On this page

• Text (4)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    Untitled Article

  • 

    Untitled Article

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Untitled Article

    foility of securing a real Liberal representation , and the serious demoralization implied "by the undervaluing of political oaths , we cannot see any : course for the party to pursue except of persisting in a solemn refusal to identify itself with the institutions of the Empire .

    Untitled Article

    THE DITCHER DECISION . There are a few questions we should like to put without , however , the faintest hope of getting a satisfactory answer , and , among others , these : — Are the parties who . ¦ stirred ; up and promoted the suit that led to the sentence of deprivation against Archdeacon Deitison satisfied with the present issue of the contest ; and can they , with quiet consciences , look upon their work and say it is good—for the Church of England ? I > oes Mr . Ditcher feel more comfortable ?

    Is the Venerable Archdeacon Law of opinion that the Bath Judgment is likely to lead to that acme of perfection in conditions ecclesiastical—' Repose ? ' The Vicar of South Brent may smile complacently on his work ; but his secret partizan , the Archdeacon of AV ^ ells , if we do not misjudge ; human nature , must have some odd misgivings respecting the part he has played—preaching the doctrine of repose , practising the doctrine of contention !

    Two eminent members of the Church have spoken out on this question—the Bishop of Exeteb and the Reverend Fbedebick Maurice . The clergy of Exeter are uneasy and alarmed at the Bath judgment ; and they have appealed , as beseems them , to Henuy , the pillar of their faith . He is a courageous person and not easily alarmed " , so that he does not share their trepidations . But what does he say ? He stands fast by the penal statute of Elizabeth , " provided it be fairly dealt with" — that is , dealt with so as to secure the ascendancy of his party . But

    here his conservatism ends . He questions the authority of the Bath court , he qtiestions the validity of the Bath judgment ; he is almost , if not quite , of opinion that it is no court at all . If it be a court it is an inferior one , and Mr . Denison may be turned out of one diocese to find a place in another . And he does not seem to see the scandal of such an alternative . A clergyman may be condemned for teaching false doctrine in one district , and preferred for teachiug it in another ; and in both be a member of the Church of England !

    Mr . Maurice does not take the same ground as the Bishop of Exethk . [ Far from it . In his eyes the Church is wide enough to hold Denisox and Ditcher . He would take both the Articles and the Scripture , and read the one by the light-of the other . But if lie arrive at . a different conclusion from that expressed in any Articles ? Then he would leave the holder in quiet possession of his opinion ; nay , he would permit him to

    teach it ; hut lie would not permit him to impose it as a test upon others . It is well known that Mr . Denison applied his opinions as ordination tests . Mr , Maitiiici ; objects to that ; " but short of that he seems to favour liberty of opinion within the Church . Tons , however , this looks very like a doctrine thnt would destroy the Church of England as an ecclesiastical preserve , and throw its gates very wide indeed . But , then , what becomes of the Articles ?

    In accordance with these views Mr . Maurice asks the Privy Council , in judging Mr . De > isom ' s case , should it reach that tribunal , to act on the principle which they followed in the case of Mr . Goriiaiu :. The judgment in that case , he remarks , was hailed by the laity as representing their interest . Mr . Maurice is a single-minded pastor , and perhaps does not see why the judgment suited the laity . It suited them because they include a vast number of . patrons ' of livings , aiul livings are as much property as stock ,

    and the value of livings , as property , would have been depreciated had the Privy Council sustained instead of reversing Sir Jisnnei ? Fust's decision , ami as they will be depreciated should the Privy Council sustain instead of revei-sing the decision of the 'Archbishop of Canteruu ' h'Y . So , this great vested interest being on his side , Mr . Mauricu ' s views are likely to -triumph , and one more flagrant proof be given that it is not unity of divine truth , but a comivion-place interest in property , thnt holds the Church of England together ,

    Meanwhile , as quiet . onlookers , we may be permitted to point out some serious aspects of the question . If the principle of the Bath Judgment is affirmed , it will be a precedent , a signal for further strife , a declaration of ' open war between the two great parties in the Church ? If it be not affirmed , then the dictum of a Prince of the Church respecting the doctrine of the Eucharist will be overruled and set aside , not by a council of ecclesiastics , but by that temporal court the Judicial Committee of the Privv Council . How

    great the scandal ! The fact that the Church of England is a ' compromise , ' that it is a temporal institution resting on a basis of expediency , will he more than ever manifest . But if it be affirmed , if it should turn out that there is no appeal from the decision of the Archbishop of Canterbury , the consequences may be even more momentous .

