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    780 THE LEAPE B. [No. 334, Saturday ^

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    DENISON MARTYR. G-eorge Anthony Denison ...

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    Lizinff Ideas. J-'Nere No ^"^; ~* ^ Hovv...

    mebston is chairman ? Can it . adopt , with or without the assent of Sir Benjamin Haix , any general plan of drainage ? Or can it take any decisive step , in an important matter , without such assent ? These checks unon the action of a metropolitan council may be salutary ; but they are not self-government . Moreover , they radiate to the parochial vestries , which , nominally more popular , are really less independent than formerly , t > ein <* in large affairs responsible to the Central Board , which is , if not responsible to the Crown , liable to be overruled by one of the

    Crown ministers . But Iiord Paxmerston contemplated a laTger aggression—the reform of the London Corporation . His bill raised an opposition which he declined to meet . The City , and the political friends of the City , would not have that measure , with its suppression of free courts , its creation of dep endent magistrates , its multiplication of judicial tenantsat-will . Tet the opposition is merely one of objection . The City does not propose to amend itself , and the unprivileged inhabitants of the City—who , in this self-governed capital , are not citizens—do not signify that , whether from the Cabinet or from the

    Corporation , they will have reform . The question stands over . Next year the G-overnment , seeing that the City has nothing to propose , will again propose something itself ; and perhaps the metropolis will be centralized after all . Butf the local bodies in counties and boroughs , having lost the control of their own police , and the capital , with the exception of the City , having placed its magistracy in the hands of the G-overnruent , is it fit that the ancient Corporation of London should be so modified as to confer on the Home Secretary a

    large additional stipendiary patronage , so as to make the Downing-street influence supreme throughout the entire metropolitan district ? The Lord Mayor says No—and the Aldermen say No—and the Common Council say No ; but do the Common Council , the Aldermen , and the Lord Mayor suppose that theirs are the only privileges to be respected ? Do they ask for the magistrates of Marylebone the independence they assert for the Alderman of Cheap ? Not at all . Nor do

    they act in any way , except in . opposition . Now if , as we believe , they cannot stay where they are , they must either move in a direction chosen by themselves , or be forced into the direction chosen by the Government . To say " we will not have magistrates removable by the Home Secretary" is one thing ; but to Bay " we will have only our aldermen" is another thing , which will draw numbers of persons into a reluctant support of the Government measure . The nation that

    construes self- government to mean keeping matters as they are , and repelling the interference of the Minister , understands it but slightly . What the Minister attempts , the people should do , as far as possible , in independence of the Minister . YVe should then near little of new measures for putting religion , justice , police , local taxes , and local officers , more completely under the control of a centralized administration .

    It would be a surprising result of constitut * otyi \ progress if this nation , which has manifik * S ; *** power of conquering so many r ^ 7 T ?*®» Bhould not permanently manifest the intellectual power of developing and preserving them . Tet the men who most stubbornly resist the introduction of centralizing innovations in local government , are the men who refuse to

    make those' innovft > . irvr » u -.,., ^~«~ . 1 ... make those innovations unnecessary , by g vtng form and practicabilit y to their own ideas . Jealous of the Home Secretary , they ao nothing to take from him his apology for

    interference—generally plausible as it is . And what does the Church do ? and what the Law ? The Church permits the Prime Minister to make an inroad upon its constitution , and when the novelty has been sanctioned by Parliament no one can reasonably object to it , because no one can deny that the b

    retiring bishops had been incapacitated y age or sickness , and that to have incapable bishops is to convert episcopacy into a sham . Consequently , the Church becomes more dependent and the Minister more powerful , and though the change may be of good effect , it is not , in general , for the interest of the nation to arm the Cabinet with new means

    of influence , which , under different circumstances , might be exercised with an unconditional intention . The Cabinet is already supreme in the conduct of foreign affairs . It can give up boundary lines , negotiate commercial treaties , annul ancient principles of war , surrender fortresses , dispose of all the result of a victorious conflict , or break the European peace before its acts are known to Parliament or the nation . When did the nation learn that Lord Paimebston had concluded the Turkish Convention of 1838 ? When did it

    learn that it was committed to maintain the succession to the crown of Denmark in a line leading directly to the Imperial House of Russia ? As we have little to do in foreign politics but to assent to the policy of the Minister , we may devote some care to the preservation of our municipal institutions against the centralizing process by which states are prepared for despotism . But to resist interference is not enough ; the nation , if it would not be led , must lead ; the Government will undoubtedly do all it can to Becure increased power and patronage , for this is the science of all half-liberal administrations .

