populous  city,  active  among  the 
foremost  in  all  good  words  and  works.  The  Dean  of 
Carlisle  soon  found  himself  abundance  of  work  to  do. 
His  successor.  Dr.  Close,  has  declared  that  he  found  it 
hard  work  to  keep  pace  with  his  predecessor  in  all 
that  he  had  been  doing  for  Carlisle.  In  addition  to 
all  this.  Dr.  Tait  was  busy  as  a  member  of  the  Oxford 
University  Commission,  to  which  his  friend.  Dr. 
Stanley,  was  secretary. 

We  always  think  that  Carlisle,  "  the  City  of  the 
Army  by  the  Wall,"  must  be  a  peculiarly  interesting 
city  to  reside  in.  The  deanery  itself  is  an  interesting 
residence.  Writers  on  ecclesiastical  architecture  speak 
with  admiration  of  its  roof,  erected  nearly  four 
hundred  years  ago,  of  its  curious  square  head  oriel 
of  the  fifteenth  century,  and  of  its  tower.  The  cathe- 
dral, formerly  the  abbey  of  a  monastery  of  Austin 
canons,  is  rich  in  beauty  and  association,  and,  thanks 
mainly  to  Dr.  Tait,  is  now  found  in  renovated  splen- 
dour, very  different  to  what  it  was  described  in  1(539 ; 
"  like  a  great  wild  country  church,  outwardly,  so  was 
it  inwardly,  neither  beautiful  nor  adorned  one  whit. 
The  organ  and  voices  did  well  agree,  the  one  being 
like  a  shrill  bagpipe,  the  other  like  the  Scottish  tune, 
the  sermon  in  the  hke  accent.  The  communion  was 
received  in  a  wild  and  irreverent  manner." 

As  Dean,  one  of  Dr.  Tait's  first  cares  would  be  con- 
nected with  the  sacred  fabric  of  which  he  was   the 


THE    ARCHBISHOP   OF    CANTERBURY.  301 

principal  custodiaii.  Great  restorations  were  effected, 
and  about  £15,000  were  in  this  manner  expended. 
The  first  view  of  Carlisle  Cathedral  is  very  disap- 
pointing. It  has  no  nave,  and  this  heavy  loss 
irretrievably  mars  the  whole.  Nevertheless,  a  re- 
peated and  more  intelligent  examination  discloses  that 
though  the  exterior  is  unfinished  and  unprepossessing, 
the  richness  and  delicacy  of  the  choir  is  remarkable. 
Dean  Tait  and  his  allies  did  their  best.  The  tran- 
sept roof  was  raised,  a  decorated  window  was  inserted 
in  the  north  wing.  Bishop  Appleby's  unique  roof  was 
opened  and  coloured  under  the  direction  of  Owen 
Jones,  and  water  power  was  applied  to  the  organ.  In 
the  course  of  these  repairs,  a  cross  of  the  seventh 
century  was  discovered  built  into  the  transept.  Dr. 
Tait,  however,  would  be  the  last  man  to  occupy  him- 
self entirely  with  the  work  of  ecclesiastical  restoration, 
important  though  it  be,  and  to  lose  sight  of  the  still 
greater  object  of  building  up  the  "  temple  of  living 
stones."  At  Carlisle  there  is  a  large  population  of 
poor  artizans,  and  the  Dean  addressed  himself  to  their 
improvement  in  true  missionary  spirit.  Additional 
pulpit  service  was  secured  for  the  poor,  the  visitation 
system  was  improved,  every  good  educational  work 
aided  and  advanced.  We  are  informed  that  it  was 
mainly  through  his  exertions  that  the  grammar  school 
of  the  city  was  rebuilt,  and  its  system  of  education 
extended  and  improved. 

It  pleased  God  to  visit  the  Dean  with  domestic  cala- 
mities of  peculiarly  poignant  nature,  which  throughout 
the  country,  from  our  Queen  to  her  lowliest  subject 
who  heard  of  them,  excited  heartfelt  sympathy.  Thus 
beautifully   has    Dr.    Tait   alluded   to   them  : — "  The 


302  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

trials  of  life  greatly  affect  our  mental  vision ;  rightly 
used,  they  make  us  more  sympathizing,    more    con- 
siderate,   more   tolerant,  but  they  also  more    deeply 
convince  us  of  the  priceless  value  of  truths  which  have 
been   our    soul's    only   stay   in   terrible    emergencies. 
Few  mortals  pass  any  great  length  of  time  without 
sickness  and  sorrow ;  and  if  a  man  has  looked  death 
in  the  face,   or,   while  well  in  his  own  bodily  health, 
has   been    stunned   in    mind    by    seeing    fond    hopes 
vanish,  he  will  naturally  cling  with  a  firmer  tenacity 
to  the  great  religious  truths  which  bore  him  up  when 
all  else  failed,  and  will  be  more  jealous  of  any  attempt 
to  tamper  with  those  truths  than  he  was  when  he 
defended    them   in   earlier   life    on   grounds  of  mere 
speculative  orthodoxy,  having  not  yet  learned  to  prize 
and  love  them  through — what  must  be  to  each  prac- 
tically the  surest  test — their  tried  value  to  his  own 
spirit."     It  has  been  said  that  Her  Majesty's  personal 
sympathy  for  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Tait  led  to  the  elevation 
to  the  See  of  London.     If  this  was  the  case  it  was 
only  incidentally  so.     For  one  who  had  been  in  suc- 
cession   Fellow    of    Balliol,    head-master   of  a   great 
pubhc  school,  and  dean  of  a  cathedral,  to  be  promoted 
to  a  bishopric   was  very  much  a  matter  of  course, 
especially  in  the   case   of  one  whose   labours  in  the 
Oxford  University  Commission  would  alone  have  quite 
sufficed  to  bring  prominently  into  notice. 

Upon  the  passing  of  the  "  Bishops  of  London  and 
Durham  Retirement  Act,"  in  1856,  the  vacant  See  of 
London  was  conferred  upon  Dr.  Tait.  The  appoint- 
ment was  received  with  general  satisfaction,  which 
widened  and  deepened  as  the  character  of  the  new 
bishop  became  better  known  and   appreciated.     His 


THE    ARCHBISHOP   OP    CANTEEBURY.  303 

Episcopal  career  has  been  one  of  incessant  usefulness 
and  activity,  varied  only  by  well-earned  seasons  of 
travel  or  repose.  In  1868  he  was  raised  to  the 
Primacy. 

The  Archbishop  appears,  like  Dr.  Arnold,  to  regard 
the  divisions  of  the  Church  as  irreparable,  the  restora- 
tion of  the  Church  as  almost  impracticable,  and  to 
"cling,"  as  he  expresses  himself  in  one  of  his  letters, 
"  not  from  choice  but  from  necessity  to  the  Protestant 
tendency  of  laying  the  whole  stress  on  the  Christian 
religion,  and  adjourning  his  idea  of  the  Church  sine 
die.^^*  Or  rather,  we  should  say,  he  refuses  to  regard 
the  Church  under  any  lower  definition  than  "  the 
blessed  company  of  all  faithful  people."  The  primary 
charge  of  the  Bishop  was  delivered  in  November, 
1858.  It  was  a  day  which  will  not  soon  be  forgotten. 
The  charge  must  have  been  a  heavy  trial  both  for 
those  who  heard  and  for  him  who  delivered  it ;  it 
occupied  no  less  than  five  hours.  It  treated  exten- 
sively the  most  pressing  ecclesiastical  matters  of  the 
day.  It  excited  great  attention  everywhere  through- 
out the  country.  The  Bishop  everywhere  did  the 
work  of  an  Evangelist :  one  day  we  find  him  preaching 
in  the  open  air  in  Covent  Garden  market ;  another 
day  he  is  preaching  to  the  Bethnal  Green  weavers, 
who  met  on  a  week-day  evening  in  their  working 
clothes ;  on  another  day  he  is  addressing  the  London 
omnibus-drivers  and  cabmen  in  a  stable-yard  at 
Islington.  In  the  meanwhile  the  Bishop  developed 
administrative  talents  of  the  hio^hest  order,  althousfh 
it  may  be  an  open  question,  as  in  the  case  of  St. 
George's-in-the-East,  how  far  their  particular  appli- 
cation was  fully  successful. 

*  Stanley's  "Life  of  Arnold." 


304  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

As  a  preacher,  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  hardly 
calls  for  any  special  remark.  But  even  in  a  critical  point 
of  view,  Dr.  Tait  has  one  distinguishing  merit,  which 
may  ensure  more  substantial  good  than  mere  showy 
qualifications.  When  Demosthenes  said  that  the  first, 
second  and  third  requisite  for  an  orator  was  action,  we 
apprehend  that  what  Demosthenes  meant,  was  not 
action,  in  our  modern  notion  of  the  word,  but 
earnestness.  And  this  earnestness  the  Bishop 
possesses  to  the  fullest  extent ;  it  overflows  in  tone, 
manner,  language,  and  never  fails  in  being  impres- 
sive, never  fails  in  producing  that  effect  of  reality 
which  mere  rhetoric  would  be  powerless  to  produce. 
Hardly  subject  to  enthusiasm  himself,  he  is  hardly 
capable  of  arousing  the  enthusiasm  of  others,  and  we 
should  be  surprised  if  those  who  ask  for  his  willing 
aid  in  preaching  a  sermon  for  a  charitable  purpose, 
succeed  in  the  object  of  obtaining  a  very  full  congre- 
gation or  a  very  full  collection ;  and  if  he  is  reading 
his  sermon  to  a  hardly  average  congregation,  the 
sermon  would  be  considered,  if  men  were  discussing 
a  less  distinguised  dignitary,  as  decidedly  monotonous. 
This  objection  would  be  modified,  if  not  totally 
obviated,  if  in  the  supposed  case  the  Archbishop  was 
delivering  not  a  written  but  an  extemporaneous  dis- 
course. There  are,  however,  certain  occasions  on 
which  the  sermons  of  the  Archbishop,  both  in  matter 
and  manner,  rise  to  an  unusual  and  very  remarkable 
degree  of  excellence.  We  are  thinking  of  the  special 
services  held  in  St.  Paul's  Cathedral  or  in  West- 
minster Abbey.  The  inspiring  associations  of  the 
place  and  scene,  the  solemn  gathering  of  listening 
thousands,  possibly  the  knowledge  that  next  morning 


TEE  AECHBISnOP  OF  CANTERBURY.        305 

the  press  will  be  scattering  a  'precis  of  his  sermon 
wherever  the  English  tongue  is  spoken,  most  cer- 
tainly the  prospect  of  doing  much  good  on  a  large 
scale,  have  caused  the  preacher  to  give  most  careful 
preparation  to  his  sermon,  and  to  evince  an  earnest- 
ness that  produces  the  best  effects  of  absolute 
eloquence.  And  on  these  occasions  the  preacher 
addresses  himself  not  only  to  the  heart,  but  directly 
to  the  intellect,  the  information,  and  the  good  sense 
of  his  listeners.  The  sermons  then  become  really 
model  sermons,  which  every  preacher  might  study 
with  advantage.  They  do  not  exhibit  the  mistakes 
of  many  well-meaning  but  imbecile  persons,  whose 
sermons  are  a  miscellaneous  collection  of  tracts 
strung  together  by  obvious  truisms.  Least  of  all  do 
they  exhibit  the  mistake  or  sin,  much  less  frequent 
and  far  more  pitiable,  of  ambitious  language  and 
oratorical  display,  out  of  mere  vanity.  The  robust 
sense,  the  interesting  reference  to  past  or  current 
history,  the  close  logical  argument  that  makes  meu 
think,  the  kindly  and  pointed  appeal  which  makes 
men  feel,  all  are  found  in  the  better  order  of  the 
Archbishop's  speeches  and  addresses. 

Extremely  unaffected,  but  exhibiting  more  learning 
and  elaboration,  are  the  sermons  preached  before  the 
University  of  Oxford.  These  may  be  found  in  a 
volume  published  in  1862,  entitled  "  Dangers  and 
Safeguards  of  Modern  Theology,"  dedicated  to  the 
Master  and  Fellows  of  Baliiol  College,  "  in  remem- 
brance of  much  kindness  received,  and  many  years  of 
pleasant  intercourse."  The  immediate  cause  of  the 
publication  of  this  volume  was  the  "  Essays  and  Re- 

VOL.  I.  X 


306  OUK   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

views."  "  Of  two  out  of  the  seven  Essavists  it  is  im- 
possible  for  him  to  speak  without  affectionate  regard, 
connected  as  he  is  with  them  by  a  friendship  of  more 
than  twenty  years."  The  "  Essays  and  Reviews" 
produced  a  hterature  of  their  own ;  the  number  of 
books  and  pamphlets  connected  with  them  may  be 
stated  in  round  numbers  at  a  hundred.  Few  of  them 
will  attain  a  prominent  place  in  the  library  of  theology, 
and  the  "  Dangers  and  Safeguards"  will  scarcely  be 
among  the  number.  Critics  and  practised  readers 
would  naturally  be  impatient  of  a  work  of  which  the 
more  important  part  was  published  fifteen  years  before 
the  controversy,  and  the  remainder  of  which  simply 
consisted  of  miscellaneous  sermons.  The  work  has  a 
certain  positive  and  constructive  value,  but  in  the 
same  way  that  "  Scott's  Commentary,"  or  Leslie's 
"  Short  Way  with  the  Deists"  possesses  such ;  they  all 
of  them  supply  a  teaching  which,  if  faithfully  received, 
may  be  a  "  Safeguard"  against  "  Dangers ;"  but  the 
Archbishop's  work  has  only  this  indirect  value  in 
reference  to  the  difficulties  for  which,  according  to 
its  letter,  it  would  seem  to  arbitrate. 

The  Archbishop  has  not  uufrequently  spoken  in  the 
House  of  Lords,  where  he  at  once  obtained  a  seat. 
These  speeches  have  been  almost  entirely  ecclesiastical ; 
such  as  the  Exeter  Hall  services,  subscription,  the 
burial  service,  the  condition  of  the  clergy,  union  of 
benefices,  church  extension,  and  latterl}'-  there  has 
been  much  speaking  on  the  Public  Worship  Regulation 
Bill.  These  are  subjects  on  which  he  of  course  speaks 
with  authority;  but,  firm,  sensible,  and  practical,  the 
Archbishop  would  on  any  question  make  an  excellent 
debater.  He  has  a  great  variety  of  offices  and  duties  to 


THE    ARCHBISHOP    OF    CANTERBOEY.  307 

attend  to,  and  lie  does  his  work  well,  apparently  de- 
lighting in  it.  He  is  of  course  a  Privy  Councillor, 
which  at  times  has  imposed  onerous  duties.  It  fell  to 
his  lot  as  Bishop  of  Loudon,  to  decide  judicially  on  the 
appeal  in  the  "  Essays  and  Reviews"  case.  As  a  judge, 
he  coincided  in  the  decision  that  reversed  the  judgment 
of  the  court  below.  It  has  excited  considerable  criticism 
and  comruent — the  fact  that  Dr.  Tait  did  not  unite  in 
the  protest  of  the  then  Archbishops.  We  do  not  believe 
that  the  Archbishop  has  any  sympathy  with  the  views  of 
such  writers  ;  but  it  has  been  his  lot  to  be  intimate 
with  men  of  many  and  most  varying  sentiments,  and 
to  be  familiar  with  this  conflict  of  opinions  in  a  degree 
greatly  beyond  the  lot  of  most  men.  He  is  friendly 
to  the  utmost  freedom  of  thought  and  decision,  and 
looks  mainly  to  the  personal  element  in  each  case,  the 
real  earnestness,  purpose,  and  prayerfulness  of  a  man, 
and,  when  these  are  present,  does  not  so  greatly  re- 
gard the  logical  consequence  of  theological  specula- 
tions. This  tenderness  and  leniency  contrasts,  how- 
ever, somewhat  forcibly  with  the  unhesitating  judg- 
ment in  any  cases  in  which  "  Puseyite"  preachers  are 
concerned.  As  in  the  instance  of  St.  Barnabas,  it  will 
be  remembered  that,  when  he  preached  the  consecra- 
tion sermon  of  "All  Saints,"  Margaret  Street,  his 
sermon,  singularly  able  and  faithful  in  many  respects, 
refrained  from  the  least  expression  of  sympathy  with  or 
congratulation  on  the  energy  and  self-sacrifice  and 
devotion  of  the  heart  to  God  which  had  raised  that 
sumptuous  pile — merely  expressing  a  hope  that  the 
church  might  prove  "  a  fresh  help  to  those  whose 
tastes  it  gratifies." 

It  is  in  the  direction  of  practical  labour  indicated  by 

X  2 


308  OUR    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

such  a  sentence  that  Dr.  Tait's  strength  mainly  lies. 
His  great  scheme  (one  in  which  our  Royal  Family  is 
taking  a  warm  interest)  for  raising  a  million  of  money 
within  ten  years,  or  rather  three  millions,  for  supply- 
ing the  spiritual  destitution  of  the  diocese  of  London, 
was  the  great  event  of  his  career,  and  his  best  title  of 
remembrance.  Bishop  Blomfield  had  been  indefatig- 
able in  this  good  work,  and  laid  the  foundation  of  all 
that  was  to  follow.  The  subject  was  mooted  in  the 
primary  charge,  and  we  believe  it  was  in  1860,  when 
his  physicians  had  confined  him  to  his  room  in  conse- 
quence of  illness  brought  on  by  overwork,  and  had  in- 
terdicted all  ministerial  duty,  that  Dr.  Tait  framed  and 
issued  his  address  to  the  laity  on  the  subject  of  pro- 
viding additional  church  accommodation,  especially 
for  the  poor.  Since  then  the  scheme  has  grown,  and 
is  now  one  for  the  complete  organisation  of  a 
church  system  in  London,  which,  so  far  as  the  irre- 
vocable past  will  allow,  will  atone  for  the  neglect  of 
ages. 

