On this page

• Departments (2)
  • 
  • 
• Text (5)

  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

  • 

    THE " OBDINATION SEUYICE."

  • 

    WHAT IS AN AUDITOR?

• 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

    Sir Charles Napier ' s advocacy of Admiral Hope is an illustration of the readiness with which " reformers " are ready to sacrifice their principles for the . sake of themselves or their friends ; l > ut Iiord C . Pa get ' s quietthough severe rebuke will prove useful in enlightening inauy obtuse understandings . It was , however , marred by a statement that Admiral Hope ' s conduct had the approval of the Government . It was a most manifest ease of reprehensible carelessness to assail the front of a position without recoiinoitering it , -and to send brave men to stick in the mud and be shot at , without any reasonable

    prospect that the sacrifice would lead to any corresponding beneficial result . Such blunders ought not to have the approval of any Government , however \ yell-coimected their authors may be . Sir C . Napier thinks his pet admiral has been depreciated in order that Mi \ Bruce should be unduly extolled . If this has occurred , an injustice has been done . i 3 oth functionaries did the stupidest tiling open to them ; and if we had an Order of Pemerit , no objection could be made to their taking rank in it immediately below the Grand Crosses that would be bestowed upon the Court favourites ' of the Russian wai \

    Untitled Article

    T HE secession from the ranks of the Established Church by tlie Rev : Canon Wodehouse is not only one amongst the many ominous signs of the times in relation to ecclesiastical reform , but js an event to be regretted by every . true friend of the doctrine and discipline by which that Church is upheld . But it is consolatory to ^ predict that as fro m present evil much futu re gopd ultimately results , so from this loss of a faithful , labourer in the vineyard of the Establishment inquiries and scrutinies into the cause of it may be wholesom difica

    instituted , which will lead to amendments and . e mo - tions . This secession is the more to be deplored , because the reverend' dignitary was neither a popularity-seekuig Calvinistic lpreacher , nor a pervert to Popery or the kindred practices ^ of iPuseyism . He is a conscientious divine , whose maturer studies in tlieqiogy have led him to a review of certain doctrines in the Book of" Common Pi * ayer , which in his earlier examination of that volume he accepted without difficulty , and which , it would seem , at the time of his ordination he bad received without hesitation or

    without qualification that if they mean nothing the sooner they are removed from the ordination service the better for the cause of common sense , plain dealing , and true religion . The bishops themselves , With certain , exceptions ; to which it is not necessary more particularly to allude , are aware of the necessity of explaining away what appears to most persons to be a definite and explicit claim to the power of giving supernatural authority by one man to another , and accordingly in those books which are put into the hands of candidates for ordination , all such glosses and all such arguments as human ingenuity can suggest , and such pleading as acuteness of intellect can supply , are made use of to explain and qualify the startling affirmation . Thus , young men , who like ! Mr . Wodehouse have at the time of ordination made little progress in divinity , receive with the indifference of ignorance or the imbecility of reliance" on others what in their maturer years and more extended knowledge they repudiate and abjure . ¦ " .. ' ' . - - ¦

    distrust ., ' . . - . ¦ ¦ .. ¦ .. ' ¦ : ¦ .. ¦ ¦ ¦ . . '¦ ¦ : We feel considerable anixiety lest , in calling the attention of oiir readers to this subject , our motives may be misinterpreted , and we unintentionally give offence where we intend '' none . '' ' Our object , as members of the Christian community generally , and of the Established Church of England particularly , is to labour in our vocation for the universal good of our brethren , a . id , as honest journalists , tq record , all events impartially , accompanied by fitting comments . Mr . Wodehotjse , in a letter to the Bishop of Noiivricn , which has been published in the columns of the daily press , has himself explained the motives of his secession ; t o that document , which is too long for our limited spacej we must refer our readers ,

