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Leader (1850-1860), 5th May 1860, Edition 2 of 2, Page 6

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      Church Dissensions. Where Are Certain We...

      power will only be available towards curates , who are already too much under episcopal control . ,. - . ' . . „ Now , as matters stand at present , every incumbent- is his own roaster in his own parish . His duties are to a ?****}? ' **&&* £ fined , but there is a large margin , in which he is left to his own discretion . The canon law binds him , in some respects , to a cou se of conduct at variance with the feeling of the nation , and he hoWs himself therefore excused from attending to this latter . He may refuse to bury one , and to marry another , He may refuse the sacrament of the Eucharist to persons whose fitness for its reception he doubts . He mav adhere to a multitude of obsolete regulations . colour

      and offend his parishioners every day of his life , under oj keeping his ordination vows , arid showing himself a good and pious son of the Church—and there is no knowing what direction piety may take in some oddly-constituted minds . Stanley Faber tells us of an ecclesiastical dispute , not altogether unlike those which weekly take place at St . George ' s-in-the-East , in which an energetic member of the orthodox party " piously poked out the eye ot Stephen , Archbishop of Grau , with a stick . " We confess that to such exhibitions we entertain a very decided objection . It would matter little to sensible laymen what kind of robes the clergy ot parishes thoueht fit to wear—green and gold , red and yellow , copes ,

      albs , dalmaticas , stoles , and all the wardrobe of mediajval Eome might be adopted ; and , if this were all , it mightall be done without offence : but , when we know that these mummeries are inconsistent \ rith sound common sense- ^ that if a man show himself to be a fool in small matters , he is very likely to be one in affairs of greater consequence , and that the man whose mountebank tricks and harlequin dress offend and disgust us every Sunday is in many respects the most important personin the parish , that he has the especial duty of instructing the ignorant , and training the children of the poor , — character

      then things , in themselves of little moment , assume a grave . At all events , the entire destruction of that devotional feeling which ought to characterize the attendants on public worship is not a light evil ; and this , no one can doubt , is the consequence of such absurdities as those which are witnessed , week after week ,... at- St . George ' s . But a still grayer importance attaches to these practices when we knowTthat they are SQ-decidedly the . badges ^ of ^ a party as to indicate , in almost every possible direction , the opinions of those who adopt them . A man wears an embroidered robe of many colours ^—he fancies that the rubrics bear him out in so doing ; he

      is therefore opposed to a revision of the Liturgy ; he adheres as far as possible tojihe canon law , because he imagines that all his practices are in accordance with its provisions ; he therefore opposes any alteration in the present most iniquitous arrangements about marriage . He knowsi " + v . ot if the Voluntary svstem couloV only prevail forViie hour 7 he andTiis abettors would " " deprived ot an . ywj ™ C » troubling the Church ' s peace ; therefore he stands up for Church rates and all similar imposts , and he vehemently resists the slightest introduction of the lay element into Church polity . He believes that his party have , and will continue to have , the distribution ot the loaves and fishes ; he therefore has no desire _ to see . wrings equalised , or the poorer clergy elevated as a class . He would take —^ nen-of ^ Hound-Ghurch ~ yie ^ vs ^ -out-ofUhe ^ ir ; e . ^ Jl ut he woul d , , wish the mire to remain for the others to stick in . Holding what are called " sacramental opinions , " he does not recognise dissent as Christianity , and therefore ha 3 nothing to do with those societies

      ( such as the Bible Society ) in which the co-operation ot Nonconformists is allowed . He opposes the Church Missionary ^ Society and the Pastoral-Aid Society , or at least withholds from them all aid , on the ground that the one is not in safe hands , and that the other has a large mixture of the laity in its composition . The character thus described is consistent enough , foolish , we grant , and unchristian , but unhappily by no means rare ; and his mode of celebrating divine service may be , and is , taken as an index ot the man ' s opinions on all . other points of doctrine and discipline . At results from this , not very logically perhaps , that in . the popular mind all who agree with him on any one of the multifarious subjects in dispute are supposed to agreo with him in them all . He Encourages the notion himself as far as he enn , and would have ¦ the world believe , that the ten thousand clergymen who have signed tho document lately addressed to , Lord Eb , ur . y , and deprecating any change in the Liturgy , are with him in all his ways of , thinking and Churcii 01

      acting . It would be a bad thing for the . ungiana n there were ten , thousand of her ministers like Mr . Bryan Kino . But it is what a large . number of the laity do believe ; and unless the ten thousand can beat a , retreat as slcilful as was that ot Xenophon , the notion will increase in strength , and spread widely . It can hardly faij to . . tell , with deadly force upon the Church rate question ; and that once settled adversely to the Church , it requires no prophet to see that tithes will bo the next object of attack ; and to alienate tho affections of tho , laity at such a juncture is , a most suicidal proceeding . Little dp the ton thousand think of tho mischief they have done , and a . very , gmalL portion of which is now m their power to undo—little do " ,, they know aow the laity m general read their dooument , and what has already been its effect m tj » e House of Commons . : ¦ ¦ •_ .