There  are  many  insulated  points  in  Archbishop 
Tait's  career  that  might  be  taken  up  for  discussion. 
We  will  briefly  quote  a  remarkable  speech  which  he 
made  at  a  meeting  of  the  Society  for  the  Propagation 
of  the  Gospel,  which  was  made  remarkable  by  the 
vigorous  response  which  the  Hindoo  gentlemen  made. 
That  very  answer,  however,  served  to  give  force  and 
point  to  the  Archbishop's  remarks  : — 

"  It  is  now  almost  easier  to  go  to  a  distant  heathen 
land  than  it  was  in  the  days  of  our  grandfathers  to 
travel  from  Carlisle  to  London.  The  whole  world  has 
been  brought  wonderfully  near.  In  old  times  if  you 
wished  to  stir  up  men's  zeal   for  the  missionary  cause 


THE    ARCilBlSUOP    OF    OANTEliBUKY.  309 

knowing  that  the  sight  was  far  more  powerful  than 
what  we  merely  hear  of — it  might  be  necessary  to 
send  them  to  distant  lands  that  they  might  see  speci- 
mens of  the  heathen.  But  now,  take  a  return  ticket 
to  London  in  the  middle  of  the  season ;  go  either  to 
Her  Majesty's  lev^e  or  the  Lord  Mayor's  banquet,  or 
walk  even  through  the  streets,  and  what  do  you  see  ? 
A  cavalcade  of  some  six  carriao^es  bearino;  the  Bur- 
mese  ambassadors — absolute  heathen,  who  have  come 
to  do  their  homage  to  the  greatness  of  England  in  the 
centre  of  England.  Go  to  the  Temple,  where  the 
familiar  sight  of  our  barristers  with  their  peculiar  cos- 
tume used  formerly  to  be  the  only  thing  we  saw,  and 
we  find  some  sixty  Hindoos  members  of  the  Temple 
or  Lincoln's  Inn,  still  remaining  Hindoos  and  heathen, 
in  the  centre  of  English  civilisation.  Go,  again,  to  an- 
other quarter  of  the  city — to  the  East  end  of  London 
— to  what  is  called  the  Oriental  Home,  where  every 
specimen  of  the  heathen  of  the  East  is  gathered  to- 
gether in  consequence  of  our  merchandise  with  the 
East,  living  here  for  mouths,  mixing  with  our  people; 
or  follow  Mr.  Dickens  into  the  Chinaman's  shop,  and 
see  there  men  smoking  opium  as  if  they  were  in  the 
centre  of  China ;  or  go  elsewhere  and  meet  a  whole 
troupe  of  Japanese,  and  you  will  see  that  a  man  no 
more  requires  to  go  to  the  extremities  of  the  earth  to 
be  convinced  of  the  claims  which  the  heathen  have 
upon  us,  and  that  in  our  own  metropolis  we  are 
brougfht  so  near  heathenism  of  the  worst  class  that, 
unless  we  take  some  steps,  instead  of  converting  the 
heathen  the  heathen  will  be  converting  us.  For  this 
is  not  merely  an  imaginary  idea.  I  am  almost  afraid 
to  say  it,  but  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  this  great 


310  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

proximity  of  the  East  to  ourselves  has  somehow  or 
other  infected  the  philosophy  on  which  the  young 
men  feed  in  our  great  seminaries  of  learning,  and  that 
men  of  learning,  from  rubbing  shoulders  with  men 
who  altogether  disbelieve  in  Christianity,  have  more 
toleration  for  that  denial  than  they  had  in  the  olden 
times ;  and  that  systems  which  have  existed  for  cen- 
turies in  the  extreme  lands  of  heathenism  are  finding 
some  sort  of  echo  even  among  the  literature  and 
philosophy  of  this  Christian  country." 

It  will  be  recollected  how  Dr.  Tait  overworked  him- 
self, and  brought  on  an  attack  of  dangerous  illness.  In 
the  life  of  Dean  Alford  there  is  an  interestino-  letter  from 

O 

the  Archbishop  to  Dean  Alford,  dated  from  Mentone, 
which  only  arrived  at  Canterbury  a  day  or  two  before 
the  Dean's  funeral : — "  I  write  to  beg  you  to  give 
yourself  immediate  and  lengthened  rest.  Let  my  ex- 
ample be  a  warning  to  you.  But  I  suspect  your 
literary  work  has  been  a  greater  strain  than  my  neces- 
sar}?-  occupations  of  business  in  London,  and  in  my 
first  nine  months  of  Lambeth  and  the  Cut.  I  earnestly 
hope  that  we  shall  soon  hear  that  you  are  quite  well. 
If  you  have  never  read,  read  at  once  Sir  B.  Brodie's 
'  Psychological  Researches,'  and  see  what  amount  of 
literary  work  he  thinks  the  human  frame  can  stand. 
I  think  you  are  severe  on  St.  Remo,  which,  if  we 
could  only  have  found  beach  walks,  we  should  have 
greatly  enjoyed.  We  stayed  there  a  month,  and  had 
many  most  lovely  drives.  Will  you  not  come  here 
and  refresh  yourself  at  once  ?  What  can  we  look  for- 
ward to  before  it  is  time  to  turn  our  faces  towards 
England  ?  The  fear  of  passing  through  France  op- 
presses us.     The  French  who  are  here  seem  resolved 


THE    ARCUBISnOP    OF    CANTERBURY.  311 

not  to  believe  that  any  real  evil  can  happen  to  Paris, 
and  bear  as  good  a  heart  as  possible  on  the  sad  state 
of  things.  Would  that  the  love  of  Christ  had  so  taken 
possession  of  men's  hearts  that  wars  were  impossible." 

Everyone  who  knows  anything  of  Archbishop  Tait 
speaks  heartily  of  his  pleasant,  courteous,  kindly  ways. 
Amid  all  the  gravity  and  care  that  his  high  office  has 
brought  him,  he  has  still  the  keen  perception  of  wit 
and  sense  of  the  humorous.  There  is  a  singular  be- 
nignity and  whole-heartedness  about  him  ;  a  more 
Catholic-minded  man  does  not  exist.  Some  measure 
of  criticism  might  be  bestowed  on  his  administration 
of  patronage.  He  is  a  man  who  always  takes  care  of 
friends;  ho  is  devoted  to  them,  and,  as  a  con- 
sequence, they  are  devoted  to  him.  Chaplain  after 
chaplain  has  been  made  bishop,  or  has  had  a 
bishopric  offered  to  him.  Livings  have  been  distributed 
to  all  within  the  charmed  circle.  He  not  only  takes 
care  of  his  friends,  but  of  his  friends'  friends.  Some- 
times he  puts  round  pegs  into  square  holes,  and  square 
pegs  into  round  holes ;  as  when  he  has  sent  men  of 
severe  learning  and  retired,  studious  habits  into  the  in- 
cumbencies of  vast  poor  parishes,  as  the  readiest  means 
of  providing  for  them.  Sometimes  he  has  made  the 
popular  appointment  of  nominating  to  a  parish  a  curate 
of  many  years'  standing  to  succeed  its  deceased  in- 
cumbent. But  we  are  not  aware  of  any  instances  in- 
which  the  Archbishop  has  sought  out  any  scholar  of 
eminence,  or  curate  of  prolonged  services,  unless  a 
a  popular  cry  or  powerful  interest  had  been  brought 
to  bear  on  the  selection. 

The  most  remarkable  point  in  the  career  of  the 
Archbishop,  by  which  he  will  be  longest  recollected  is 


3J2  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

his  origination  of  the  famous  Bill  for  the  Regulation 
of  Public  Worship.     He  was  much   criticised  for  the 
scanty  reverence  he  bestowed   on  Convocation.     But 
the    somewhat     Erastian    Archbishop    thought   that 
even  in  such  matters  Convocation  must  not  necessarily 
have  a  priority  over  Parliament.     The  weak  point  in 
the  Archbishop's  plan  was  that  he  proposed  to  ad- 
minister a  law  that  is  itself  uncertain  and  ill-defined. 
The  E;itualistic  party  maintain,  and  allege  high  legal 
authoritv  for    the   assertion,    that    had  the   Purchas 
case  been  fully  argued  out,  there   would  have  been  a 
different  kind  of  decision.  Anyhow  they  do  not  appear 
to  consider  that  it  is  a  judgment  that  is  binding  on 
their    consciences.     We  are   afraid  that  any    kind  of 
judgment  that   condemned   their   proceedings    would 
equally    fail   to    bind    their   consciences.     Still  it    is 
clear   that  a    new  judge  and    a   new    tribunal    have 
to  administer   an    unsettled  law.     The    Archbishop's 
strong    point   lay   in    his   personal   narrative  of   the 
thousands  of  pounds  spent,  and  the  many  years  con- 
sumed in  the  ordinary   course  of  ecclesiastical  litiga- 
tion.    His  case  rests  on  the  fundamental  axiom  that 
the  administration  of  the  law  ought  to  be  cheap  and 
speedy.  He  took  great  pains  in  explaining  to  an  eccle- 
siastical conference  the  simplicity  and  honesty  of  his 
aim,    so    supplementing   anything    left    unsaid   in  his 
place   in  Parliament.     One   criticism    that   arises   is, 
that  this  bill  was  originally  expressly  levelled  against 
the  Eitualistic  Ministry  in  the  Church,  and  was  not 
intended  to  apply  to  all  parties ;   and  another  adverse 
point  was  that  it  dealt  with  offences  against  form,  and 
not  against  morality.     If  it  be  truth  that  the  adminis- 
tration of  law  should  be  cheap  and  speedy,  it  is  equally 


THE    ARCHBISnOP    01'    CANTERBURY.  313 

true  that  the  law  itself  should  be  clear  and  unam- 
biguous, so  that  whosoever  runs  may  read.  The  ques- 
tion really  narrows  itself  to  this  :  should  you  attend 
first  to  your  tribunal  or  your  laws  ?  have  a  judge  to 
administer  the  law,  or  is  the  law  for  a  judge  to  ad- 
minister ?  will  you  put  the  cart  before  the  horse,  or 
the  horse  before  the  cart  ?  If  it  be  settled  that  we 
must  first  ascertain  and  define  the  law,  it  will  then  be 
agreed  that  the  law  should  be  settled  by  Church  and 
State,  by  Convocation  and  by  Parliament.  This 
brings  before  us  that  much-contested  subject  of  Con- 
vocation. It  cannot  be  said  that  Convocation  repre- 
sents the  Church  in  the  same  way  that  Parliament 
represents  the  country.  Convocation  does  not  repre- 
sent the  parochial  clergy,  who  are  swallowed  up  in 
the  vast  preponderance  of  the  cathedral  clergy.  The 
curates,  who  form  the  great  mass  of  the  working 
clergy,  are  not  represented  at  all.  Once  an  eccentric 
Archdeacon  opposed  their  admission,  but,  consistent 
in  his  uniform  inconsistency,  he  voted  against  his  own 
motion.  Convocation,  until  there  is  some  sweep- 
ing measure  of  reform,  cannot  be  held  to  repre- 
sent the  voice  of  the  Anglican  Church.  The  reform 
of  Convocation  is  practically  the  key  to  the  whole 
position.  When  Convocation  fully  and  adequately 
represents  the  Church,  then  it  will  frame  the  legisla- 
tion which  will  meet  the  Church's  needs,  and  which  will 
obtain  Parliamentary  sanction.  If  the  Archbishop 
had  worked  upon  the  line  indicated,  he  might  have 
met  the  just  views  of  all  parties,  and  have  framed  the 
legislation  that  would  have  settled  the  peace  of  the 
Church  for  centuries.  A  decided  movement  is  made 
in  this  direction   by    the   letters    of  business    which 


314  OUR    BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

authorize  a  Kevision  of  Rubrics  by  Convocation.  But 
Convocation  itself  stops  the  way.  Until  Convocation 
is  reformed,  its  legislation  must  prove  unsatisfactory. 

It  must  be  a  matter  of  great  congratulation  that  a 
sufficiently  distant  date  has  been  fixed  for  the  opera- 
tion of  the  Bill,  to  afford  the  hope  of  some  settlement 
of  rubrical  law,  and  that  the  main  criticism  to  which 
it  was  exposed  is  to  a  considerable  extent  obviated. 
When  it  is  generally  understood  we  hope  it  will  be 
generally  obeyed,  and  that  the  law-abiding  instincts 
of  the  clergy  will  do  away  with  the  scandal  that  has 
generally  attached  to  their  colourable  disobedience. 
The  Bill,  such  as  it  is,  will  set  the  Archbishop's  mark 
upon  his  time,  and  show  that,  while  mild  and  moderate, 
he  is  not  to  be  reckoned  among  the  prelates  who 
are  merely  mild  and  moderate,  and  have  made  the 
seat  of  St.  Augustine  a  golden  sinecure,  or  a  least,  a 
place  of  dignified  repose  for  the  first  subject  in  the 
kingdom.  Sagacious,  polished,  experienced,  with  a 
love  of  work,  and  an  enjoyment  of  leisure,  he  is  one 
of  the  most  successful  and  famous  of  the  northern 
legion  who  have  wandered  to  the  south  of  the  Tweed, 
and  carried  away  fame  and  fortune  among  the 
Southerners. 


315 


CHAPTER  VI. 

ARCHBISHOP     THOMSON. 

ASSUEEDLY  there  is  no  "  upper  chamber"  con- 
secrated to  the  services  of  religion  more  beautiful 
and  beloved  than  the  little  chapel  of  the  learned  and 
honourable  society  of  Lincoln's  Inn.  In  bygone  years 
it  was  the  duty  and  delight  of  this  present  writer,  in 
flying  visits  to  town,  to  attend  these  services.  We 
enter  on  Sunday  mornings  through  a  postern  gate 
from  the  largest  and  most  renowned  of  London 
squares,  into  the  green  lawn,  islanded  amid  "  the 
dusky  purlieus  of  the  law."  Then  you  ascend  a  stone 
staircase,  as  if  about  to  consult  some  learned  counsel, 
and  find  yourself  at  the  entrance  of  the  V'ttbpojov  the  little 
chapel,  as  indeed  you  might  gather  by  the  burial 
tablets  of  distinguished  lawyers.  The  atmosphere  is 
dim,  and  your  first  impressions  are  indistinct.  Every 
one  of  the  windows  is  of  painted  glass ;  the  religious 
gloom  is  perfect,  and  magnificent  radiations  of  colour 
play  over  the  chancel  and  above  the  bowed  heads  of 
the  worshippers.  Behind  you  is  a  noble  organ,  worthy 
of  the  magnificent  voices  which  you   will   recognize 


316  OUE    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

among  the  white-robed  clioir.  Those  ancient  carved 
oaken  pews,  that  fine  old  pulpit,  that  falling  echo, 
harmonize  well.  It  is  as  a  little  college  chapel,  as  a 
section  of  University  life,  settled  down  "  hard  by  roar- 
ing Temple  Bar."  The  lawyer  from  the  Universities 
easily  realizes  the  fine  lines  of  our  poet — 

"  And  heard  once  more  in  college  fanes 

The  storm  their  high-built  organs  make, 
And  thunder-music  rolling  shake 
The  prophets  blazoned  on  the  panes." 

And  when  Mr.  Preacher  ascends  the  pulpit — he  is  Mr. 
Preacher  here,  just  as  the  head  of  the  bar  is  Mr. 
Attorney,  and  the  head  of  the  chapter  is  Mr.  Dean 
— the  old  University  impression  continues  strong. 
We  listen  to  the  noble  "  bidding  prayer,"  only  we 
miss  the  customary  formula  :  "  And,  as  in  private 
duty  bound,  I  desire  your  prayers  for  the  ancient  and 
religious  foundation  of  Queen's  College,"  with  the 
enumeration  of  pious  founders  and  benefactors.  It 
is  just  possible,  too,  that  the  very  sermon  you  are 
listening  to,  you  have  heard  already  in  the  University 
pulpit  of  St.  Mary's.  And  if  this  is  the  case,  you  are 
really  very  glad  ;  it  is  the  very  thing  you  could  have 
wished;  your  chained  attention  had  hardly  been  able 
to  take  in  fully  the  whole  of  what  you  had  heard 
before,  and  you  would  willingly  gather  up  completely 
all  the  points  of  that  remarkable  discourse.  It  has 
been  a  full  cathedral  service,  the  anthem  most  nobly 
given,  only  the  prayers  have  been  read  and  not  in- 
toned, and  you  perceive  that  our  cathedral  service 
bears  this  alteration  very  well.  But  then  the  reading, 
in  the  days  of  which  I  speak,  was  the  magnificent 
reading  of  Mr.   Maurice,    so   singularly   earnest    and 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  317 

impressive,  and  Lincoln's  Inn  Chapel  was  renowned 
indeed  at  the  date  of  which  I  speak,  when  Dr.  Thomson 
was  its  preacher,  and  Mr.  Maurice  its  chaplain. 
Dr.  Thomson  preaclied  in  the  morning  during  term 
time,  and  Mr.  Maurice  in  the  afternoon ;  and  the 
full  congregation  included  some  of  the  most  dis- 
tinguished, and  thoughtful,  and  learned  men  in 
London. 

Mr.  Preacher  lias  left  his  pew  opposite  the  reading- 
desk,  and  has  ascended  the  pulpit.  In  those  days  he 
was  a  man  still  young,  dark,  and  rather  heavy  looking, 
until  his  face  became  lit  up  with  characteristic  ex- 
pression. His  pulpit  characteristics  have  never 
wavered.  Quiet,  with  very  little  action,  with  not 
much  force  of  delivery,  but  grave,  earnest,  devotional ; 
such  is  the  general  and  never-failing  impression  he 
conveys.  There  is  no  doubt  in  the  world  about  his 
meaning.  Each  clear  sentence  gives  a  clear  sense ; 
and  the  sermon  is  deeply  and  definitively  impressive. 
It  is  always  a  practical  sermon,  and  always  one  nicely 
adapted  to  his  auditory.  Here  is  an  educated  man 
addressing^  educated  men.  He  takes  a  o^ood  deal  for 
granted.  He  need  not  hesitate  about  alluding  to  a 
Greek  author,  or  combating  some  new  dogma  in 
philosophy.  He  assumes  a  certain  mental  equality 
between  himself  and  his  hearers.  But  whatever  may 
be  the  general  mental  direction  of  the  sermon,  and 
some  have  a  relation  to  historical  and  some  to  mental 
science,  it  is  evermore  a  practical  sermon.  Here  is  a 
dying  man  speaking  to  dying  men.  Here  is  a  com- 
pany gathered  together,  and  whatever  may  be  the 
social  and  intellectual  grade  of  each,  they  all  are  alike 
in  sinfulness,  in  liabihty   to  temptation,  in  responsi- 


318  OUE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

bility,  in  eternal  hopes  and  fears.  And  all  that  may 
concern  Christian  faith  and  practice,  either  the  nicest 
intellectual  difficulty  that  may  beset  Christian  faith, 
or  the  most  flagrant  sin  that  might  violate  Christian 
practice,  come  within  the  domain  of  preaching,  and 
of  this  preacher,  and  are  touched  upon  in  the  clear 
final  language  of  authority  and  plain  speaking.  And 
so  whatever  may  be  the  secondary  and  subordinate 
impressions  left  by  the  sermon,  the  leading  idea  is 
essentially  practical  and  direct.  The  auditor  is  struck 
by  the  rare  command  of  epithet  and  phrase ;  by  the 
marshalled  array  of  arguments  and  facts  ;  by  the 
logical  exposure  of  fallacy  and  sophism  ;  and  often  the 
music  of  some  beautiful  and  perfectly  constructed 
sentence  lingers  in  the  memory,  but  first  and  chief, 
above  and  beyond  all,  is  the  manifest  attempt  to  lead 
men  in  the  paths  of  prayer  and  faith  and  holiness. 
Dr.  Thomson  is  a  master  of  keen,  robust  reasoning ; 
he  belongs  to  that  school  of  which  Bishop  Butler  is 
the  most  conspicuous  example,  and  the  late  Arch- 
bishop Whateley  the  most  memorable  recent  instance ; 
and  like  them,  his  power  lies  in  his  logic,  and  does 
not,  as  with  Mr.  Maurice,  extend  into  the  domain  of 
metaphysics.  United  with  these  solid  and  substantial 
excellences  is  the  great  and  rare  literary  excellence 
that  Dr.  Thomson  has  in  reality  achieved,  and  created 
for  himself  his  own  peculiar  and  independent  style. 
Archbishop  Thomson  has  himself,  in  one  of  his 
speeches,  drawn  attention  to  the  importance  of  style, 
and  to  the  fact  that  all  great  authors  have  their  dis- 
tinctive style.  His  own  writings  are  an  excellent 
commentary  on  his  own  words.  I  think  it  is  Bufi*on 
who  says  that  the   style  is  the   soul  of  a  book ;  it  is 