    780 The Leape B. [No. 334, Saturday ^

    780 THE LEAPE B . [ No . 334 , Saturday ^

    Denison Martyr. G-Eorge Anthony Denison ...

    DENISON MARTYR . G-eorge Anthony Denison is likely to be driven from his archdeaconry , if not from the Church of England , by the sentence which was pronounced at Bath oa Tuesday . The expulsion of that oppugnant but able and earnest man would be a real misfortune to the Establishment , which has been so long driving from it men that cannot accept particular interpretations of its doctrines . Or it has been retaining within the pale of the Church those who conform outwardly while

    they dissent inwardly , and whose continuance , therefore , stamps the Establishment as one whose members cling to it for the sake of its profits , and juggle the public with ceremonies that they disbelieve . Three months are given to George Anthony for consideration whether he will be content to cry peccavito say he believes what he does not believeor to quit . A less stubborn man would acquiesce ; George Anthony , we doubt , will go . But either way there is an injury to the Establishment . We have seen it thus

    throw off at the two extremities its Baptist Noels and its Dentsons ; and the dominant majority within , are continually labouring to cast off these extremes . The property of the Church remains the same , while its qualifications arc narrowed , and this last judgment ia calculated to carry still further the process of contraction . In one view there is no denying tho

    practical common sense of the judgment . The archdeacon is charged with preaching the doctrine " that tho body and blood of Christ are really , after an immaterial and spiritual manner , iu the consecrated bread ana wine , are therein and thereby given to all , and are received by all who come to the Lord ' s Supper ; " furthermore , thnt to those who eat and drink , whether worthily or

    unworthily , " the body and blood of Christ are received "— doctrines repugnant to the 28 th and 29 th Articles of Religion . Mr . Denisoit has appealed to the Scriptures ; but Dr . Ltjshington avers that the appeal is closed against him . Parliament has pronounced , says Dr . Lttsiiington , in the given form of the Thirty-nine Articles , what are the doctrines of the Church ; " and no proceeding could be more inconvenient or more opposed to law , than that an individual sermon should

    be compared with a number of disputed texts in Scripture . " " Inconvenient "—that is the judge ' s word . We know , indeed , how open to objection the doctrine of Mr . Denison is . On this subject no work could be perused with more advantage than Dr . WHATEiiT ' s recently published pamphlet on " The Bight Principle for the Interpretation of Scripture , " the collected substance of passages in various charges which he lias delivered . Dr . Whately argues that the

    institution of the communion was established by the founder of Christianity , with the plain original understanding that the bread and wine were to be eaten on future occasions in " memory of Me ; " that the communion , therefore , is a commemorative rite , not mystical , or instinct with any of those virtues which fanciful theologians have put upon it . When Mr . Gobham preached the doctrine that grace entered into the act of baptism at a stage entirely different from that assigned , to it by his Bishop , the arguthe Church of

    ment in his defence was , that England admits different interpretations of Scripture . We see the wide severance between Denison and Whately ; but Dr . Lushington tells us that we must not look to Scripture ; we must not compare disputed texts ; we must look to the Thirty-nine Articles—there is the rule by which the Church is to be judged . Now , if we accept the Church of England as a Parliamentary institution—as the appointment of certain qualified persons to diffuse Christianity according to the House of Commons and the House of

    Lords , the principle of Dr . Lushington is complete . In fact , his judgment is an avowal that the Church of England is nothing more nor less than a corporation created by Parliament , appointed by Parliament , governed by Parliamentary regulations , and preaching " the Word" as it is in the Statutes at Large . Mr . Denison appealed to the volume which is regarded as the standard of Christianity ; but , savB Dr . Lushington , it is not the standard

    of the Church of England ;—and we are not in a position to contradict the Deputy of the Archbishop of Canterbury . We must suppose that the Primate and Dr . Lushington give us an authoritative statement of the relation which the Church of England beard to the Legislature , to the people , and the Scriptures ; standing indeed closely connected with the Parliament , but having a vory qualified connexion with the Bible .

    If the force of this judgment be fully understood , we are quite certain that tho genuine religious feeling and spirit of the groat bulk of tho people of this country will oblige them to leave the Church of England amongst other rotten corporations , and to cxerfc themselves for developing in some freer spirit tho true Church " of England , "—that is , the Church of the people and tho country . it

    On a second consideration , however , appears to us that the judgment of D |* - Lushington is calculated to promote this movement moat decidedly and most beneficially . It so completely narrows the ground for tho corporate profession , that there in us t bo a reaction against it . It is inconsistent with tho fucts of tho day , as well aa with tho opinions of tho majority of Christians who doBire to remain connected with tho Church ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 16, 1856, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_16081856/page/12/