      We shall be told that ages ago the Church Establishment was threatened with sweeping reform , and that in the reign pf Henby IV . the axe was a ] bput , to be laid , to the root of the tree that threatened men hero long , and tliat the Church \ a certainly less corrupt now than it was im the fifteenth century . Wo are willing to admit the last proposition , but not to the extent that its advancers require . The Church in her temporalities is extremely corrupt at the present time ; and if Church rates are dopmed , the thin end of the wedge is already inserted . We are not likoly to see the foil of tithes m a

      hurry . The present generation will pass away , and leave them behind as an existing institution of the English Church ; but they are only safe for a comparatively short time . It will take more dotation , a longer period , ana the aid of more powerful men to uproot them , than have been necessary to uproot Church rates , because the interests involved are greater ; the laity are largely concerned , and the whole hierarchy will hold up their hands to preserve their property . But when we recollect how short a time has elapsed since Thobogood of Braintree was , in the late Mr . Barnes ' s admirable language , " a feather-bed martyr , a parlour boarder in the school of tribulation , an inside passenger to glory , we shall , on considering the present position of the Church rate question , be able to work out a similar problem with respect to tithes . ... ' .

      _ Now , we wish our readers , and especially our clerical readers , not to mistake our object . We are not arguing in favour of abolishing either tithes or Church rates . We are merely looking with open eyes on the signs of the times ; and we put them on their guard , not , in the present temper of the public mind , to provoke the enmity of the people , not needlessly to confirm the idea that there are ten thousand medievalists—half Romanizers—among our clergy , and not to lose any means of conciliation which it may be in their power to adopt .

      418 The Leader And Saturday Analyst. . [...

      418 The Leader and Saturday Analyst . . [ May 5 , I 860 .

      The Pullingee, Frauds. " Joint Stock Com...

      THE PULLINGEE , FRAUDS . " JOINT Stock Company" has well nigh become a cant term for « J a rogues' nest , and unless the morality of these institutions can be improved , honourable men will shrink from being directors , and the management of associated enterprises will fall entirely , as it has already done to a large extent , into the hands of speculative tricksters , who prefer an exciting career of plunder to one of steady industry and slow accumulation . In some instances of defalcations , the directors have been the parties directly guilty of the offence , as in the case of those fraudulent banks and swindling assurance offices whose names have become feloniously familiar . In other instances the robberies have been committed byservants , such as Eobson at the- Crystal Palace , Redpath at the Great Northern , and PraxiNGEB at the Union Bank ; but in all these casesthe directorshave pursued a course of conduct that naturally Jed to the calamitous result . In the Crystal Palace there was a-recklessness both of- calculation and assertion ; the affair cost three times as mucli as the shareholders ] were originally led to expect , and _ a system of profligate expenditure went on with scarcely an attempt at check " . The wonder was , not that a single official was detected in plundering , but that the malversations did not reach a much larger amount . VhrriinnfNTrtv riimf

      ' , .. ¦ t . hfim vpioiced in a chairman who di ?«! ivcd ei ' eac vhry .. Mrtvt . hem reioiced in a chairman Wsiq «! Spiaycci greac aclfvifcyin " niahitaTii ] ng- " his position against a discontented proprietary ; but the " Board" could find no time for that accurate supervision of accounts that would have detected , the transactions of JRedpath long before they reached the enormous amount of £ 240 , 000 . The directors were not in the habit of inquiring into the appropriation of the large sum set apart for the payment of dividends , and by this gross negligence they facilitated the robbery that took mace . ~ ' ' " *"" ¦ : " ~ " ^ ¦ ¦' ' ¦ _ ' . ~ Z After the confidence of the public had been shaken by a remarkable series of ioint stock company frauds , Mr . H . L . Morgan , the

      accountant employed to investigate the Patti , and Manini delinquencies , brought the question of directors' duties and responsibilities , to a focus in an able pamphlet , in which he pointed out the causes of the catastrophes that had taken . place , and indicated the means by which they might be easily avoided in future . Mr . Morgan observed , that honourable men could- only make their position as directors safe by " enforcing a niethod of book-keeping and preparation of statements so clear and complete , as to afford them from day to day and from week to week as accurate a knowledge of , all important facts as a merchant or banker is in the habit of obtaining- in his own counting-house . " Mr . Morgan added , "A director should assume every thing to bo incorrect which he cannot fully understand ; he should take care that an audit is a reality and not a sham , and never suffer a single document to go forth to shareholders or to the public upon the authority of any accountant or auditor , however honest and able , unless it bo so

      arranged as . to give to his own mind , without doubt or difficulty , every information to which his constituents or "tlie public are entitled . " Nothing can bo plainer or ' more reasonable than this advice ; and yet the Union Bunk frauds show how impervious " Boards " are to anything like common sense . Tho particular frauds for which Pujdlinger is now in custody could only have been committed within the five years during which ho held the post of chief cashier , and they amount to a thousand pounds a week for the whole time , and in tho aggregate to £ 203 , 070 . 8 a . lOd . Not once , while these gigantic robberies were beuig committed , could tho directors or manager have adopted a single rational precaution to know the etato bf"tiieir cash affairs and balanoe at the Bank . The story laid before tho public is , that

      PuixiNajEji decoivod the ledger clerk and Board by producing a forge d pass-book , and withheld the rail book from them , while his tricks wore going on . If this be tho case , It will appear that the Management habitually neglected those precautions which arc universally adopted by private firms . When a merchant , sends a clerk to his bankers ' , he not only ascertains that ho takes tho right sum with him , but that hq tulces tho puss-book also , and on his return nothing is ensier than to seo from the entry that the right sum has boon paid in . It is true the clerk might pocket the money und forge the entry : but his employer is accustomed to tho look of tho real

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), May 5, 1860, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_05051860/page/6/