AKCHBISHOP    THOxAISON.  319 

certainly  not  only  the  dress  of  thouglit,  but  the  body 
of  thought.  A  perfect  style  is  like  the  atmosphere  of 
some  southern  heaven  which  makes  all  things  visible, 
and  is  invisible  itself.  Now  Dr.  Thomson's  style  very 
nearly  conceals  his  style,  although  there  are  abundant 
indications  that  the  accomplished  writer  on  Logic  has 
a  strong  natural  affinity  for  Rhetoric.  He  has  a 
horror  of  exaggeration  in  language  and  style;  his 
business  is  with  his  work,  and  with  the  language  which 
instrumentally  will  best  do  his  work.  It  is  in  this 
respect  that  Dr.  Thomson  differs  from  such  an  elo- 
quent and  admirable  pulpit  orator  as  the  late  Mr.  Melvill. 
He  has  an  earnestness  that  amounts  to  eloquence, 
but  not  that  kind  of  spoken  eloquence  which  causes 
oratorical  fame,  and  never  even  approximates  to  those 
examples  of  eloquence,  worthy  of  Bossuet  and  Bour- 
daloue,  which  we  so  often  find  in  Mr.  Melvill's 
earlier  sermons.  But  Mr.  Melvill's  style  is  not 
free  from  the  imputation  of  rhetorical  artifice;  he 
trained  his  hearers  to  look  anxiously  to  each  customary 
climax,  and  his  fixed  principle  of  making  the  text  his 
climax  sometimes  causes  him  to  give  the  text  an 
untenable  meaning  or  application.  Those  who  have 
studied  these  most  splendid  specimens  of  the  modern 
eloquence  of  the  English  pulpit  will,  we  believe,  bo 
induced  to  concur  in  this  stricture.  The  Archbishop 
is  beyond  a  suspicion  of  anything  of  the  kind.  Never- 
theless, this  very  defect  probably  helped  Mr.  Melvill 
in  arriving  at  his  remarkable  and  almost  unparalleled 
popularity.  Presbyterian  ministers  have  tried  to 
obtain  a  "  call"  by  preaching  without  acknowledgment 
these  wonderful  sermons  ;  and  we  have  been  informed 
that  even  members  of  Parliament  have  industriously 


320  ..         OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

trained  themselves  upon  liis  model.  To  hear  Mr. 
Melvill  was  almost  to  produce  a  Melvill  fever,  and  an 
impatience  of  hearing  any  one  else.  "  I  would  not 
wisli  one  preacher  to  disgust  us  with  all  others,"  says 
Fenelon;  "on  the  contrary,  I  seek  for  a  man  who 
shall  inspire  me  with  such  a  love  and  respect  for  the 
Word  of  God  that  I  should  be  but  the  more  disposed 
to  hear  it  everywhere."  We  believe  that  Mr.  Melvill's 
sermons  have  in  their  time  accomplished  an  infinity  of 
good ;  but  Dr.  Thomson,  with  some  likeness  to  him, 
has  avoided  that  fault  of  mannerism,  for  such  it 
ultimately  becomes,  which  is  not  an  excellence,  but 
a  blot  upon  excellence.  Dr.  Thomson  in  his  style, 
habitually  toned  down  and  grave,  to  which  his  manner 
harmoniously  corresponds,  affords  only  a  faint  parallel 
to  Mr.  Melvill's  magnificent  declamation.  The  re- 
semblance lies  in  this.  In  each  we  have  an  example 
of  what  I  believe  the  critics  consider  the  most  finished 
style  of  oratory,  where  there  is  a  union  of  the  closest 
and  really  scientific  reasoning  with  a  certain  measure 
of  imagination  and  poetry.  This  has  been  the 
characteristic  of  the  greatest  masters  of  written  or 
spoken  eloquence,  such  as  Bacon  and  Burke.  Thus 
flowerets  grow  upon  the  brink  of  Alpine  precipices, 
and  rose-flushed  lights  bathe  the  cold  crowns  of  Alpine 
snows. 

These  "  Lincoln's  Inn  Sermons"  of  Dr.  Thomson 
have  been  gathered  up  into  a  volume.  A  second 
volume  of  sermons,  which  includes  some  published  in 
the  first  volume,  has  lately  been  added.  We  imagine 
that  many  of  our  readers  have  placed  it  on  those 
favourite  shelves  on  which  are  laid  the  bright  and 
favourite  volumes   of  our  best  modern  writers.     We 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  321 

recognise  one  or  two  tliat  we  have  heard,  and  miss 
one  or  two  that  we  would  wilUngly  have  seen  printed. 
They  gain  upon  a  perusal,   and  even  more  upon  a  re- 
peated perusal.     We  had  intended  to  have  quoted  our 
favourite  passages,  but  we    have  pencilled  so  many 
favourite  passages,  and  turned  down  so  many  pages, 
that  all  limits  of  fair  quotation  would  be  transcended. 
We  have  lately  been  reading  Biingener's  well-known 
work  "  The  Preacher  and  the  King,"    an  admirable 
work,   evidencing  the  same  knowledge  of  his  period 
as   that  possessed  by   Victor   Cousin  or  St.    Beuve. 
It  is  the  work  of  a  man  who  has  failed  to   attain  to 
any  particular  success  as  a   preacher  in  the  Reformed 
Church  of  France,  but  who  has  the  soundest  and  most 
enlightened    conception    of    his    subject,    which    is, 
virtually,  sacred  eloquence.     He  takes  the  phrase  of 
Cicero  as  the  true  theory  of  the  sermon,  "  Effloruisse 
jpenitus  videatur ;  let  it  spring  from  the  text  as  the 
stem  of  a  flower  springs  from  the  centre  and  depth  of 
the  plant."     Again,   "  St.  Bernard  compared  God  in 
relation  with  man,   to  a  writer  or  painter  who  guides 
the  hand  of  a  little   child,   and  only  asks  one  thing  of 
it — that  it  will  not  move  its  hand,  but  will  allow  it  to 
be  guided.      Here  is   the   image    of  the   evangelical 
preacher."     Archbishop  Thomson  fully  complies  with 
these  requisites,  and  shows  that  the  exhibition  of  the 
simplest  evangelical  truth  is  not  inconsistent  with  the 
highest  mental  power  and  the  best  mental  culture. 

We  are  not  writing  a  "  Retrospective  Review,"  and 
therefore  can  hardly  venture  to  comment  on  this 
volume  with  the  fulness  that  would  be  desirable  on 
some  grounds.  Here  are  a  pair  of  sentences  which 
remind  us  of  the  audience  to  whom  they  were  ad- 
VOL.  I.  T 


322  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

dressed : — "  That  in  the  nineteenth  century,  in  the 
midst  of  the  monotony  of  our  civilisation,  here  in 
London,  here  in  this  Httle  chapel,  the  presence  of  the 
same  divine  spirit  in  those  who  love  God  is  as  sure  as 
the  presence  o£  the  air  they  breathe,  as  the  light 
wherewith  they  see  one  another ;  this  is  a  proposition 
which  has  something  startling  even  for  us  who  profess 
to  admit  it."  "With  manv  of  us  the  calls  of  a  hard 
profession  may  consume  our  days  and  nights,  and  the 
time  we  give  to  it  and  that  which  we  give  to  our 
spiritual  concerns,  may  bear  no  proportion  to  each 
other.  And  yet  we  know  that  the  passions  of  suitors 
are  matters  of  a  moment,  and  the  words  in  which  we 
try  to  do  them  justice,  eloquent  and  ingenious  words, 
fall  dead  without  an  echo,  whilst  the  soul  is  an  heir  to 
eternity.     But  so  has  our  Maker  allotted  us  our  share 

of  duty Compare  the  great  realities  that  we 

have  been  looking  at  to-day  with  the  all-engrossing 
business  that  draws  our  attention  off  them.  The 
subtlest  tongue  will  be  silent  before  long ;  the  most 
eager  strife  will  cease ;  the  wisest  decision  will  be 
quoted  no  longer  at  most  than  the  kind  of  right 
it  relates  to  shall  subsist.  But  we  must  all  appear 
before  the  judgment  seat  of  Christ ;  and  at  that  bar 
the  issue  that  is  decided  is  for  eternity.  May  He  that 
judges  us,  plead  our  cause  also."  In  these  sermons 
there  is  a  vein  of  literary  allusion,  slight  but  of  ex- 
quisite kind,  which  for  many  must  possess  a  great 
charm  and  great  impressiveness.  "  There  was  a  city 
visited  by  the  plague  long  since;  and  whilst  death 
was  busily  visiting  every  household,  a  few  frivolous 
men  and  women  sought  out  a  pleasant  retirement,  and 
there  they  spent  their  days  in  weaving  love-tales  and 


ARCnBISnOP   THOMSON.  323 

playiog  with  compliments,  and  while  the  plague  was 
cutting  off  hundreds  at  their  gate.  Just  so  do  we 
act  under  our  greater  plague.  Oh,  my  friends,  it  is 
not  bj  hiding  our  heads,  hke  a  silly  bird  pursued  by 
hunters,  that  we  can  escape  the  keen  eye  of  our  pur- 
suer." The  Archbishop  has  read  the  "  Decameron" 
to  better  purpose  than  most  men.  Dr.  Thomson  does 
not  scruple  to  make  use  of  the  theologians  of  other 
countries,  such  as  Julius  Miiller  and  Athanase 
Coquerel.  We  have  occasional  reference  to  current 
systems  of  philosophy,  and  to  the  more  thought- 
ful passages  of  our  great  modern  poet.  Here  is 
the  briefest  and  most  complete  refutation  of  Mr. 
Buckle's  "  Law  of  Averaws"  with  which  we  are 
acquainted.  "  This  average,  which  is  supposed  to 
rule  the  will  like  a  rod  of  iron,  is  itself  the  most 
variable.  It  yields  under  the  hand  like  tempered  clay. 
It  is  not  the  same  in  London  and  in  Paris  ;  it  varies 
even  in  the  adjoining  counties ;  it  alters  with  time 
and  circumstance.  We  ourselves  may  alter  it.  We 
are  doing  so  in  teaching  our  poor,  in  finding  them 
employment,  in  protecting  female  chastity,  in  check- 
ing male  intemperance.  I  do  not  see  how  that  which 
our  will  is  now  acting  upon,  which  varies  in  different 
countries  because  the  will  of  man  has  made  different 
laws  there,  can  be  conclusive  against  the  doctrine  of 
free  will.  The  average  of  human  conduct  is  only  the 
expression  of  the  results  of  many  human  wills;  we 
have  made  the  giant  which,  according  to  this  in- 
genious writer,  is  to  fall  and  crush  us.  The  study  of 
the  law  of  averages,  so  far  from  paralysing  philanthropic 
exertions,  will  only  assure  us  of  the  wide  scope 
allowed  us  for  success,  and  if  it  shows  us  a  reofularitv 

Y   2 


324  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

and  certainty  in  the  recurrence  of  evil,  it  will  en- 
courage us  to  think  that  the  same  regularity  will  ap- 
pear in  the  good  results  that  may  follow  from  honest 
endeavours  after  good." 

One  remarkable  sermon  was  preached  before  the 
Queen  at  Buckingham  Palace,  in  1858,  entitled  "The 
Night  Cometh."  If,  as  is  sometimes  said,  there  has 
been  strong  Palace  influence  in  favour  of  Dr.  Thomson, 
such  a  sermon  enables  us  to  perceive  how  worthily  it 
has  been  obtained.  It  is  a  kind  of  sermon  which,  we 
may  believe,  is  peculiarly  attractive  to  the  Royal 
mind.  It  very  much  resembles  the  famous  sermon 
"  Religion  in  Common  Life,"  which  Professor  Caird 
preached  before  Her  Majesty  at  Balmoral.  A  sermon 
containing  very  much  that  Professor  Caird  said,  is  to 
be  found  among  the  sermons  of  Dr.  Arnold,  and  this 
one  of  Dr.  Thomson's  may  compare  favourably  with 
Dr.  Caird's.  But  Dr.  Caird  gave  his  royal  listeners 
one  of  his  old  sermons ;  we  have  heard  him  preach  it 
a  long  time  before,  and  were  of  the  opinion  that  in 
several  particulars  it  was  inferior  to  others  of  his 
sermons.  Christian  activity  is  the  subject  both  of 
the  English  and  Scotch  divine.  "  jSFo  one,"  says 
Dr.  Thomson,  addressing  his  Palace  audience,  "  but 
will  pardon  a  few  plain  words  on  a  subject  which,  if 
it  has  been  handled  by  ten  thousand  preachers,  can 
never,  so  long  as  the  safety  of  souls  is  knit  up  with 
it,  be  thought  obsolete."  Let  us  quote  a  few  sen- 
tences, as  examples  of  truthful  speaking,  some  of 
which  have  now  a  significancy  of  which  the  preacher 
could  have  hardly  thought.  "  That  friend  or  neigh- 
bour with  whom  we  take  sweet  counsel,  let  us  learn 
from  him  all  we  can,  let  us  pour  out  for  him  all  the 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  325 

truth  we  know,  and  let  heart  strengthen  heart,  as 
iron  sharpeneth  iron ;  for  we  may  see  him  again  no 
more  for  ever,  and  in  his  stead  nothing  but  recollec- 
tions shall  remain  overshadowed  with  the  night  of  a 
grievous  loss.  Teach  the  child  while  he  is  spared  you, 
for  the  angel  may  gather  that  flower  into  one  of  his 
sheaves  to  plant  him  again  in  the  radiance  of  the 
Divine  Throne,  leaving  you  to  the  trial  of  a  numbed 
and  benighted  affection.  .  .  .  God  has  placed  us 
upon  this  narrow  island  of  time  with  the  waters  of 
eternity  all  around  us;  and  every  inch  of  ground  is 
more  precious  to  us  than  gold  or  rubies ;  for,  as  our 
dealings  with  time  are,  so  our  choice  of  immortality 
will  be.  And  we  can  make  no  terms  with  Him  to 
grant  us  a  longer  season  to  finish  the  work  He  has 
sent  us  to  do.  The  night  cometh,  and  it  shall  over- 
take the  thinker  before  he  has  matured  his  discovery, 
a7id  the  ruler  in  the  midst  of  plans  of  order  and  im- 
provement.^* 

Two  years  after  the  delivery  of  this  sermon,  Dr. 
Thomson  was  made  Chaplain  in  Ordinary  to  the 
Queen.  From  1855  to  1862  were  "the  seven  good 
years"  during  which  he  attained  to  more  numerous 
and  rapid  promotions  than  we  remember  in  any 
similar  instance.  The  commencement  of  those  seven 
years  saw  him  the  fellow  of  a  college,  the  repute  of 
which  was  at  low  ebb,  and  lately  a  diligent  provincial 
curate ;  the  end  of  the  seven  years  found  him  Primate 
of  England.  One  Holy  Week  he  paid  a  visit  to  his 
birth-place,  Whitehaven,  on  the  Cumberland  coast. 
The  town  did  honour  to  the  prelate  who  had  done  so 
much  honour  to  the  town.  A  congratulatory  address 
was  presented.     The  Volunteers   formed  a  guard  of 


326  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

honour.  The  Archbishop  acknowledged  all  this  in 
his  usual  kindly  and  honest  language.  He  might 
indeed  have  indulged  a  very  allowable  feeling  of  gra- 
tification. It  rarely  indeed  happens  that  a  man  in 
the  prime  of  his  years  and  strength  returns  to  the 
obscure  locality  of  his  birth,  father  and  friends  yet 
living,  having  attained  to  one  of  the  highest  distinc- 
tions to  which  it  is  in  the  power  of  a  subject  to 
aspire. 

He  was  born  at  Whitehaven  in  1819,  where  his 
father  was  engaged  in  the  local  commerce  of  the 
place,  and  was  one  of  the  directors  of  the  local  bank. 
He  received  his  education  at  the  renowed  school  of 
Shrewsbury,  but  his  name  is  not  found  in  the  Sabrinse 
Corolla.  "  I  do  not  consider  him  to  have  been  a 
clever  fellow  at  school,  when  I  was  there,"  has  re- 
marked a  clerical  friend.  But  our  friend — who  belongs 
to  a  rustic  parish  and  whose  mind  has  partially  run 
into  turnips — may  not  be  the  best  judge  of  such  a 
point,  and  perhaps  forgot  that  many  of  the  best 
minds  flower  late.  As  a  North  countryman,  Queen's 
College  offered  the  best  prospects  to  a  scholar  who 
came  from  Whitehaven.  A  worthy  ecclesiastic,  Con- 
fessor to  Queen  Philippa,  pitying  the  unhappiness 
and  disorganization  into  which  the  long  warfare 
between  English  and  Scotch  had  thrown  the  border 
counties,  founded  this  college  to  make  atonement,  in 
the  best  way  which  suggested  itself  to  his  mind,  for 
the  injury  which  the  youth  of  Cumberland  and  West- 
moreland had  sustained.  Secure  in  the  rigid  legal 
constrQCtion  of  a  certain  cceteris  imrihus  clause  in  the 
Founder's  Statutes,  the  Cumberland  and  Westmore- 
land men  snugly  succeeded  to  close  fellowships.     In 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  327 

the  present  instance  the  old  close  system  worked  well. 
For  the  modest  degree  of  third  class  attained  in  this 
case  would  hardly,  in  the  present  position  of  things, 
have  secured  him  who  gained  it  that  University  status 
which  is  the  starting  point  for  distinction.  But  in 
those  days  the  fellows  of  Queen's  rarely  took  more 
than  thirds,  and  it  was  rather  creditable  if  even  so 
much  was  secured.  But  from  such  a  one  as  "  Thom- 
son of  Queen's"  something  better  might  be  ex- 
pected. 

It  is  certainly  remarkable  that  Dr.  Thomson's  class 
was  no  better  than  a  third.  Nevertheless,  a  list 
might  be  drawn  up  of  really  learned  and  brilliant 
men,  to  whom  the  good  sense  of  their  friends  has 
instinctively  assigned  a  first  class,  and  yet  who  have 
not  obtained  it.  We  believe  that  in  nothins:  did  the 
future  prelate  fail  more  signally  than  in  his  Logic 
papers.  Now  here  is  the  noticeable  point.  It  is  by 
no  means  remarkable  or  uncommon  that  a  young 
man  of  great  talents  and  attainments  should  fail  to 
satisfy  the  University  Examiners  in  his  Logic  paper. 
He  might  be  a  very  clever  man,  and  moreover  an 
exceedingly  good  reasoner,  for  all  that.  But  it  is  very 
remarkable  that  the  young  bachelor  of  arts,  instead 
of  making  a  holocaust  of  Logic  books  and  papers  upon 
taking  his  degree,  as  is  very  commonly  the  case,  should 
set  to  work  and  produce  a  book  upon  logic,  which  is  one 
of  the  best  books  on  the  subject  extant.  This  is  the 
Archbishop's  "  Outlines  of  the  Laws  of  Thought," 
of  which  the  publishers  have  issued  repeated 
editions.  It  is  a  book  which,  for  the  purposes 
of  the  schools,  Oxford  men  hold  in  high  value.  I 
remember  finding  myself   in  a  room    full  of  under- 


328  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

graduates,  some  of  whom  were  about  to  go  tlirougli 
their  Moderations,  which  various  others  had  passed. 
Various  experiences,  cheerful  or  dismal,  were  related. 
"  Look  you  here,  you  fellows,"  said  one  philosophi- 
cal undergraduate,  "  I  will  tell  you  how  to  get  a 
second  in  Mods.  You  can  learn  enough  logic  in  a 
fortnight  to  be  up  to  the  logic  work  of  a  second  in 
Mods.  I  began  my  logic  just  a  fortnight  before  I 
went  in,  and  took  my  second.  I  got  up  my  Whateley 
all  right ;  and  then  I  worked  away  through  Thomson's 
Logic,  nothing  like  it,  and  got  my  second."  All 
listened  with  admiration,  and  rushed  away  to  get  the 
celebrated   "  Laws  of  Thought." 