    According to the Bath Judgment , except in cases where the language of the Articles clearly admits of more than one interpretation , the clergy of the Church . must accept the Articles absolutely and without appeal to Scripture . Dr . Lushingtojt , on behalf " of the archbishop , distinctly laid it down that the court could admit of no reference

    whatever to Scripture or the writings of great lights of the Church to prove the soundness of dogmas contrary to the clear meaning of the Articles . This being so , what becomes of the right of private judgment—that Protestant charter of freedom for which so many have died in martyrdom ? Mark tho effect . The assumption is that the learned divines who drew up the Articles had performed a final analysis of Scripture , and the fruit of tlieir labours is hung like a millstone round the necks of tho clergy of our Established Church . Well may the llov . ^ Frederick Maurice say , in his letter to IPraser ' s

    Magazine , that " the circumstances of this [ tho Djbnison ] trial force the whole question of our subscription to the Articles , and of tho allegiance to the Scriptures which these Articles demand , upon our understandings and consciences . " Clearly that is so . Which shall it be — Articles or Scriptures?—in other words , Papacy or private judgment ? And how curious it is that the parties who have raised this case against Mr . Denison should be identical with thoao who abhor the Papacy the most , and laud privato judgment to the Blues !

    Untitled Article

    LAST CHIUSTMAS-DAY . We wero at war last Christ mas- clay , and wo arc ill ; war now . Then it was with Russia ; now it is witli her client . Our well-informed friends were on that day positively assured that she would accept tho Vienna proposals , and in another direction , quite ? as positively informed that she would not . There was then tho samo tnllc of a pacifying Congress as there is now . France was weary after the efforts of the war ; Naples was adulterating her money ; America was hesitating whether to dismiss Mr . Cramptonj tho finny in the

    Crimea was in possession of Sevastopol , waiting for orders ; an Imperial Prince was expected . The world knows well how these matters have turned out ; how Prance forced us into the peace ; how 3 N " aples has not improved after our scolding ; how Mr . Crampton came to England , and was followed , in due course , by Captain Hartsteif , with the Resolute ; how the Crimean arm y has come home ; how the Imperial Prince has been made Lord of

    Biscayj Legionary of Honour , and a military grandee . Time has passed less changefully in other quarters . Sir John Deatt PauVj and liis partners have had rather more than their first year in prison ; William Palmer , last Christmas-day , was doubtful of his fate ; Bedpath sat brilliantly at tlie head of a lustrous table , and people said ,. " What capital dinners that fellow gives ! how can he afford it ?' ¦ ' And UoBSOK , not then in a canarycoloured suit , was lord of Kilburu Priory .

    Other names have been newly stamped in the year 1856 . Last Christinas-day Lord Lucaist had not so utterly " broken down as he has since ; we had not heard of the unhap 2 \ y Lord Cardigan ' s dream of his lost leg at Balaklava ; we bad only that week read the third and fourth volumes of Macaulay ? s History ; we were still asked "What do you think of ' Hiawatha ?'" Mr .

    WadbiN'&TON had not yet been driven from the Eastern Counties chair ; General Wixiiams was in the hands of the enemy ; the Edinburgh Protestants were tingling after the retort of D ' Azegxio ;—Earth has not made much progress . It has morally abolished Lord Luc an and Cardigan ; it has thanked and rewarded General Williams ; Scotland has attacked Mr . Macaulat ; and the Eastern Counties have discarded Mr .

    Waddingto . 3 * . We have hanged Palmer and Dove ; we have transported HousoN , and put Snell to hard labour ; we have Hedpatii in custody ; and the great gold robbery is in course of elucidation ; but we go oil murdering , garotting , and embezzling , capital punishments , transportation , the crank , and the general advance of society notwithstanding . We are at peace with llussia and at war with Persia . The independence of Sardinia has been strengthened , and the independence of Switzerland is menaced . Marley is hanged , and the Dublin assassination remains

    undetected . We ' keep going , ' and that is all . It is as much as wo can expect . We try to do no more . When we make war , it is as participators in some miserable diplomatic scheme ; when we make peace , it is a peace that ignores the rights of nations . Our justice is sutucient to put the criminal out of sight , without ' ¦ narrowing the channels ot ! crime . We fancy we move , but it is ¦ Time that moves ; we are where we were last Christmas .

    Untitled Article

    THE CASE OF Mn . 1 IEN 11 Y COUT . " The injustice done to an individual , " says " Junius , " " is sometimes of service to tho public ' — meaning , of course , that it arouses them to a consideration of evils which they might otherwise have neglected . " Whether , however , it shall have this vesult or not rests only with themselves . If they listen with apathy to" tho complaints of genuine sufferers , and refuse to aid in obtaining them redress , such cases may be converted into precedents , and entail the worst consequences on future

    generations . Such bus too often been the case among , ourselves . A veracious narrative of tlio wrongs and disappointments with which discoverers in the useful arts have had to contend in this country would bo an instructive page in oursouiul history . The present condition of tho patent law seems to prove how little Englishmen , as a body , stem to care about the rights of their benefactors , or to appreciate their own interest in the promotion of mechanical and scientific ili . ieoverieH . Tlioy love to nbido in the an (!» 0 "t paths , nnd seldom re-

    Untitled Article

    _ Pecember 27 , 1856 . ] THE LEADER . 1237

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 27, 1856, page 1237, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2173/page/13/