He  took  a  curacy  at  Guildford,  and  for  four  years 
was  busily  engaged  in  the  practical  work  of  the 
Church.  Then  his  college  recalled  him  to  Oxford. 
There  was,  we  are  told,  an  absolute  dearth  of  men 
who  by  their  learning  and  character  were  suitable  for 
the  office  of  college  tutor.  Queen's  was  at  a  very  low 
ebb  in  those  days,  a  position  which  its  new  tutor  did 
much  to  retrieve.  His  appointment  as  Bampton  Lec- 
turer made  his  name  better  known,  and  gave  him  a 
position  of  greater  influence.  He  continued  at  Oxford 
until  he  married  the  daughter  of  our  consul  at  Aleppo, 
with  whose  family  the  Earl  of  Carlisle  has  made  the 
public  acquainted  by  his  "  Diary  in  Turkish  and  Greek 
Waters."  Then  came  his  appointment  to  the  living 
of  All  Souls,  Langham  Place,  through  Lord  Carlisle, 
we  believe.  His  fellowship  was  of  course  vacated  by 
his  marriage  and  his  preferment.  His  connection, 
however,  was  not  to  be  severed  with  Queen's  College, 
but  to  be  drawn  closer  in  his  year  of  grace,  the  extra 
year  which  the  benevolent  custom  of  many  colleges 


AECnBISHOP   THOMSON.  329 

accords  to  fellows  become  Benedicts.  He  was  a 
metropolitan  rector  for  only  a  few  months.  His 
preaching  was  considered  of  a  much  more  genial 
character  than  that  of  his  predecessor,  and  was 
greatly  liked.  We  are  told  that  he  became  very 
popular  among  the  many  lawyers  that  attended  the 
church  at  Langham  Place,  and  these  ultimately  se- 
cured his  election  to  the  Lincoln's  Inn  preachership. 
He  had  only  held  the  living  for  a  part  of  his  year  of 
grace  when  the  Provost  of  Queen's  College  died,  and 
to  the  vacant  headship  he  was  elected.  By  and 
by  the  office  as  preacher  at  Lincoln's  Inn  be- 
came vacant.  This  has  always  been  a  coveted 
appointment.  The  preachership  of  Lincoln's  Inn 
has  often  been  the  high  road  to  a  bishopric.  It 
may  be  remembered  that  Reginald  Heber  was 
preacher  of  Lincoln's  Inn  when  the  See  of  Calcutta 
was  ofiered  to  him,  and  his  friend,  Mr.  Wynn,  who 
offered  him  the  appointment  thought  that  he  had 
better  prospects  in  England — that  an  English  mitre 
was  within  his  reach.  One  or  two  interesting  notices 
respecting  the  preachership  of  Lincoln's  Inn  occur 
in  Heber's  "  Correspondence."  "  I  hope  in  my 
anxiety  to  obtain  the  preachership  of  Lincoln's  Inn, 
the  idea  that  I  may  be  useful  in  such  a  pulpit,  and 
with  the  sort  of  audience  which  I  may  expect  to  see 
round  me  there,  has  been  no  inconsiderable  part.  I 
feel  by  no  means  sanguine  of  success,  as  Maltby  is, 
in  all  respects,  a  formidable  opponent.  ...  I  do 
not  exactly  know  whether  Maltby's  Whiggery  is  for 
or  against  him.  It  may,  and  doubtless  will,  deprive 
him   of  several  votes ;    but   on   the  other  hand,  the 


330  OUR    BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

Whigs  are  numerous  and  mighty  in  the  list  of 
benchers  now  lying  before  me ;  and  a  man  of  their 
own  party  has  claims  upon  them,  which  I,  who  have 
no  party  character  at  all,  can  only  oppose  by  private 
friendship  and  interest.  I  trust  the  decision  will  be 
made  durinof  this  term,  as  even  defeat  is  more  endura- 
ble  than  suspense."  Heber  gains  the  preachership, 
and  afterwards  gives  his  friends  some  description  of 
it.  "  The  chambers  appropriated  to  the  preacher 
here  do  not,  indeed,  lay  claim  to  the  character  of  a 
house ;  they  are,  however,  more  convenient  than  I 
expected  to  find  them,  and,  though  small,  will  hold 
my  wife  as  well  as  myself  very  comfortably  during  the 
Summer  terms.  The  two  others  I  shall  come  up  as  a 
bachelor.  The  situation  in  all  other  respects,  of 
society,  etc.,  is  a  most  agreeable  one.  ...  I  am 
now  at  work  on  my  sermons  for  next  term.  I  fore- 
see already  that,  if  I  mean  to  do  any  good,  or  to 
keep  whatever  credit  I  have  got  at  Lincoln's  Inn,  I 
must  take  a  great  deal  of  pains,  and  bear  in  mind 
that  I  have  a  very  fastidious  audience."  We  imagine 
that  such  extracts  embody  pretty  accurately  the 
experience  of  any  Lincoln's  Inn  preacher.  The 
preacher  at  Lincoln's  Inn  ranks  socially  as  one  of  the 
benchers. 

It  was  at  first  said  that  Dr.  Thomson  would  hold 
both  his  London  living  and  his  Oxford  headship.  This 
he  promptly  disavowed,  and  remained  at  Oxford  until 
Lincoln's  Inn  again  gave  him  a  metropolitan  pulpit. 
With  the  undergraduates  of  his  college,  and  some 
others,  he  was  hardly  popular ;  nor  is  this  to  be  won- 
dered at.  There  was  disagreeable  work  to  be  done, 
and  it  was  done  without  slirinking.     New  reforms  had 


AECnUISIIOP   THOMSON.  331 

to  be  carried  out,  aod  discipline,  wbicli  had  grown 
somewhat  lax,  to  be  effectually  restored.  The  Uni- 
versity made  him  select  preacher.  There  is  no  better 
criterion  of  the  estimation  in  wliich  a  man  is  held  than 
the  audience  which  gathers  to  hear  him  in  the  church 
of  St.  Mary's.  With  "  the  awful  auditory  of  the  Uni- 
versity," as  good  Bishop  Hall  calls  it  in  his  autobio- 
graphic sketch,  the  Provost  of  Queen's  College  always 
stood  well.  The  gallery  devoted  to  the  undergraduates 
was  generally  crowded.  Once  or  twice  indeed  he 
might  preach  to  empty  pews,  but  this  would  only  be 
the  result  of  accident.  Such  an  accident  might  arise 
thus.  Some  one  else  miMit  have  been  announced  to 
preach,  and  at  the  last  hour  something  might  lead  to 
this  arrangement  being  altered,  and  the  select  preacher 
would  take  his  place.  Every  clergyman  who  is  M.A. 
knows  that  after  the  lapse  of  a  certain  time  he  may 
be  called  upon  to  preach  before  the  University.  A 
clergyman,  of  not  much  intellect  or  culture,  who  may 
have  been  accustomed  for  years  to  minister  to  the 
bucolic  mind,  may  be  called  upon  in  his  turn  to  preach 
before  the  University.  If  he  is  a  sensible  man,  he  will 
give  some  simple,  earnest,  practical  sermon,  which  is 
never  out  of  place  for  any  description  of  audience. 
But  if  he  has  any  spark  of  clerical  ambition,  that  spark 
is  inflamed.  A  discourse,  magnificent,  or  meant  to  be 
magnificent,  is  produced;  at  the  last  moment  the 
preacher  becomes  very  nervous,  or  makes  himself 
very  ill :  and  in  this  way  it  comes  to  pass  that  a 
punctual  undergraduate,  who  laudably  makes  it  a 
point  of  conscience  to  attend  every  University  sermon, 
may  go  to  St.  Mary's  expecting  to  hear  a  preacher  of 
no  celebrity,  and  instead  of  that  hstens  to  a  preacher 


332  OUK   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

of  the  greatest  celebrity.  I  remember  such  a  one 
telling  his  friends  how  much  they  had  missed.  He 
had  gone  expecting  to  hear  a  stranger,  and  the  Provost 
of  Queen's  had  given  a  sermon  which  had  impressed 
him  very  greatly. 

On  the  translation  of  Dr.  Barinor  to  the  see  of 
Durham  in  1861,  Dr.  Thomson  was  appointed  to  the 
vacant  see  of  Gloucester  and  Bristol.  He  was  only 
ten  months  in  that  diocese,  but  during  that  period  he 
won  golden  opinions.  Extreme  men  might  be  annoyed 
by  the  incident  of  his  ordering  the  removal  of  a  floral 
cross  before  he  would  proceed  with  the  consecration 
of  a  church,  but  notwithstanding  this,  the  new  bishop 
stood  aloof  from  all  party.  None  more  than  the  can- 
didate for  holy  orders  had  reason  to  appreciate  the 
thoughtfulness  and  kindness  of  the  Bishop,  who  exer- 
cised freely  the  truly  episcopal  virtue  of  hospitality, 
and  gave  them  admirable  hints  and  instruction  for 
their  preaching,  which  his  own  experience  would  make 
of  great  value. 

Of  all  the  bishops  on  the  bench.  Dr.  Thomson  best 
merits  the  character  of  a  literary  man.  He  is  not 
indeed  a  great  historian,  like  the  late  Bishop  of  St. 
David's,  or  a  great  philosopher,  like  the  late  Bishop  of 
Hereford.  But  he  has  read,  thought,  and  written 
much  on  mental  science,  and  has  assiduously  devoted 
himself  to  the  cultivation  of  the  literature  of  his  sacred 
profession.  We  have  already  mentioned  the  "  Laws 
of  Thought,"  the  "  Bampton  Lectures,"  and  at  greater 
length  the  "  Lincoln's  Inn  Sermons."  We  would  now 
speak  of  some  other  publications.  In  1855  the  first 
volume  of  the  "  Oxford  Essays,"  shortly  followed  by  a 
companion    volume   of  "  Cambridge    Essays,"    made 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  333 

its  appearance.  In  this  design  Dr.  Thomson,  tlien 
simply  Fellow  of  Queen's,  co-operated.  The  series 
continued  for  four  years,  and  then  ceased  to  appear. 
He  only  contributed  to  the  first  volume,  and  his  con- 
tribution is  by  far  the  shortest  in  the  book.  It  is  a 
paper  on  "  Crime  and  its  Excuses,"  which  may  still  be 
read  with  interest  and  instruction.  He  especially 
deals  with  the  question  of  unsoundness  of  mind  in 
criminal  cases.  He  makes  a  large  use  of  "  the  fasci- 
nating pages"  of  the  "  Journal  of  Psychological 
Medicine."  Here  is  a  striking  sentence  :  "  Before  the 
throne  of  Zeus,  says  Hesiod,  Dike  weeps  whenever  the 
earthly  judge  decides  wrongly.  No  wonder  that  in- 
genious sculptors,  on  county  halls,  represent  her  with 
bound  eyes — she  has  gone  weeping-blind."  His  argu- 
ment goes  to  a  length  which  would  acquit  a  criminal 
where  the  intellect  is  in  no  wise  or  hardly  impaired, 
but  where  the  moral  perceptions  are  wrecked.  There 
■would  certainly  be  great  difficulties  in  the  application 
of  such  a  principle,  inasmuch  as  all  great  crimes,  by 
their  very  nature,  indicate  a  wreck  of  moral  percep- 
tion. There  is  throughout  the  paper  a  vein  of  charac- 
teristic philanthropy. 

Dr.  Thomson  separated  himself  from  these  allies. 
In  time  he  took  up  a  position  of  decided  antagonism 
to  them.  For  the  Oxford  and  Cambridge  Essays 
eventually  resulted  in  the  Essays  and  Reviews.  In- 
numerable were  the  pamphlets  and  articles  which  that 
unhappy  work  elicited.  After  a  brisk  and  incessant 
discharge  of  musketry,  the  heavy  cannonade  began. 
That  is  to  say,  that  various  heavy  controversial  works 
were  published  in  reply.  Amid  that  voluminous  litera- 
ture there  was  one  volume,  and  one  volume  alone,  of 


334  OUE    BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

very  conspicuous  merit,  which  will  probably  attain  a 
standard  place  in  the  library  of  theology.  This  was 
the  "Aids  to  Faith,"  a  series  of  essays  by  several 
writers  under  the  editorship  of  the  then  Bishop  of 
Gloucester  and  Bristol.  The  plan  of  the  work  is  very 
admirable.  We  rarely  find  the  weapons  of  con- 
troversy, and  they  are  very  sparingly  used.  To  this 
rule  the  editor  himself  is  the  chief  exception.  The 
plan  adopted  was  that  each  essay  should  assume  the 
form  of  an  independent  treatise,  and  thus,  by  a  syn- 
thetic, constructive  method,  a  right  view  of  a  subject 
should  be  asserted,  from  whence  the  opposing  errors 
might  be  clearly  discovered  and  definitely  answered. 
The  editor's  own  essay  gives  in  a  simpler,  clearer  form, 
stripped  of  the  critical  apparatus  of  learned  authorities, 
and  perhaps  with  more  definite  expression,  the  sum 
and  substance  of  the  "  Bampton  Lectures." 

In  one  other  literary  and  theological  undertaking, 
the  result  of  multifarious  learning  and  the  product  of 
many  minds.  Dr.  Thomson  has  taken  a  conspicuous 
share.  All  his  articles  possess  an  essential  unity  of 
treatment  and  design,  and  we  should  be  glad  to  see 
them  disengaged  from  the  literary  strata  in  which 
they  are  imbedded,  and  published  in  a  separate  form. 
It  is  to  be  regretted,  in  reference  to  "  Smith's  Dic- 
tionary of  the  Bible,"  that  the  great  learning  and 
piety  by  which  that  magnificent  work  is  characterized 
should  be  indefinitely  marred  by  the  inefficient  editorial 
supervision  which  has  admitted  within  its  pages  some 
papers  of  a  very  contradictory  description  to  those  of 
the  great  bulk  of  the  volume.  We  suspect  that  the 
Archbishop  of  York  has  only  a  scanty  sympathy  with 
some  of  his  coadjutors. 


ARCHBISHOP   THOMSON.  335 

Dr.  Thomson  bas  been  successful,  with  others,  in 
effecting  some  great  benefits  for  the  University  and 
country.  He  has  done  much  for  promoting  that  in- 
telhgent  study  of  the  Word  of  God  which  is  the  best 
foundation  of  knowledge  and  character.  It  had  been 
the  plan  of  the  University  of  Oxford  to  refuse  her 
honours  to  those  who  did  not  possess  the  required 
knowledge  of  the  Bible,  but  not  to  reward  any  pro- 
ficiency that  might  be  displayed  in  the  same  way  that 
she  rewarded  other  kinds  of  excellence.  This  pro- 
cedure was  unquestionably  founded  on  the  unwilling- 
ness of  the  University  to  make  sacred  subjects  a 
matter  of  gain  and  advancement,  but  at  the  same 
time  it  was  manifestly  unjust  that  men  who  had  given 
a  careful  instead  of  a  hurried  attention  to  these  sub- 
jects, should  be  the  losers  by  this  disposition  of  their 
time.  This  has  been  now  amended,  and  the  marks 
now  obtained  in  this  way  count  up  in  the  general 
result  of  the  examination.  It  has  been  the  same 
with  the  middle  class  examinations.  Dr.  Thomson 
strongly  urged,  and  in  a  measure  brought  about  the 
present  state  of  affairs,  by  which  the  Bible  is  made  an 
integral  subject  of  study,  and  obtains  a  substantial 
recognition  in  the  distribution  of  honours  in  the  in- 
stitution of  a  theological  school. 

On  the  death  of  the  venerable  Archbishop  Sumner, 
Dr.  Longley  naturally  "  went  up  a  step,"  and  the 
archiepiscopal  see  of  York  became  vacant.  After  a 
long  delay,  the  appointment  was  conferred,  contrary 
to  all  precedent,  on  the  youngest  bishop  on  the  bench, 
on  one  wlio  had  not  yet  been  a  twelvemonth  bishop. 
It  is  unnecessary  now  to  discuss  any  of  the  contro- 
versies   which  the  appointment    then  evoked.      The 


336  OUE  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

Archbishop  has,  however,  assuredly  vindicated  the 
selection  by  arduous  practical  work.  Like  most 
literary  bishops,  he  has  ceased  to  write.  There  was  a 
Pope  who  flung  away  the  crutch  after  it  had  gained 
him  the  tiara.  As  we  are  only  concerned  with  the 
literary  aspect  of  the  Archbishop's  character,  our  re- 
marks cease  now  that  it  has  become  merged  in  a 
public  career. 

The  Archbishop  has  given  the  public  some  of  his 
episcopal  experiences  : — 

"  There  is  no  doubt,  in  the  regular  education  many 
of  us  have  received,  a  great  advantage;  but  this  I 
know,  and  I  do  not  exaggerate,  and  I  speak  from 
papers  that  have  passed  under  my  own  eye,  and  I  say 
again,  that  the  papers  in  divinity  which  I  have  read 
from  boys  of  sixteen,  seventeen,  and  eighteen,  would 
have  done  credit  to  any  undergraduate  of  the  Uni- 
versity, who  has  spent  his  whole  time  in  the  most 
careful  education ;  and  I  will  go  further  now,  with 
my  present  experience,  and  say  they  would  have  done 
credit  to  any  candidate  for  holy  orders,  and  I  should 
not  have  been  sorry  to  have  kept  by  me  some  of  the 
best  of  those  papers,  and  produced  them  and  said, 
'  Now  you  see  what  a  schoolboy  can  do ;  you  who  are 
going  to  teach  others  must  go  beyond  that.'  " 

We  believe  that  bishops  do  not  unfrequently  feel 
this.  We  were  one  day  talking  to  a  young  lady,  who 
told  us  that  a  distinguished  clergyman,  now  also  one 
of  our  archbishops,  had  been  examining  her  class  at  a 
good  London  boarding-school.  "  In  the  Bible,  of 
course,"  T  said;  "  and  were  you  very  frightened  at  the 
great  man  ?"  "  A  little ;  but  the  great  man  seemed 
rather  frightened    at   us    also;    such    a  lot  of   girls 


AECUBlSnOP   THOMSOx\.  337 

seemed  sometliing  quite  new  to  him."  **  I  hope, 
young  lady,  that  you  and  your  friends  pleased  him." 
*'  Indeed  we  did,"  was  the  answer.  "  He  told  us  that 
he  was  examining  chaplain  to  a  bishop,  and  would  be 
very  glad  indeed  if  you  men  from  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge would  give  as  good  answers  to  his  questions 
in  Bible  history  as  we  school-girls  did." 

He  thus    remarks    in    his    last    charo-e  : — "  Seven 

O 

years  of  labour  are  now  completed ;  who,  in  my  posi- 
tion, would  be  so  hardy  as  to  reckon  on  seven  more  ? 
Through  your  ready  help,  they  have  been  fruitful 
years.  To  God  on  high  be  the  thanks  and  the  praise. 
But  whilst  we  are  allowed,  for  our  encourao-ement, 
to  take  note  of  what  has  been  done,  we  must  not  pause 
too  long  in  the  retrospect,  for  the  time  is  short,  and 
the  ways  before  us  long  and  steep.  I  will  say,  for 
myself,  that  during  the  past  years  I  have  endeavoured, 
as  my  strength  would  permit,  and  sometimes  a  little 
beyond  it,  to  show  myself  serims  servorum  Dei,  the 
servant  of  God's  servants  in  doing  the  work  of  our 
Lord." 

The  Archbishop  is  a  man  who  fairly  puts  his  mind 
to  any  great  question  of  the  day  that  may  emerge,  and 
argues  out  his  case  vigorously  and  acutely.  He  took 
a  considerable  part  in  the  Public  Worship  Regulation 
Bill,  and  all  heard  with  regret  that  he  was  suddenly 
called  away  from  his  Parliamentary  duties  to  the  bed- 
side of  a  dying  brother. 

Once  in  speaking  on  public  education  the  Archbishop 
used  some  rather  stroug  lano^uao^e.  The  Dissenters 
did  not  at  all  appreciate  being  called  "  bats  and  owls" 
from  Birmingham.  A  prelate  is  an  object  of  attrac- 
tion or  rather  of  perturbation  to  the  Nonconformist 

VOL.  I.  z 


333  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

mind,    and   a   Dissenting   review  regretted  tliat   tliis 
mode    of    speaking   prevented    the    Arclibisliop   from 
doing  the  services  which,  from  his  ability  and  position, 
he  ouo-ht  to  render  to  the   cause  of    truth.     But  a 
further  procees  of  vihpending  might  be  resorted  to. 
"  No  one  who  has  ever  seen  Dr.  Thomson  can  suppose 
that  he  will  ever  sacrifice  an  iota  of  the  consideration 
and  authority  which  he  is   entitled  to  claim."     The 
periodical  also  considered  that  he  "  lacks  both  origin- 
ahty  and   sympathy.     He  is  a  hard  worker,  but  he  is 
nothing   more.   .  .  He    has   an    exalted   idea    of   his 
episcopal  authority.     Those  who  have   watched  him 
closely  have  marked  a  perceptible  change  in   his  tone 
and  deportment    since  his  accession  to   his    present 
high  dignity.  ...  If  we  are  to  judge  from  his  pubhc 
addresses,  we  do  not  think  the  Bench  has  improved 
him.     Perhaps    there   are    not    many   men   whom   it 
really  does     improve.      All    their    surroundings    are 
against  it."     It  is  a  true  proverb,  Fas  est  et  ah  hoste 
doceri,  but  at  the  same  time  there  is  a  manifold  spite- 
fulness  in  the  criticism. 

So  far  from  Dr.  Thomson  not  rendering  the  services 
which  he  might  to  the  cause  of  truth,  there  is  no 
prelate  who  has  rendered  more  distinctive  service. 
He  manfully  entered  the  lists  against  the  wide-sweep- 
ing doctrines  of  Huxley  and  Darwin,  pointing  out  the 
gaps  in  their  chain  of  evidence,  and  the  great  sweep- 
ino-  deductions  which  have  been  built  up  on  uncertified 
theories.  He  has  been  covered  with  abuse  in  the 
Fortnightly  and  kindred  periodicals;  but  those  who 
have  followed  the  controversy  with  care,  will  probably 
think  that  his  keen  vigorous  logic  had  the  best  of  it. 
The  Archbishop's  lectures  show  how  thoroughly  and 


ARCHBISHOP    THOxMSON.  330 

earnestly  he  has  followed  the  whole  ramifications  of 
the  modern  materialistic  argument,  and  he  is  by  no 
means  devoid  of  a  keen  sympathy  that  enables  him  to 
realize  the  intellectual  and  moral  standpoint  of  earnest 
unbelief.  The  unbelief  that  is  earnest  is  very  different 
from  the  unbelief  which  has  only  the  affectation  of 
earnestness.  Any  man  who  is  really  troubled  by  the 
doubts  and  problems  of  modern  days,  and  simply 
desires  in  a  frank  teachable  spirit  to  search  out  the 
absolute  truth,  will  find  himself  greatly  helped  by 
such  papers  as  those  which  the  Archbishop  read  before 
the  Christian  Evidence  Society.  In  the  labours  of 
that  active  useful  modest  association,  an  organization 
which  seeks  to  deal  with  the  whole  gamut  of  unbelief 
throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land,  the 
Archbishop  has  taken  a  leading  part,  so  that  he  not 
only  seeks  to  combat  scepticism  and  secularism  on  their 
speculative  side,  but  also  with  the  instinct  of  his 
strong  practical  character,  he  directly  combats  the 
growing  mischief  which  he  deplores.  He  is  the  one 
prelate  on  the  bench,  before  any  other,  who  is 
familiar  with  all  the  intellectual  phenomena  of  unbelief, 
and  encounters  them  with  honesty  and  sympathy  and 
real  intellectual  force. 


340 


CHAPTER  YII. 

THE  BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTEK,  AND  DUKHAM. 

AT  that  point  where  London  fades 
into  the  country  and  indicating 
pretty  exactly  the  point  of  demar- 
cation, is  Fulham  Palace,  connected  with  some  stirring 
epochs  in  Enghsh  history  and  with  various  associa- 
tions of  great  and  good  men.  From  far  remote  days 
it  has  been  the  seat — old  authors  called  it  "  the  summer 
residence" — of  the  Bishops  of  London.  It  better  de- 
served this  last  title  once  upon  a  time  than  it  does 
now.  In  the  Tudor  days  it  may  have  been  merely 
an  old  manorial  dwelling,  a  veritable  "  moated  grange," 
embossed  in  its  elms,  and  fronted  by  the  then 
"  silver"  Thames.  In  the  hush  of  a  calm  day  there 
might  come  almost  indistinguishable  murmurs  from 
the  old  city  in  the  distance,  dimly  echoing  beyond  the 
villasre  which  is  now  Charino;  Cross,  and  the  meadows 
which  are  now  Oxford  Street  and  Piccadilly.  But 
now  suburban  villas  and  busy  thoroughfares  and 
drivinsr  trade  bind  Fulham  to  London  with  continuous 
links.  If  the  overgrown  city  thus  continues  to  expand 
westward,  Fulham  Palace  will  indeed  be  rus  in  iirbe — 
a  country  domain  amid  a  wilderness  of  brick  houses. 
The  pleasant  illusion  of  the  old  country  days  is,  in 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCTIESTEIJ,  AND  DUKHAM.       341 

inany  respects,  still  retained.  Walking  the  Bishop's 
Walk  or  the  Bishop's  Avenue,  or  musing  amid  the 
lawns  and  gardens,  there  is  such  quiet  and  repose  that 
we  might  imagine  that  the  long  arms  of  London  had 
not  reached  Fulham,  and  that  things  remained  even 
as  they  were  in  "  the  spacious  times  of  great  Eliza- 
beth." 

The  Palace  and  grounds  are  situated  near  the  old 
parish  church  of  Fulham,  very  near  also  to  the  wooden 
bridge.  If  you  go  directly  up  the  lane,  you  will  come 
to  the  large  gates  adorned  with  the  armorial  bearings 
of  the  See,  fronting  the  avenue.  Or  you  may  turn 
aside  to  the  left,  and  passing  along  a  shady  walk 
between  the  moat  and  the  river,  so  reach  the  porter's 
lodge.  Near  the  lodge  is  a  row  of  limes  of  great  age, 
which  were  very  probably  planted  by  Bishop  Compton 
soon  after  the  Revolution  of  1G88,  which  he  had  taken 
so  active  a  part  in  bringing  about.  It  was  then  the 
fashion  to  plant  long  avenues  of  limes  according  to 
the  Dutch  mode  which  William  III.  introduced  into 
Enofland,  and  with  which  Londoners  are  so  familiar 
from  the  examples  at  Hampton  Court.  Several  of  the 
bishops  have  lavished  great  pains  and  great  expendi- 
ture on  the  security  and  adornment  of  their  little 
territory.  Thus  they  raised  the  embankment  against 
the  Winter  rains,  and  beautified  it  with  extensive 
shrubberies.  The  land  consists,  an  old  topographical 
writer  tells  us,  "  of  about  thirty-seven  acres,  including 
the  garden  and  the  large  field  called  the  Warren,  and 
the  whole  is  surrounded  by  a  moat,  over  which  there 
are  two  bridges."  The  present  edifice  is  in  various 
respects  comparatively  modern.  About  a  century  and 
a   half  ago,   Bishop    Robinson   sent   in  a  petition   to 


^-12  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  setting  forth  that  his 
palace  was  grown  very  old  and  decayed  ;  that  part  of 
the  building  was  absolutely  ruinous,  and  the  whole 
too  large  for  the  revenues  of  the  bishopric.  Some 
commissioners  were  accordingly  appointed  to  examine 
the  premises,  among  whom  were  the  illustrious  Sir 
Christopher  Wren  and  Sir  John  Yanbrugh.  The  com- 
missioners reported  that  after  a  considerable  amount 
of  demolition  there  would  remain  fifty  or  sixty  rooms 
besides  the  chapel  and  hall.  A  license  was  accordingly 
obtained,  and  the  other  buildings  pulled  down.  The 
principal  entrance  into  the  great  quadrangle  is  on  the 
west  side,  through  an  arched  gateway.  The  building 
is  of  brick,  and  consists  of  two  courts.  As  we  enter 
the  old  quadrangle,  we  see  a  kind  of  resemblance,  only 
something  homelier,  to  a  smaller  college  of  Oxford  or 
Cambridge.  It  was  built  by  Bishop  Fitzjames  in  the 
reign  of  Henry  VII ,  as  appears  by  the  bishop's  arms 
on  a  stone  over  a  door,  leading  from  the  offices  in  the 
south  wing.  The  palace  is,  however,  of  a  much  further 
antiquity  than  this  date;  although  in  the  course  of 
ao-es  the  buildino-  must  several  times  have  perished 
and  been  renewed.  In  the  year  1141,  during  the  war 
between  King  Stephen  and  the  Empress  Maud, 
Geoffrey  de  Mandeville,  the  King's  general,  came  to 
Fulham,  and  seized  Robert  de  Sigillo,  Bishop  of 
London,  then  "  lodging  in  his  own  manor  place." 
An  old  writer  says  that  Henry  III.  was  often  at  this 
palace.  In  the  early  part  of  the  fourteenth  century 
Bishop  Baldock  was  Bishop  of  London ;  and,  accord- 
ing to  the  custom  of  those  days,  also  held  the  high 
office  of  Chancellor.  From  old  official  documents  we 
learn  that  this  bishop  discharged  many  of  his  public 


BISHOl'S  Oi''  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  ANO  DURHAM.       343 

acts  at  Fulliam.  The  last  bishop  who  thus  held  a 
high  state  office  was  Juxon,  Bishop  of  London.  He 
was  appointed  Lord  Treasurer,  apparently  much 
against  his  own  wishes,  through  the  overweening 
interest  of  Laud,  his  predecessor  in  the  See,  and  then 
both  Archbishop  and  virtual  Premier.  Lord  Claren- 
don, in  his  "  History,"  tells  us  how  greatly  this 
alienated  from  the  King  the  minds  of  that  class  from 
whom  the  holder  of  such  high  office  is  generally  selected, 
and  formed  one  of  the  preludes  that  led  to  the  civil 
war.  He  was  himself  a  humble,  unambitious  man, 
and  we  have  no  doubt  happy  enough  when  the  time 
came  to  lay  down  the  weight  of  his  secular  office. 
His  name  will  always  be  associated  in  history  with  his 
unfortunate  master,  Charles  L,  with  whom  he  stood 
on  the  scaffold,  on  the  sad  morning  of  the  execution, 
when  we  trust  that  tlie  words  then  spoken  were  ful- 
filled, that  he  passed  "  from  a  corruptible  to  an  incor- 
ruptible crown." 

Several  of  the  bishops  have,  so  to  speak,  left  their 
personal  impress  on  the  present  structure.  Osbal- 
deston  bequeathed  a  thousand  pounds  for  repairs. 
Part  of  this  money  was  devoted  by  his  successor  to 
the  enlarging  and  embelhshing  of-  the  chapel  on  the 
north  side  of  the  inner  court.  A  new  and  beautiful 
chapel  was  erected  in  the  time  of  Bishop  Tait,  in  great 
measure  through  contributions  made  by  clergy  or- 
dained in  the  diocese.  There  is  some  very  fair  painted 
o-lass  at  Fulham,  and  on  the  different  windows  are  the 
various  coats  of  arms  of  different  prelates  ;  the  win- 
dows also  contain  other  and  sacred  subjects.  The 
"  Hall,"  a  noble  room,  is  especially  associated  wqth 
Bishop  Sherlock,  whose  arms  are   over  the  chimney- 


344  OUR    BISHOPS  A^^D   DEANS. 

piece.  In  one  of  the  rooms  is  placed  a  bust  of  Wil- 
liam Pitt.  The  great  statesman  was  a  near  relative 
of  the  Bishop  of  Loudon,  having  a  villa  at  Putney  on 
the  other  side  of  the  Thames.  Fulham  Palace,  from 
its  vicinity  to  London,  must  often  have  been  the  scene 
of  gatherings  of  illustrious  men.  In  the  Memoirs  of 
Hannah  More  we  see  that  the  good  lady  was  often  a 
guest  at  Fulham  while  Dr.  Porteous  was  Bishop.  She 
wrote  a  little  poem  on  an  incident  whicli  occurred  at 
Fulham.  There  used  to  be  a  great  wooden  chair  in 
the  palace,  and  the  tradition  ran,  that  on  this  chair 
Bishop  Bonner  used  to  sit  when  passing  sentence  on 
the  heretics.  Bonner  is  reputed  to  have  belaboured 
the  heads  and  ears  of  the  obstinate  Protestants  brought 
before  him.  His  chair  was  removed  into  the  shrub- 
bery, and  good  Hannah  More  wrote  her  little  poem 
about  it.  There  were  a  great  many  traditions  about 
Bonner.  I  believe  it  is  true  that  he  used  to  carry 
heretics  off  to  Fulham  and  turn  them  to  profitable  ac- 
count by  making  them  work  on  the  grounds.  I  have 
only  heard  of  one  tradition  which  is  at  all  to  Bouner's 
credit.  It  is  said  that  he  afforded  an  asylum  to  John 
Byrde,  one  of  the  deprived  Protestant  bishops.  "  Upon 
his  coming,"  says  old  Wood,  "  he  brought  his  present 
with  him,  a  dish  of  apples  and  a  bottle  of  wine."  I 
should  like  to  see  this  story  confirmed ;  Byrde,  we  are 
told,  was  the  last  provincial  of  the  Carmelites,  and 
this  may  have  had  something  to  do  with  it. 

Hannah  More's  friend.  Bishop  Porteous,  is  the  first 
bishop,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  who  has  left  on  record  an 
account  of  the  enormous  spiritual  destitution  that 
prevailed  in  his  diocese.  Nearly  a  hundred  years 
before,  Addison  had  drawn  attention  to  the  same  thing 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       345 

in  the  Spectator.     In  one   of  the  delightful  Sir  Roger 
de  Coverley  papers,   the  good  old  knight  takes  the 
water,   and  looking  at  London   from  what  has  been 
called  the  noblest  of  London   streets,   remarked  how 
fifty  more  churches  would  mend   the  prospect.     This 
allusion  is  probably  connected  with  a  parliamentary 
measure  in  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne,  by  which  a  con- 
siderable sura  was  voted  in  aid   of  fifty  new  churches. 
I  have  close  by  me   the  Bishop's   "  Lectures   on   St. 
Matthew."     He  is   speaking  of  the  centurion,  "  who 
loveth  our  nation  and  hath  built  us  a  synagogue,"  and 
thereon  subjoins  a  note.     "  There  is  a  most  dreadful 
want  of  this  nature  in  the  western  part   of  this  great 
metropolis.     From  St.  Martin-in-the-Fields  to  Mary- 
lebone   Church,   inclusive,   a  space    containing  about 
two  hundred  thousand  souls,  there  are  only  five  parish 
churches — St.  Martin's,  St.  Anne's,  Soho,  St.  James's, 
St.  George's  Hanover  Square,  and  the  very  small  church 
of  Marylebone.     There  are,  it  is  true,  a  few  chapels  in- 
terspersed in  this  space  ;  but  what  they  can  contain  is 
a  mere  trifle,  compared  with  the  whole  number  of  in- 
habitants in  those  parts,   and  the  lowest  classes  are 
almost  entirely  excluded  from  them.     The  only  mea- 
sure that  can  be  of  any  essential  service,  is  the  erec- 
tion of   several  spacious  parish  churches,   capable  of 
receiving  very  large   congregations,  and  aff'ording  de- 
cent accommodation  for  the  lower  and  inferior,  as  well 
as  the  higher  order  of  the  people."     I  do  not  know  if 
Bishop  Porteous    did    much  towards  remedying  the 
evil  which  he  deplored.     I  beheve  he  left  behind  him 
a  very  large  fortune — two  or  three  hundred  thousand 
pounds — which  in  itself  almost  forbids  the  hope  that  he 
did  much  for  the  wants  of  his  diocese.     Much,  however, 


o 


46  OUE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 


has  been  done  since  his  time,  and  much  yet  remains 
to  do.  The  two  last  Bishops  and  the  present  Bishop 
of  London  have  been  indefatigable  in  the  same  cause. 
I  reo-ret  that  Thackeray  has  attacked  Porteous 
in  his  "  Lectures  on  the  Four  Georges,"  for  flattery 
to  George  III. ;  unjustly,  inasmuch  as  Dr.  Porteous 
only  expressed  the  feeling  which  pervaded  the  whole 
nation  about  the  good  king. 

There  is  an  excellent  library  at  Fulham,  bequeathed 
by  Bishop  Porteous.  It  is  the  heirloom  of  the  See, 
handed  down  to  bishop  after  bishop.  There  were 
also  "  manuscript  treasures"  preserved,' — hardly,  we 
imagine,  of  the  same  extent  and  importance  as  those 
at  Lambeth,  but  still  of  much  interest.  Part  of  them 
relate  to  the  old  jurisdiction  which  the  Bishops  of 
London  used  to  exercise  in  spiritual  matters  over  the 
colonies.  This  jurisdiction  was  of  an  informal  and 
almost  inoperative  character,  and  very  scantily  sufiiced 
to  foster,  control,  or  encourage  the  Episcopalians  of  the 
American  "plantations."  In  1685  the  then  bishop  of 
London  sent  out  one  Dr.  Blair  as  his  commissary  to 
Virginia,  who  continued  in  that  position  for  more  than 
half  a  century.  Many  interesting  letters  are  preserved 
at  Fulham,  giving  an  account  of  the  state  of  religion 
in  the  early  history  of  America.  How  the  Bishops  of 
London  came  to  exercise  this  jurisdiction  is  quite  un- 
certain. In  a  legal  point  of  view,  no  form  of  religion 
was  established  in  America.  It  most  probably  origi- 
nated in  the  hearty  concurrence  of  the  Bishops  of 
London  in  the  plans  formed  by  the  Virginia  company 
for  the  promotion  of  religion  among  the  settlers. 
Thus  their  first  clergy  were  nominated  from  Fulham 
or  London  House,  and  thus  there  grew  up  a  some- 


BlSIIOrS  OF  LONDON,  WINOnESTEE,    AND  DUllHAM.       347 

what  indefinite  notion  that  these  American  clergymen 
belonged  to  the  diocese  of  London.  In  the  Fiilhara 
manuscript,  as  quoted  by  Bishop  Wilberforce  in  his 
"  History  of  the  American  Church,"  we  find  Bishop 
Compton  writing  thus  :  "  As  the  care  of  your  churches, 
with  the  rest  of  the  plantations,  lies  upon  me  as  your 
diocesan,  so,  to  discharge  that  trust,  I  shall  omit  no 
occasions  of  promoting  their  good  and  interest." 
When  Dr.  Gibson  became  bishop,  he  suspected  that 
this  notion  was  insubstantial.  He  was  told  that  an 
order  in  council,  in  the  reio-n  of  Charles  II,  made  the 
colonies  a  part  of  the  See  of  London.  Upon  investi- 
gation, however,  no  such  order  in  council  was  dis- 
coverable. Bishop  Gibson  consequently  declined  to 
exercise  any  jurisdiction.  Under  these  circumstances, 
a  special  commission  was  issued  by  the  crown,  con- 
ferring this  authority  upon  him.  The  good  bishop 
resolved  faithfully  to  exercise  the  pastoral  charge  over 
his  distant  people. 

It  seems,  however,  that  any  official  connexion  be- 
tween Fulham  and  the  American  States  came  to  an 
end  long  before  the  epoch  of  the  Revolution.  Yet  we 
find  constant  evidence  of  the  Bishops  of  London  taking 
the  most  earnest  interest  in  the  spiritual  condition  of 
America,  and  vehemently  urging  upon  the  government 
of  the  day  the  necessity  of  taking  measures  to  provide 
for  the  religious  welfare  of  the  people.  The  Bishop  of 
London,  we  should  here  say,  includes  in  his  diocese 
all  the  clergy  labouring  on  the  continent  of  Europe. 

In  an  American  writer  we  find  a  notice  of  a  visit  in 
former  days  to  Fulham  Palace  :  "  When  we  returned 
from  the  chapel,"  says  Jacob  Bailey,*  "  we  were  con- 

*  Quoted  from  "  Life  of  Bishop  Boss  of  Massachusetts."     New  York, 
1859. 


348  OUR   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

ducted  into  a  vast  large  hall,  entirely  composed  of  the 
finest  marble.  It  was  arched  overhead,  and  was  at 
least  twenty  feet  high.  All  the  walls,  as  well  as  the 
grand  canopy,  were  covered  with  the  most  striking 
figures,  so  that  this  spacious  apartment  might  be  truly 
said  to  be  fine  without  hangings,  and  beautiful  with- 
out paint.  In  the  middle  stood  a  long  table  covered 
with  silver  dishes.  We  sat  down  with  his  lordship  of 
Rochester,  the  Bishop  of  London's  lady,  and  several 
others,  in  all  twenty-one.  We  had  the  servants  to 
attend  us,  and  were  served  with  twenty-four  difi'erent 
dishes,  dressed  in  such  an  elegant  manner  that  many 
of  us  could  scarce  eat  a  mouthful.  The  drinking 
vessels  were  either  of  glass  or  solid  gold."  We  imagine 
that  there  is  a  httle  transatlantic  exaggeration  in  this 
sketch  of  such  unapostolic  display.  The  days,  we 
trust,  are  for  ever  passed  away,  when  a  display  of 
worldly  grandeur  and  wealth  were  considered  indis- 
pensable to  the  character  of  a  Christian  bishop. 

We  have  thought  it  worth  while  to  make  these  notes 
on  the  metropolitan  Episcopal  palace.  When  we 
have  mentioned  the  time-honoured  connnection  with 
America,  the  peculiar  tie  that  connects  the  Bishop  of 
London  with  Anglican  clergy  on  the  Continent,  and 
the  great  effort  made  to  christianize  that  vast  me- 
tropolis, compared  with  winch  every  other  metropolis 
is  only  a  provincial  city,  we  have  summarised  the 
great  duties  and  interests  that  belong  to  the  See  of 
London.  The  Bishop  of  London  has  a  political  and 
ecclesiastical  importance  only  second  to  that  of  the 
holder  of  the  See  of  Canterbury.  However  quiet  and 
retiring,  such  a  man  has  greatness  forced  upon  him, 
his  acts  deal  with  the  largest  interests  ;  his  words  have 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DUliHAM.       349 

a  judicial  weifflit.  Dr.  Jackson  is  not  a  son  of  Boa- 
nerges ;  bo  has  not  the  oratorical  or  statesmanlike 
powers  of  Blomfield,  or  the  instigated  force  in  his 
successor  Dr.  Tait ;  he  seems  to  rest  on  the  hene  vixit 
qui  hene  latuit  theory  ;  but  the  holder  of  such  a  see  is 
necessarily  a  power  in  Church  and  State. 

On  two  occasions  only  have  I  been  privileged  to 
hear  the  Bishop  of  London.  It  was  when  he  ruled 
the  diocese  of  Lincoln.  The  two  occasions  combined, 
gave  a  very  fair  idea  of  the  calibre  of  the  man.  On 
one  occasion  he  was  preaching  before  the  University 
of  Oxford ;  on  the  other  occasion,  he  was  addressing 
some  young  children  who  had  just  been  confirmed  in  a 
remote  village  in  Nottingham.  The  Bishop  exactly 
and  evenly  filled  his  place  on  each  occasion.  The  first 
address  was  thoughtful  and  learned ;  the  second  was 
simple  and  practical.  You  could  hardly  have  imagined 
that  the  erudite  academic  divine  could  so  have  under- 
stood and  adapted  himself  to  the  hearts  of  youthful 
villagers  ;  you  would  hardly  have  thought  that  one 
who  with  such  sweet  persuasiveness  addressed  these 
villagers,  could  have  so  impressed  "  the  awful  auditory 
of  the  University." 

I  have  heard  that  Dr.  Jackson's  elevation  was  quite 
accidental,  if  we  may  with  propriety  apply  the  term 
"  accidental"  to  such  circumstances.  The  living  of 
St.  James's,  Piccadilly,  which  has  so  often  proved  the 
avenue  to  a  bishopric,  fell  vacant ;  and  it  was  offered 
by  the  then  Bishop  of  London  to  a  clergyman  who 
esteemed  himself  too  old  for  the  appointment.  But 
he  advised  the  Bishop  to  step  round  to  a  neighbouring 
church  to  hear  the  Rev.  John  Jackson,  and  so  pleased 
was  the  Bishop  with  the  preaching  and  demeanour  of 


350  OUR   BISHOPS    Ax\D    DEANS. 

the  strange  clergyman,  that  he  speedily  gave  him  the 
living  which  led  to  the  bishopric.  The  Bishop  keeps 
up  the  great  state  of  Fulham  in  the  old  seignorial 
fashion.  He  does  not  often  appear  in  public  life,  but 
he  is  noted  for  the  firmness,  wisdom,  and  moderation 
of  his  rule. 

The  Bishop  is  not  to  be  found  among  those  who  take 
a  part  in  great  movements,   who  place  themselves  at 
the  head  of  vast  organizations,  and  who  interest  them- 
selves in  the  political  and  philosophical  discussions  of 
the  day.     But  he  has  his  own  earnest  quiet  say  on  the 
matters  that  come  nearest  to  the  very   springs  and 
sources  of  Christian  life  and   character.     St.  James's 
Church,  Piccadilly,  is  the  parish  church  of  the  Bishop 
of  London,  and  under  the  auspices  of  its  kindly  in- 
cumbent, immense  congregations  have  been  drawn  to 
listen  to  such  teachings   as  those  of  Dr.  Liddon  and 
Dr.  Jackson.     There  is  perhaps  no  more   useful  and 
popular  books  than  those  which  contain  Dr.  Jackson's 
sermons  on  Repentance  and  Little  Sins,   dealing  with 
those  infirmities  of  character,  those  vexities  of  the  re- 
ligious life,  on  which  all  earnest  men  have  to  ponder 
solemnly  and  often,  and  where  they  gladly  welcome 
any  real  help  to  aid  them  in  their  progress  over  per- 
plexed and  thorny  ground.     What  gives  the  main  in- 
terest to  this  enormous  diocese  is  the  reflection  that 
London  is  the  great  focus,  the  seething  centre  of  reli- 
gious thought  and  energy.     It  is  very  important  that 
we  should   have  an   accurate  knowledge  of  what   is 
really  done  in  the  diocese  of  London.  Several  attempts 
have  been  made  to  guage  certain  religious  work  done 
in  London,  both  on  the  orthodox  and  on  the  unortho- 
dox side.     But  a  degree  of  attention  has  been  given 


BISHOPS  01'  LONDON,  WINOnESTER,  AND  DURHAM.      351 

to  tlie  unorthodox  side  entirely  disproportioned  to  the 
real  measure  of  its  importance.  We  may  just  take  some 
examples  of  this.  The  Unitarians  are  the  most  intel- 
lectual of  Dissenters,  and  the  Church  may  well  grudge 
them  such  ministers  as  Mr.  Martineau  and  Mr.  Bland. 
Their  theology  is  always  coloured  by  the  current 
philosophy  of  the  day.  Many  persons  embrace  Uni- 
tarianism  who  are,  in  fact.  Deists,  or  belong  to  that 
very  narrow  debateable  tract  between  Deism  and 
Atheism,  but  who  still  wish,  from  inferior  secondary 
motives,  to  profess  to  maintain  some  form  of  creed. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  are  many  who  are  only 
divided  from  orthodoxy  by  the  same  line  as  Arius  of 
old.  It  can  hardly,  however,  be  said  of  modern  Uni- 
tarians that  they  possess  a  creed;  and  they  always 
speak  and  write  of  the  orthodox  as  a  body  separate 
from  themselves.  They  have  been  utterly  unable  to 
arouse  in  London  the  same  enthusiasm  that  the 
Arians  once  did  in  Alexandria.  They  have  not  got 
many  chapels  in  London,  and  their  influence  is  a 
declining  influence  all  over  the  country.  The  Quakers 
are  decidedly  a  moribund  body.  Their  numbers  in 
London  are  perceptibly  thinning.  In  the  course  of  the 
last  century  and  a  half  they  have  showed  a  progres- 
sive decline,  both  in  this  couatry  and  in  America. 
One  of  their  leaders  has  frankly  admitted  that  if  other 
Churches  had  declined  as  we  have  done,  Christianity 
must  have  died  out.  And  when  Christianity  has  been 
supposed  to  die  out,  and  a  teaching  of  human  know- 
ledge has  been  substituted,  one  may  see  a  few  sporadic 
audiences  drawn  together  to  listen  to  a  Gradgrind 
gospel  of  facts  and  figures. 

London  is   a  world  in  itself,  and  has  a  collection 


352  OUK    BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

of  all  the  Clmrches  and  all  the  sects.  Some  of  tliem 
are  noticed  in  the  press  in  a  way  altogether  dispro- 
portioned  to  their  importance.  If  we  may  judge  by 
advertisements,  they  absorb  the  parish,  but  as  a 
rule  the  Churches  do  not  advertise.  The  results 
shown  by  these  eccentric  bodies  are  so  trifling  and 
insignificant  that  they  are  not  worthy  of  any  formal 
enumeration. 

There  are  minor  sects  and  extreme  secularists, 
"  advanced  religionists"  and  "  schools  of  thought," 
as  I  beheve  the  slang  goes,  which  have  perhaps  their 
solitary  chapel,  a  chapel  not  half  filled,  or  filled 
with  a  very  low  order  of  persons,  which  have  no 
organization  for  the  promotion  of  good  works,  and 
where  there  is  generally  a  tariff  of  prices  for  admis- 
sion, extending  from  twopence  to  half-a-crown,  with 
a  reduction  if  tickets  are  taken  by  the  course  or  by 
the  year.  It  is  curious  to  observe  how  the  penny 
papers  will  dwell  on  all  those  abnormal  develop- 
ments of  "  religionism"  as  something  of  great  mo- 
ment, and  even  class  the  most  devout  and  orthodox 
Dissenters  under  the  title  of  Unorthodox  London,  as 
if  to  represent  a  depth  and  variety  of  revolt  against 
the  received  doctrines  of  religion  which,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  does  not  really  exist,  while  of  that  vast  con- 
stant quantity,  the  working  of  the  Church,  hardly  any 
account  is  given— none  that  represents  the  full,  deep, 
humble,  devout  life  of  those  who  have  grown  up  or 
numbered  themselves  in  the  faithful  ranks  of  the 
Church.  There  has  been  more  mention  made  in  the 
newspapers  of  Mr.  Yoysey's  queer  conventicle  than 
of  a  hundred  parish  churches,  each  with  its  thousand  of 
worshippers  and  carefully-tested  organization.     Quiet, 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       353 

healthy,   vigorous    life   is   generally   ignored   by   the 
journal  whoso  professed  work  it  is  to   notice  what  is 
abnormal  or  diseased.     We  do  not   say,   using  that 
rough-and-ready  money  taste,  which,   after  all,  is  not 
an   unsafe  one,   that  the   Church   in   London,  as  evi- 
denced by  the  returns  of  Hospital  Sunday,  does  all 
that  it  ought  to  do,  does   anything  like  that  which  is 
done  by  Presbyterian  congregations  in  Scotland,  or 
Calvinistic   Methodist  congregations   in  Wales,  but  it 
did  by  far  the  larger  part  of  what  was  done.     All  this 
vast  reputable  body  of   Episcopalians   acknowledges 
the  Bishop  of  London  as  its  titular  head.     It  is  thus 
that   he   is   as  much    removed    from    any  individual 
Churchman  as  if  he  were  Patriarch  of  Constantinople, 
but  still  the  occasion  may  arise  for  any  one  when  he 
is  to  be  seen,  to  be  heard,  and  to  be  talked  to,  and 
on  such  occasions    a    Churchman  feels  that  there  is 
something  real  and  valuable  in  Episcopacy. 

It  is  very  interesting  to  glance  at  a  farewell  sermon 
which  Bishop  Jackson  delivered  in   Lincoln  Cathedral 
when  he  was  leaving  his  old  diocese  for  the  diocese 
of  London  : — "  It  is    much  more  than  fifteen  years 
since  I  first  took  my  seat  in  this  cathedral  and  preached 
from  its  pulpit.     It  would  not  be  humility,  but  ingra- 
titude, to  look  back  over  this  period  without  thank- 
fulness— albeit    a    very    humhling    thankfulness ;    for 
there  is  the   strong    contrast  which    the    Apostle  so 
often  draws  between  man's  feebleness  and  God's  work. 
On  the    one    hand    there  rises    only  too  readily  to 
memory  a  long  array  of  imperfections,  errors,  short- 
comings, of  duties  neglected  or  only  half  performed,  of 
opportunities  lost,  of  faults  of  temper,  of  misapprehen- 
sions and  hasty  judgments,   of  timid   shrinkings  from 
VOL.  I.  A  A 


354  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

what  was  right,  and  a  dwarfed  and  unstable  standard  of 
ministerial  obligation  and  labour — for  all  which  I  en- 
treat you,  brethren,  to  ask  pardon   for  me  when  we 
kneel  together.     On  the  other  hand,   the   retrospect 
shows  progress  and  life  in   the  Church  and  its  work 
for  which  we  may  well  thank  God.     Twenty-four  new 
churches  and   seven    mission-houses  built,    sixty-one 
churches  rebuilt,  and  more  than  two  hundred  restored, 
at  a  cost  of  above  four  hundred  thousand  pounds, 
bear  testimony  to  no  small  amount  of  liberality  and 
self-denial ;  while  the  greater  care  and  reverence  with 
which  Divine  worship  is  conducted,  witnesses,   while 
it  assists,  the  growth  of  more  devout  habits.     Single 
services  on   the  Lord's  Day,   once  so  common,  have 
become   almost  confined  to  certain  benefices  having 
two  churches — the  very   few  exceptions  having  the 
excuse,  if  not  the  justification,  of  very  small  popula- 
tions, of  illness,  or  old  age.     The  frequency  of  the 
administration   of  the  Holy   Communion  has  greatly 
increased,  although  in  too  many  parishes  still  below  the 
duty  of   the    pastor    and    the    needs   of  his  people. 
Schools  have  multiplied  in  number  and  improved  in 
efficiency  ;  a  stimulus  and  aid  is  afforded  by  a  system 
of  voluntary  but    able  inspection ;    and  an  excellent 
Training  Institution   provides  for   a   supply  of  well- 
taught  and  well-principled  mistresses.     The  secondary 
causes  of  this  progress  are  not  far  to  seek.     There 
was  the  long  and  patient  tillage  of  my  predecessor, 
whose  wise  and  gentle  administration  continued   to 
bear  fruit  long  after  he  had  been  called  to  his  rest  and 
reward.      There  was  the   gradual  but  certain  opera- 
tion  of  the  statutes  which  his  prudence  assisted  to 
frame,  under  which  the   evils    of  non-residence   and 


BISHOPS  OP  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.      355 

plurality  have  all  but  disappeared.  There  has  been 
the  remarkable  development  in  our  country  of  a  taste 
for  music  and  architecture  which  has  found  suitable 
scope  for  its  exercise  in  the  fabrics  of  our  churches 
and  the  worship  of  the  congregation.  There  has  been 
the  onward  march  of  a  great  theological  movement, 
which,  whatever  conflictsit  may  have  occasioned,  and 
whatever  evils  may  have  accompanied  it,  has  broken 
up  the  slumbers  of  uninterested  routine,  and  has  made 
multitudes  think  and  act  who  might  otherwise  have 
been  content  to  do  nothing  for  themselves  and  others. 
And  without  instituting  any  boastful  comparison  with 
our  predecessors,  who  have  often  left  us  examples  of 
simple  habits,  quiet  faith,  and  high-toned  piety  which 
might  be  profitably  followed  in  these  days  of  ceaseless 
questioning,  of  display  and  unrest,  there  has  been  a 
wider  and  deeper  sense  of  ministerial  responsibility 
issuing  in  a  healthy  growth  of  ministerial  activity. 
And  above  all,  employing  or  overruling  all  these 
causes  and  influences,  there  has  been  the  living  Spirit 
of  God  blessing  man's  efforts  far  beyond  his  deserts, 
and  breathing  into  His  Church  a  life  and  power  which 
it  owes  only  to  Him. 

"  This  is  not  the  place  to  speak  of  closely-knit 
family  ties  which  must  hereafter  be  stretched  by  dis- 
tance, nor  of  the  pain  of  leaving  scenes  endeared  by 
years  of  tranquil  happiness,  and  spots  hallowed  by 
lasting  though  hopeful  sorrows.  But  many  other 
bonds  of  union  have  been  woven  by  the  work  and 
companionship  of  above  fifteen  years,  which  need  not, 
I  trust,  be  severed,  but  must  needs  be  weakened  now  : 
friendships  cemented  not  by  respect  merely  and 
esteem,    but    by    afi'ection    and    brotherly   love.     A 

AA  2 


356  OUE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

bishop's  office,  brethren,  at  least  in  these  our  days, 
must  ever  be  an  office  of  anxiety  and  difficulty ;  but 
never  surely  did  any  one  on  whom  this  burden  has 
been  laid,  find  it  so  lightened  as  I  have,  by  kindness, 
patience,  forbearance,  ready  sympathy,  and  active, 
self-denying  co-operation. 

"  There  is  enough  before  me,  brethren,  to  make  me 
earnestly  desire  your  prayers  in  my  behalf.  Labours, 
more  heavy  and  various  than  in  other  dioceses  pro- 
bably, to  be  undertaken  in  advancing  years  and  with 
failing  strength  ;  the  spiritual  oversight  of  nearly  two 
millions  of  souls ;  the  Church  of  the  metropolis,  in 
which  must  necessarily  be  exhibited  on  the  largest 
scale  all  the  good  and  the  evil  which  is  found 
elsewhere — the  manifold  forms  of  ill  with  the  warfare 
of  the  gospel  against  them ;  the  various  schools  of 
thought  and  sections  within  the  Church,  pushed 
more  often  to  their  extremes;  and  ivithout,  indiffe- 
rence, scepticism,  and  hostile  sects,  armed  with  the 
keenest  weapons  of  educated  intellect ;  a  position 
exceptionally  exposed  to  observation,  in  which  errors 
must  be  most  mischievous,  misapprehensions  most 
frequent,  and  incapacity  most  certain  to  be  detected  ; 
— all  this  constitutes  a  charge  from  which  anyone 
might  be  pardoned  from  shrinking,  and  which,  if 
ever  charge  did,  requires  the  daily  guidance  and  the 
grace  of  God. 

"  Nor,  indeed,  am  I  sure  that  it  would  be  right  to 
ask  your  prayers,  were  such  a  post  self  sought,  or 
assumed  under  the  inducement  of  the  social  advan- 
tages which  it  possesses,  or  may  be  supposed  to 
possess.  To  seek  responsibihties  uncalled  is  very 
near  the  sin  of  tempting  God.     But  if  it  be  allowable 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDO}J,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DQliHAM.      357 

to  think  that  a  clergyman,  Hke  a  soldier — unless 
some  physical  or  other  serious  obstacle  interpose — 
is  to  go  where  he  appears  to  be  sent,  notwithstanding 
that  the  post  is  difficult — or  rather,  perhaps,  becaasG 
it  is  difficult — then  let  me  earnestly  ask  your  prayers, 
brethren,  as  we  take  our  farewell, — first,  that  if  I 
have  mistaken  God's  will.  He  will  in  His  mercy  par- 
don me,  and  not  permit  my  involuntary  error  to  be 
hurtful  to  the  Church  or  to  myself;  and  then,  that 
in  the  untried  duties  which  lie  before  me.  He  will 
never  leave  me  to  myself,  but  will  hold  me  by  the 
hand,  and  guide  me  with  that  pure  and  gentle  wisdom 
which  cometh  from  above." 

Such  a  passage  as  this  appears  to  us  to  be  truly 
valuable,  so  to  speak,  it  enables  us  to  see  the  Bishop's 
inner  mind,  it  gives  us  a  clear  rapid  view  of  Church 
progress  in  one  of  the  largest  of  EngUsh  dioceses, 
it  shows  the  character  and  principles  of  action  of 
one  of  the  chief  rulers  of  the  Church.  Bishop  Jack- 
son is  not  a  man  who,  to  use  an  expression  which 
might  be  applied  to  some  other  bishops,  wears  his 
heart  upon  his  sleeve,  and  Londoners  who  have  read 
this  touching  farewell  sermon  gain  a  touching  insight 
into  the  character  of  the  Bishop  of  London. 

Not  the  least  remarkable  features 

of  the  diocese  of  Winchester  are  that 

Browne. 

it  owns  such  a  magnificent  cathe- 
dral, and  such  a  magnificent  episcopal  abode  as 
that  of  Farnham  Castle.  Winchester,  one  of  the 
great  historical  cities  of  England,  and  for  some  space 
of  time  its  metropolis,  has  a  cathedral  that  might 
well  rejoice  the  heart  of  its  bishop.     From  more  than 


358  OUE   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

one  point  seven  chantries  and  chapels  are  visible,  and 
seven  great  prelates  repose  therein.  Horace  Walpole 
has  mused  on  this  episcopal  memento  mori — "  How 
much  power  and  ambition  under  half  a  dozen  stones  ! 
T  own  I  grow  to  look  on  tombs  as  lasting  mansions, 
instead  of  observing  them  for  curious  pieces  of  archi- 
tecture." The  first  of  the  chantry  chapels  is  that  of 
Bishop  Edingdon,  who  has  recorded  the  grateful 
experience  of  many  opulent  prelates,  and  though 
"  Canterbury  be  the  higher  rank,  yet  Winchester  has 
the  deeper  manger." 

From  the  cathedral  to  the  episcopal  palace,  to 
which  Bishop  Browne  has  just  succeeded,  is  a  natural 
transition.  There  are  now  abundant  popular  asso- 
ciations with  Farnham,  from  its  vicinity  to  Aldershot, 
and  the  abundant  hop  plantations  of  jocund  memory. 
But  the  most  numerous  and  the  highest  class  of  asso- 
ciations cling  to  the  ancient  episcopal  castle.  The 
terraced  lawn,  shadowed  by  its  cedars,  in  front  of  the 
ancient  keep,  looks  far  and  wide  on  a  noble  English 
landscape,  with  valleys  and  wooded  hills,  the  river 
Wey  wandering  through  its  midst,  and  the  old  town 
of  Farnham  climbing  its  opposing  banks.  The  Park 
is  one  of  the  most  stately  and  beautiful  in  England. 
Formerly  there  was  a  Great  Park,  as  well  as  the  New 
or  Little  Park.  The  former  has  been  disforested 
since  the  days  of  the  second  Charles,  and  parcelled 
off  into  farms  and  homesteads ;  but  the  so-called 
Little  Park  has  nearly  three  hundred  acres,  and  is 
nearly  three  miles  in  circumference.  On  the  north- 
east side  is  a  noble  avenue  of  elms,  extending  three- 
quarters  of  a  mile.  The  present  modern  arrange- 
ment  is   greatly   due   to    Bishop   Brownlow    North, 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       359 

whose  fine  statue  by  Chantrey  is  the  greatest  orna- 
ment of  that  renowned  Lady  Chapel  in  Winchester 
Cathedral,  which  was  the  scene  of  the  ominous  nup- 
tials of  Philip  of  Spain  and  Mary  of  England.  The 
shattered  keep  was  apparently  hexagonal,  and  being 
now  entirely  unroofed  the  area  has  been  laid  out  as  a 
flower-garden,  in  which  a  veritable  tea-tree  flourishes 
in  the  open  air.  In  some  parts  the  keep  is  covered 
with  luxuriant  ivy,  and  there  are  indications  of 
some  dungeons,  to  which  we  descend  by  very  old 
steps.  The  servants'  hall,  with  its  circular  pillars,  is 
part  of  the  ancient  structure.  The  house  itself  is 
modernized,  of  red  brick.  The  library  is  a  long,  low, 
narrow  room.  The  chapel  is  small,  and — which  is 
hardly  an  ecclesiastical  adornment — has  festoons  of 
fruit  and  flowers  carved  by  Gibbons.  The  outer  walls 
of  the  castle  used  to  be  fortified  with  square  bastions, 
which  still  partly  remain,  and  were  surrounded  by  a 
wide  and  deep  moat,  which  is  now  a  path  for  cattle, 
and  where  fine  oaks  and  beech-trees  flourish. 

The  episcopal  castle  has  always  been  a  favourite 
with  English  royalty.  We  have  even  heard  a  rumour 
that  there  was  once  an  intention  to  take  measures  to 
convert  it  into  one  of  the  abodes  of  Queen  Victoria. 
When  another  great  Queen  once  visited  it.  Queen 
EHzabeth,  she  met  the  Duke  of  Norfolk  at  the  dinner 
board  just  before  Babington's  conspiracy,  and  while 
plotting  his  own  marriage  with  Mary  Queen  of  Scots. 
The  Queen  pleasantly  but  ominously  advised  him  to 
be  careful  on  what  pillow  he  laid  his  head,  a  speech 
prophetic  of  the  block.  This  place  was  the  delight 
of  James  the  First.  It  has  its  own  eventful  history 
in  the  time  of  the  civil  wars.     It  was  taken  and  re- 


360  OUR   BISHOPS   AND   DEANS. 

taken,  and  became  the  head-quarters  of  four  thousand 
troops.  Hither  came  King  Charles  on  his  last  melan- 
choly journey  from  Hurst  Castle  to  London,  and  was 
received  with  great  humanity.  But  Farnham  has 
its  recollections  of  still  more  illustrious  visitants. 
Hither  came  holy  Ken  to  console  the  last  moments 
of  the  illustrious  and  munificent  Bishop  Morton,  who 
after  the  Restoration  built  up  the  waste  places  which 
Puritanism  had  destroyed.  Once  a  bishop,  while 
addressing  candidates  for  orders,  quoted  some  lines 
of  this  illustrious  inmate  of  the  Castle,  Bishop  Ken 
— lines  which  admirably  describe  the  offices  both  of 
bishop  and  priest : — 

"A  father's  kindness,  a  shepherd's  care, 
A  leader's  courage,  which  the  cross  can  bear; 
A  ruler's  awe,  a  watchman's  wakeful  eye, 
A  pilot's  skill  the  helm  in  storms  to  ply. 
A  father's  patience  and  a  labourer's  toil, 
A  guide's  dexterity  to  disembroil; 
A  prophet's  inspiration  from  above, 
A  teacher's  knowledge,  and  a  Saviour's  love." 

The  following  description  of  Farnham  Palace  refers 
to  the  days  of  the  long  Episcopate  of  Bishop  Sumner  : 

**  Some  five  and  twenty  miles  from  the  cathedral 
city  stands  the  Bishop's  Palace,  a  building,  in  all  its 
features,  still  bringing  back  to  remembrance  its 
Norman  origin,  in  the  depth  and  massiveness  of  its 
towers,  walls,  and  windows ;  although  the  hand  of 
successive  generations  has  been  busy  with  its  front 
and  gables,  its  rooms  and  chimneys.  Placed  upon  a 
swelling  eminence,  it  looks  abroad  upon  a  park,  studded 
with  giant  trees  of  a  remote  date,  whose  forked  heads 
and  hollowed  trunks,  together  with  long  and  fantastic 
arms,  bared  at  the  end  and  twisted,  give  truthful  evi- 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCnESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       361 

dence  that  they  saw  the  day  when  the  bishop  trod 
upon  the  neck  of  princes ;  and  have  survived  until 
princes  tread  with  impunity  upon  the  neck  of  bishops 
....  This  is  the  Saturday  Evening,  the  Ordination 
is  the  next  day.  The  small  town,  with  its  picturesque 
church,  lies  in  a  hollow,  poorly  planted  out,  and  poorly 
protruding  itself  upon  the  Episcopal  mansion ;  while 
the  broad  battlemented  tower  of  the  church  loill  be 
seen  as  though  it  had  a  right  to  frown  its  mediaeval 
frown  upon  the  lawn  sleeves  and  simple  college  cap  of 
an  Anglican  bishop.  .  .  .  The  grim  old  Norman 
tower  frowns  even  more  gloomily  on  the  Sunday 
morning,  although  the  peal  of  bells  rings  merrily,  and 
swings  a  Sabbath  music  over  the  valleys  to  the  distant 
world,  where  the  shepherd  listens  to  its  bidding  and 
wonders  why  on  Sundays  the  stillness  of  that  soli- 
tude should  seem  more  still ;  or  when  broken  by  the 
continuous  vibrations  of  these  soft  bells,  why  it  should 
seem  to  partake  more  of  heaven  than  earth.  The 
parishioners  are  walking  through  the  avenues  of  yews 
into  the  western  porch ;  while  the  Bishop,  his  two 
chaplains,  his  lady  and  family,  his  household,  and 
twenty-three  candidates  for  ordination,  are  seating 
themselves  in  that  same  private  chapel  which,  attached 
to  the  palace,  has  witnessed  the  daily  clippings  of  the 
Prayer-Book.  .  .  .  The  chapel  is  plain  in  its  furniture, 
with  an  untidy  air  in  the  hassocks,  curtains,  and 
prayer  book ;  a  seraphine  stands  in  a  *  convenient 
place,'  no  doubt  in  this  instance  as  directed  by  the 
'  ordinary.'  The  spirit  of  the  Church  yields  to  the 
savour  of  the  Conventicle,  and  the  unhappy  Oxonian 
goes  home  to  his  flock  with  a  thorn  rankling  in  his 
bosom."     This  extract  is  taken  from  a  now  forgotten 


362 


OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 


work,  Speculum  Ecclesice,  and  not  unfairly  represents 
the  view  which  would  naturally  be  taken  under  similar 
circumstances  by  many  minds.  It  must  be  stated, 
however,  that  the  writer  speaks  of  his  discontented 
Oxonian  going  over  to  Rome. 

It  so  happened  that  just  about  the  time  that  Dr. 
Browne  was  exchanging  Ely  for  Winchester,  a  great 
occasion  arose  in  the  diocese ;  there  was  a  great  cele- 
bration in  the  Cathedral  that  very  fitly  closed  the 
chapter  of  his  Ely  episcopate.  This  was  the  twelve 
hundreth  anniversary  of  the  foundation  of  a  monastery 
at  Ely  by  Saint  Etheldreda.  The  occasion  was  a 
memorable  one,  of  a  most  suggestive  character ;  and 
its  full  import  was  admirably  worked  out  by  the  dis- 
tinguished men  who  took  part  in  the  services.  The 
accomplished  and  learned  Dean  made  an  address  redo- 
lent of  the  scholarship  and  historical  genius  for  which 
he  is  renowned,  and  reached  some  of  the  highest  tones 
of  sacred  eloquence.  The  Bishop  of  Peterborough 
poured  forth  one  of  those  resistless  tides  of  eloquence 
which  make  his  oratory  a  marvel  and  a  delight.  Canon 
Kingsley,  as  was  his  wont,  was  pathetic,  earnest,  and 
picturesque.  But  no  sermon  showed  more  nobleness 
and  intellectual  power  than  the  Bishop's,  the  very  last 
sermon  which  he  preached  in  Ely  Cathedral,  as  Bishop 
of  Ely.  As  an  historical  argument  and  discussion  it 
might  have  adorned  the  best  days  of  any  of  our  best 
periodicals.  But  at  such  a  time  the  Bishop's  autobio- 
graphical references  must  have  been  of  the  deepest 
interest  to  his  auditory.  On  one  occasion  the  Bishop 
alluded  to  a  kind  of  work  which,  it  is  hardly  too  much 
to  say,  he  has  made  peculiarly  his  own,  which  is  in 
strict  accord  with  the  best  spirit  of  our  modern  days, 


Bisnops  or  london,  Winchester,  and  Durham.     3G3 

and  which  the  Church  of  England  must  maintain  if 
she  would  maintain  her  existence  as  a  Church.  "  Above 
all,  I  have  had  it  at  heart  to  promote  greater  unity, 
and  to  break  down  that  isolation,  that  wall  of  separa- 
tion, which  divides  one  clergyman  from  another ;  and 
the  clergy  in  general  from  the  laity  of  the  Church." 
The  Bishop  also  alluded  to  his  efforts  in  establishing 
Deaconesses  in  his  diocese,  one  of  the  most  interest- 
ing and  important  of  our  modern  Church  movements ; 
and  the  employment  of  Mission  women.  Every  kind 
of  affection  and  friendship  was,  on  this  occasion, 
manifested  towards  the  departing  Bishop.  "  You  have 
been  so  kind,"  he  said,  "  as  to  remember  what  little 
I  have  been  able  to  do  for  the  interests  of  the  Church 
in  this  diocese ;  but  what  I  have  most  in  mind  are  my 
own  shortcomings  and  failures.  I  feel  that  a  man  of 
more  power,  of  more  physical  and  mental  strength, 
would  have  done  a  vast  deal  more  than  I  have  been 
able  to  effect." 

The  Bishop  of  Winchester's  great  work  is  that 
on  the  Articles.  The  ninth  edition  (1871)  of 
this  bulky  work  is  now  before  us.  It  may  be  said  to 
have  superseded  every  other,  and  even  to  have  thrown 
such  a  work  as  Hey's  into  undeserved  neglect.  This 
is,  in  many  respects,  the  most  thoughtful  and  con- 
siderable work  in  theology  that  has  been  produced  by 
any  bishop  of  the  Victorian  bench,  and  one  on  which 
we  should  chiefly  rely  for  the  credit  of  pure  divinity 
in  England.  The  work  is  perhaps  chiefly  used  as  a 
text  book  for  clergymen,  but  it  also  deserves  a  place 
among  those  books  which  no  gentleman's  library 
ought  to  be  without ;  books  which,  we  are  afraid,  are 
as  a  general  rule  the  most  neglected  of  all.     Any  his- 


364  OUE   BISHOPS   AND    DEANS. 

torical  student  might  read  with  interest  and  profit  the 
section  on  the  "  History,"  which  is  prefixed  to  the 
discussion  of  each  article.  The  work  is  dedicated  to 
Bishop  Thirlwall,  "in  affectionate  gratitude  for  un- 
sought and  unexpected  kindness,  and  with  deep  respect 
for  profound  intellect  and  high  Christian  integrity." 
The  general  reader  will  hardly  advance  beyond  two 
dozen  pages  of  the  introduction ;  but  it  is  to  be  hoped 
that  he  will  at  least  read  that  much  to  become  ac- 
quainted with  the  writings  of  a  foremost  prelate  of  our 
Church,  and  to  know  something  of  a  work  which,  in 
its  own  way,  has  obtained  a  unique  degree  of  success. 
The  last  lines  of  that  Introduction  may  be  cited  as  an 
example  of  the  -tolerant,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the 
devout  orthodox  spirit  in  which  the  Bishop  writes  : 
"  To  sign  any  document  in  a  non-natural  sense  seems 
neither  consistent  with  Christian  integrity  nor  with 
common  manliness.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  a  national 
Church  should  never  be  needlessly  exclusive.  It 
should,  we  can  hardly  doubt,  be  ready  to  embrace,  if 
possible,  all  who  freely  believe  in  God,  and  in  Jesus 
Christ  whom  He  hath  sent.  Accordingly  our  own 
Church  requires  of  its  lay  members  no  confession  of 
their  faith,  except  that  contained  in  the  Apostles' 
Creed.  In  the  following  pages  an  attempt  is  made  to 
interpret  and  explain  the  Articles  of  the  Church  which 
bind  the  consciences  of  her  clergy,  according  to  their 
natural  and  genuine  meanings,  and  to  prove  that 
meaning  to  be  both  Scriptural  and  Catholic.  None 
can  feel  so  satisfied,  nor  act  so  straightforwardly,  as 
those  who  subscribe  them  in  such  a  sense.  But  if  we 
consider  how  much  variety  of  sentiment  may  prevail 
among   persons  who  are,  in  the   main,  sound  in  the 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,   WINCnESTER,  AND  DURnAM.       365 

faith,  we  can  never  wish  that  a  National  Church,  which 
ought  to  have  all  the  marks  of  Catholicity,  should 
enforce  too  rigid  and  uniform  an  interpretation  of  its 
formularies  and  terms  of  union.  The  Church  should 
be  not  only  Holy  and  Apostolic,  but  as  well  One  and 
Catholic.  Unity  and  universality  are  scarcely  attain- 
able where  a  greater  vigour  of  subscription  is  required 
than  such  as  shall  ensure  an  adherence  and  conformity 
to  those  great  Catholic  truths  which  the  primitive 
Christians  lived  by  and  died  for."  We  may  compare 
with  this  the  language  which  Dr.  Browne  wrote  about 
himself  in  a  letter  to  the  Bishop  of  Melbourne :  "  I 
call  myself  an  old-fashioned  English  Churchman,  and 
I  find  more  to  repel  me  in  any  one  of  the  extreme 
schools  in  England  than  I  do  in  anything  I  have  seen 
or  heard  of  the  Old  Catholics.  Now  I  do  not  wish  to 
expel  from  my  own  communion  any  of  the  adherents 
of  the  three  schools  within  it.  The  Church  ought  to 
hold  them  all,  or  it  will  become  a  sect.  A  fortiori  I 
would  gladly  welcome  to  Christian  brotherhood  men 
so  much  to  be  loved  and  honoured  as  Dollinger,  and 
those  who  have  escaped  from  errors  for  which  I 
fear  some  within  our  own  body  have  too  much 
sympathy." 

In  the  recent  debates  on  the  Public  Worship  Bill, 
the  Bishop  of  Winchester  took  a  considerable  part. 
He  especially  took  an  active  part  in  the  discussion  at 
the  end  of  the  Session  on  the  Commons  amendment 
that  there  should  be  a  power  of  appeal  from  the 
bishops  to  the  archbishops.  The  two  archbishops 
naturally  voted  in  favour  of  giving  themselves  very 
large  additional  powers,  and  such  of  the  bishops  as 
voted  were  quite  as  naturally  adverse  to  the  implied 


366  OUR  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

slur  on  their  judgment  and  authority.  The  arch- 
bishops took  a  somewhat  Erastian  view,  but  the  High 
Church  prelates,  who  clung  together  in  a  cluster,  took 
the  high  jics  divinum  view  of  Episcopacy.  They  urged 
that  Episcopacy  was  a  divine  institution,  but,  as  for 
the  making  of  Metropolitans,  that  was  only  a  human 
institution.  On  this  occasion  Dr.  Harold  Browne  used 
some  remarkable  language,  in  which  he  clearly  defined 
the  points  at  issue  in  respect  to  the  theory  of  Episco- 
pacy, and  showed  how  acutely  he  felt  the  practical 
consequences  which  flowed  from  the  doctrine.  He 
asked  the  assent  of  their  Lordships  to  the  proposition 
that  the  Episcopacy  was  a  Divine  institution.  There 
was  as  strong  scriptural  authority  for  the  government 
of  a  bishop  in  his  diocese  as  there  was  historical 
authority  for  the  fact  that  Csesar  governed  Rome.  If 
he  did  not  believe  that  the  Episcopacy  was  a  divine 
institution  he  would  give  up  his  episcopate,  and 
trample  his  robe  on  the  ground,  because  unless  there 
was  Divine  authority  for  the  Episcopacy,  it  would  be  a 
most  schismatic  act  for  the  Church  of  England  to 
maintain  it  when  large  religious  bodies  had  felt 
themselves  obliged  to  give  it  up,  and  now  looked  upon 
it  as  being  unlawful.  Unless  the  Church  of  England 
believed  the  Episcopacy  to  be  a  divine  ordinance  she 
was  acting  now  schismatically  when,  by  throwing  it 
off,  she  might  bridge  over  a  gulf  which  was  between 
her  and  many  other  religious  bodies.  We  believe  the 
Bishop  afterwards  wrote  to  say  that  he  had  used,  or 
intended  to  use,  the  word  "  historical"  instead  of 
"  scriptural."  This  is,  in  point  of  fact,  placing  the 
question  on  that  historical  basis  for  which  we  con- 
tend.    Sir  William  Harcourt  answered  this  language 


BTSnOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DUKHAM.       3G7 

very  vigorously  in  tlie  House  of  Commons.  But 
Bishop  Browne's  language  appears  in  a  way  that  was 
not  noted  to  be  likely  to  lead  to  some  confusion  of 
thought.  We  hold  it  to  be  strictly  scriptural  that 
there  should  be  overseers,  i'^riffx.oTrot,  who  should  take 
oversight,  that  is,  exercise  Episcopacy  over  the 
churches.  But  the  question  remains  whether  the 
Episcopacy  of  the  Divine  thought  is  the  Episcopacy 
of  the  English  State-Church.  It  can  hardly  be  urged 
that  it  was  the  Scriptural  doctrine  that  bishops  should 
hold  seats  in  Parliament  by  a  baronial  tenure.  It  can 
hardly  be  urged  that  it  is  Scriptural  doctrine  that 
the  bishops  should  be  lords  over  Christ's  heritage. 
Bishop  Wordsworth,  who  followed  him,  truly  enough 
said  that  Episcopacy  was  an  institution  of  God  him- 
self, independent  of  statute  law.  But  the  comfortable 
human  accident  of  Episcopacy  was  the  result  of 
statute,  and  it  is  rather  an  ingratitude  to  speak  dis- 
paragingly of  that  statute  law  which  has  made  such 
splendid  arrangements  for  prelates. 

It  is  now  a  number  of  years  since  the  late  Lord  Ossing- 
ton,  then  Evelyn  Denis  on,  suggested  the  idea  of  the 
"  Speaker's  Commentary."  It  was  some  seven  years 
afterwards  before  the  first  volume  appeared.  The 
first  portion  of  the  first  volume  was  the  composition 
of  the  Bishop  of  Winchester.  It  will  be  well  indeed  if 
the  rest  of  this  gigantic  work  corresponds  with  this 
commencement.  Dr.  Harold  Browne's  portion  con- 
sisted of  the  general  introduction  to  the  Pentateuch, 
and  the  Book  of  Genesis,  with  Introduction,  Com- 
mentary, and  Notes.  The  chief  interest  of  such 
writings  for  the  general  reader  will  be  that  this 
ground  is  the  stage  of  conflict  between  supposed  state- 


368  OUR   BISHOPS  AND    DEANS. 

ments  in  Scripture  and  the  conclusions  of  modern 
science  and  criticism.  We  believe  it  will  be  a  com- 
fort to  many  persons  to  read  the  Bishop's  extremely 
careful  and  moderate  language.  His  point  of  view- 
was  "  that  a  miraculous  revelation  of  scientific  truths 
was  never  designed  by  God  for  man.  The  account  of 
the  Creation  is  given  in  popular  language  ;  yet  it  is 
believed  that  it  will  be  found  not  inconsistent  with, 

though  not  anticipatory  of,  modern   discovery 

Let  us  suppose  that  it  had  pleased   God  to  reveal  to 
Moses  the  fact  that  the  earth  revolves  round  the  sun, 
a  fact  familiar  now  to  children,  but  unknown  to  astro- 
nomers for  more  than  three  thousand  years  after  the 
Exodus.    The  effect  of  such  revelation  would  probably 
have  been  to  place  the  believer  and  the  astronomer  in 
a  state  of  antagonism.     The   ancient  believer  would 
have   believed  the   truth;   yet    the   observer   of    the 
heavens  would  have  triumphantly   convicted  him  of 
ignorance  and  error.     We   can   see  plainly  that  the 
wise  course  for  both  would  have  been  to  suspend  their 
judgments,  believing  the  Bible,  and  yet  following  out 
the  teaching  of  Nature.     A  Galileo  would  then  have 
been  not  feared  as  a  heretic,  but  hailed  as  a  harmonist. 
There  appears  now  to  some  an  inconsistency  between 
the  words  of  Moses  and  the  records  of  Creation.  Both 
may    be    misinterpreted.      Further    researches    into 
science,  language,  literature,  and  exegesis  may  show 
there  is  substantial  argument  where  there  now  appears 
partial  inconsistency.     It  would  evidently  have  served 
no  good  purpose  had  a  revelation  been  vouchsafed  of 
the  Copernican  system,  or  of  modern  geological  science. 
Yet  there  may  be  in   Scripture  truth    popularly  ex- 
pressed concerning  the  origin  of  all  things,  truth  not 


BISHOPS  OP  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       3G9 

apparent  to  us  because  we  have  not  yet  acquired  the 
knowledge  to  see  and  appreciate  it.  Certainly  as  yet 
nothing  has  been  proved  which  can  disprove  the 
records  of  Genesis,  if  both  the  proof  and  the  records 
be  interpreted  largely  and  fairly." 

We  have  some  very  sensible  language  addressed  to 
candidates  for  orders  which  go  a  great  way  in 
reconciling  ecclesiastical  and  secular  society,  and 
vrould  prevent  the  obvious  danger  of  the  clergy  be- 
coming a  mere  caste  : — "  The  skilful  artist  knows  that 
he  can  never  take  a  true  portrait  unless  he  can  catch 
the  subject  of  that  portrait  off  his  guard.  And  every 
layman,  not  least  the  poorest  of  our  parishioners,  is  in 
this  repect  an  artist  by  nature.  ....  A  firm  acquaint- 
ance with  secular  subjects  with  which  your  parishioners 
have  much  acquaintance,  helps  to  make  them  es- 
teem you  and  to  give  just  opinions  weight  with 
them  in  all  things.  Especially  try  to  be  in  some 
measure  men  of  business.  Ignorance  of  common 
business  often  brings  clergymen  into  diflSculties,  and 
not  unfrequently  into  debt.  ....  To  young  men 
with  any  degree  of  refinement  some  measure  of  shy- 
ness is  almost  inevitable.  Shyness  is  one  of  those 
inexphcable  defects  of  our  nature  which  belong  almost 
exclasively  to  the  civilised,  the  educated,  the  refined, 
generally  the  amiable.  A  young  man  who  is  wholly 
without  it,  should  have  some  very  sterling  qualities 
instead  of  it,  to  save  him  from  being  utterly  odious. 
It  is  generally  most  apparent  in  the  society  of  the 
rich;  but  it  is  the  most  misconstrued  by  the  poor. 
.  .  .  ,  The  peasant  has  often  as  clear  an  appreciation 
of  what  is  really  good  breeding  as  the  prince.  If  you 
wish  the  poor  to  respect  you,  you  must  respect  them, 

VOL.  I.  B  B 


370  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

They  deserve  your  respect.  '  Honour  all  men'  is  a  rule 
that  is  general ;  but  '  honour  the  poor'  is  a  rule  which 
may  be  equally  deduced  from  the  teaching,  if  we  have 
it  not  in  the  words  of  Scripture.  When  you  enter  a 
peasant's  hut,  do  not  keep  on  your  hat,  do  not  use 
any  of  the  airs  of  a  superior  ;  speak  always  kindly, 
even  if  you  should  be  bound  to  speak  sometimes 
sternly ;  shake  him  by  the  hand  as  an  equal ;  sit  at  his 
table,  or,  if  he  be  sick,  by  his  bed,  as  a  friend.  You 
will  never  find  that  he  takes  undue  advantage  of  such 
actions.  He  will  honour  you  because  you  have 
honoured  him." 

The  Bishop  is  very  noticeable  for  his  intense  in- 
terest in  the  Old  Cathohc  movement  in  Germany. 
He  wishes  EngHshmen  to  understand,  appreciate,  and 
support  the  movement.  The  Bull  of  1870  was  the 
logical  outcome  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Immaculate 
Conception,  promulgated  in  1854  by  the  See  of  Eome. 
Pius  the  Ninth  has  now  established  an  absolute 
ecclesiastical  C^sarism.  The  Pope  is  a  Perpetual 
Dictator.  He  was  even  styled  "  the  third  incarna- 
tion of  the  Deity."  When  the  small  yet  influential 
minority  of  the  Vatican  Assembly  yielded  to  pressure 
there  were  still  some  learned,  thoughtful,  and  influen- 
tial men  who  resisted,  chief  of  whom  was  DolHuo-er, 
the  darling  of  Munich.  They  considered  that  they 
represented  the  true  old  Catholic  cause.  They  had 
not  so  much  departed  from  the  Papacy,  as  the  Papacy 
had  departed  from  them.  Therein  was  the  true 
Catholicism.  Those  who  admitted  the  new  decrees 
had  in  truth  departed  from  the  Council  of  Trent. 
We  need  not  tell  the  reason  how  the  Old  Catholic 
resistance  moulded  itself  into  an  ecclesiastical  body, 


msnops  OF  london,  Winchester,  and  durham.     871 

and  obtained  Episcopal  consecration  for  Dr.  Reinkens, 
from  the  old  Catholic  Church  of  Holland,  better 
known  by  the  title  of  the  Jansenist  Church,  a 
term  of  which  they  assuredly  need  not  be 
ashamed.  They  have  now  held  two  great  con- 
gresses, at  Cologne  and  at  Bonn  in  1874,  "  I 
was  present,"  said  Bishop  Browne,  "  only  on  the 
first  day  of  the  meeting  at  Bonn  ;  but  I  can  testify 
to  the  general  good  feeling  and  sober  piety  which 
pervaded  the  whole  assembly,  and  especially  to  the 
learning,  wisdom,  gentleness,  conciliatory  and  yet 
decided  spirit  of  the  grand  old  man  who  presided 
over  our  councils."  These  two  councils  have  exhibited 
the  greatest  practical  steps  towards  the  unity  of 
Christendom  that  have  been  known  for  ages.  They 
have  cultivated  friendly  sympathies  not  only  with 
the  Greek  and  Latin  Churches,  but  with  Anglicans, 
Americans,  Scandinavians,  and  the  Lutherans,  and 
Evangelicals  of  Germany,  France,  and  Switzerland. 
They  have  succeeded  in  awakening  a  thrill  of  genuine 
Christian  sympathy  throughout  Christendom.  There 
was  a  time  when  the  Anglican  Church  was  pointed 
to  as  of  all  Christian  bodies  the  fittest  to  serve  as 
an  instrument  of  unity.  But  our  own  aggravated 
dissensions,"  says  the  Bishop,  "  and  the  suspicion 
with  which  Continental  Roman  Catholics  regard  all 
Continental  Protestants  (clubbing  Anglicans  with 
them)  as  being  only  infidels  in  disguise,  make  our 
position  increasingly  less  hopeful."  The  Bishop  of 
Ely,  like  Dr.  Wordsworth  on  other  occasions,  made 
a  manful  exhibition  of  his  sympathy,  for  which  he 
has  had  to  endure  some  amount  of  sharp  criticism. 
"  Hitherto   they  have    made   a  noble   stand    against 

BB   2 


372  OUR   BISHOPS    AND    DEANS. 

tyranny  and  falsehood,  and  have  not  been  hurried 
into  error  and  unbelief.  All  Christendom  stands  in 
jeopardy;  all  faith  is  on  its  trial,  all  churches  are 
shaken.  Surely  it  is  the  part  of  wisdom,  of  charity, 
and  of  piety  to  give  a  fair  field  to  those  who  are 
throwing  themselves  into  the  thick  of  the  battle, 
and  hazardino:  the  loss  of  all  thino^s  for  the  truth  and 
love  of  Jesus  Christ."  The  Old  Catholics  simply 
adopt  the  three  creeds  as  their  faith,  and  even  yield 
the  Filioque  clause,  which  was  the  main  cause  of  the 
separation  between  Church  and  State. 

Bishop  Baring  appears  to  have 
Bishop  Baring,  set  the  evil  precedent  of  being  the 
bishop  of  a  party  rather  than  of  a 
diocese.  He  never  disguises  the  fact  that  he  is  a 
party  man,  and  that  all  his  prejudice  and  patronage 
go  alike  with  a  particular  class  of  men.  We  have 
heard  the  story  that  when  he  first  went  to  Gloucester, 
the  citizens  accustomed  to  the  stately  ways  of  old 
Bishop  Monk,  were  scandalized  by  seeing  the  Bishop 
carrying  his  own  carpet-bag  from  the  terminus  to 
the  palace.  It  would  be  well  if  there  were  no  more 
serious  stricture  than  on  manly  simplicity  of  charac- 
ter. But  Durham  is  fast  winning  itself  the  character 
of  being  the  most  perturbed  diocese  in  the  country. 
The  good  point  in  itself  that  the  Bishop,  although  from 
a  merely  intellectual  point  of  view,  he  has  singularly 
falsified  the  expectations  excited  by  a  brilliant  career 
at  Oxford — is  a  singularly  earnest,  devout  man,  bent 
on  fulfilling  with  all  his  energies  his  own  conceptions 
of  his  duty.  But  the  remark  has  been  made,  well 
illustrating  the  nearness  of  extremes  that  the  Bishoj) 


BISHOPS  OF  LONDON,  WINCHESTER,  AND  DURHAM.       373 

has  constructed  a  sort  of  theory  of  Episcopal  Infal- 
HbiHty.  One  of  the  grave  defects  of  our  present 
laws,  one  of  the  matters  that  vehemently  call  for 
Church  Reform,  is  that  the  Bishop  possesses  a  tyran- 
nical power  over  the  curates  of  his  diocese,  whom  he 
can  dismiss  and  inhibit,  without  any  cause  shown,  by 
a  wave  of  the  hand,  a  stroke  of  his  pen.  This  power 
is  generally  allowed  to  lie  dormant,  but  it  is  at 
any  time  liable  to  be  executed  in  a  vindictive  and 
indiscreet  way.  Unsatisfied  by  the  immense  power  he 
possesses,  the  Bishop  has  aimed  at  its  expansion  by 
demanding  written  pledges  both  from  incumbent  and 
curate,  which  they  are  unable  to  give.  The  Bishop 
then  lays  the  parish  under  an  interdict,  refusing  the 
aid  it  urgently  requires,  and  coolly  remarking 
"  that  if  is  almost  invariably  the  result  of  any  trans- 
gression of  the  law  that  the  innocent  are  involved  in 
the  consequences,  and  often  suffer  more  severely 
than  the  offender."  The  Bishop  would  say,  and  also 
some  other  like  bishops  who  have  arrived  at  a  similar 
determination,  that  this  is  almost  their  only  weapon 
to  restrain  clergymen  who  will  not  listen  to  their 
admonitions,  and  refuse  to  obey  the  law. 

The  Bishop  of  Durham  in  the  course  he  has  pur- 
sued has  been  able  to  conciliate  for  himself  an  extra- 
ordinary amount  of  sympathy  and  support  among  the 
laity  of  his  diocese.  This  has  taken  the  unusual 
practical  turn  of  presenting  him  with  a  guarantee 
fund  of  upwards  of  seven  thousand  pounds,  and 
knowing  what  is  known  of  the  extraordinary  expenses 
of  ecclesiastical  suits,  it  is  hardly  likely  that  the  sum 
expended  will  fall  short  of  the  sum  guaranteed. 
The   sum   was   raised   by    a   very    large   number   of 


374  OUE  BISHOPS  AND  DEANS. 

persons,  between  three  and  four  thousand  laymen  in 
the  diocese.  It  may  be  added  as  a  new  indication  of 
woman's  rights,  that  amid  all  the  gentlemen  there 
was  just  one  lady  who  insisted  that  her  name  should 
be  put  down,  and  would  take  no  denial.  Bishop 
Baring  has  very  honestly  said  that  he  is  a  party  man, 
and  does  not  claim  to  be  anything  else.  He 
is  perhaps  the  most  distinct  Low  Church  Bishop 
on  the  bench ;  but  there  are  distinct  High  Church 
Bishops  as  well,  although  the  avowal  may  not  be  so 
frankly  made,  and  there  is  great  value  in  such  a 
representative  man  being  found  on  the  Episcopal 
bench. 


END    OF    THE    FIJiST    VOLUME. 


London;  Piinted  by  A.  Schiilze,  13,  Poland  Street. 


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