    contenting pui'selves with such extracts irom it as are necessary aright comprehension and estimate of its tendency and importance Mr , WoDEH ; otfsE Writes thus : " Ordained in 1814 ; in less than three years I became an incumbent and prebendary of Norwich . Led in after-years to examine more particularly the subscriptions required from clergymen , I came to the conclusion ' "that I could not assent , hi what I conceive to be the literal and established sense of our language , tp the following parts of our Liturgy , viz ., the damnatory clauses of the Athanasian Crqed ; the form of absolution in the visitation of the sick ; the woivjs used at the imposition of hands in the ordination of priests , and in the consecration of bishops / ' We assume that everybody is in possession of a Prayer Book , though , we fear , most persons very seldom examine those portions which do not 1

    relate immediately to the morning and eveningservices . We will refer them to some parts of th ' ta Liturgy to which the ex » canon objects , and content ourselves with an extract or t \ yo from the Ordination and Consecration services , and the Absolution , which is -consequent from the power therein conferred , leaving to their own judgment any opinions for or against the Athanasian Creed . The conscience of the reverend seceder has been offended by the words in the Ordination service of priests , which are therein adopted « s taken from the twenty-second chapter ' of Jhe Gospel of § t . John , and , which are used by the bishop when he lays his hands on those admitted to the holy office : " Whose soever sins ye reinit , tjiey are remitted unto them ; and whose soever sins ye retain , they live retained . " Many years ago , he tolls us , ho sought counsel of Dr . Ka , ye , then Bishop of Lincoln , who subsequently , in the House of Lords , stated the particulars of the interviewnnd then avowed that if tlie ex >

    , canon had expressed to him as a candidate for holy orders the same views which ho now entertains of the import of those words , he ( the bishop ) would nevertheless have ordained him , Now these words have either & most serious import or they have not , —^ no loss a meaning than the communication directly made by the bishop of a power conferred by the Messiah himself upon his chosen apostles and abiding by implication in the Church , to be by it , dispensed , through the instrumentality of bishops and , priests to the U \ ity , If those words , have not : such a signification , wl ' iat import have * they . P . What notions of their force the Jate Dr . Kaxb hud arrived at , we are unable to affirm ; but with all our respect for that prelate , . and with nil duo reverence for his character as an able scholar , we cannot but express our surprise nt his avowal ; and we must state

    Untitled Article

    SOME honest tradesmen , whose acquirements at school did not comprehend "b ookkeeping by single and double entry , ' * employ ah accountant to keep them aware of their own position , and to prove their honesty to the creditors of the concern . Other tradesmen there are who need no such assistance , but who practise the system of double entry not to protect their creditors , but to secure a good balance < mt of < a fraudulent bankruptcy . A case of this latter kind we remember when the Great Northern Railway introduced competition in the coal trade . The dealer in question sold coals at a loss , in order to keep up his connection ; and knowing well where this must end , charged " domestic expenses ¦ " at double the amount actually spent , in order to enable him to commence trade again . . ; . ;• ¦;¦ : '

    So some public institutions employ auditors to set forth every item of their expenditure , and convince their constituents that , the whole is properly appropriated ; whilst others ( judging from their reports and ; from the lumping fashion of their balance sheets ) use their auditors as a blind to enable thejn . still to fawn upon a benevolent public , and to misapply thei sums intrusted to their care . Widows and orphans suffer ^ whil st Officials grow fat ; subscriptions to annihilate heathenism abroad are pocketed by worse than heathens at home , and money intended to distribute Bibles here and abroad is devoured in the shape of . fat capons washed down with bid port and madeira . ¦

    '; In one society , whose proceedings have latterly attracted public notice , iiearly £ 'iOO 4 s consumed : by the adjournment of a dinner , tempting the reader to inquire what the dinner itself would have cost had it been eaten instead of being adjourned . Another society , whose professed object is to spread the -Gospel in foreign parts , and whose annual expenditure is more than £ 87 , 000 , puts down over £ 4000 as expenses of deputations , £ " 2000 for printing , and other £ 2000 for salaries . The society has £ 88 , 000 and upwards invested * but accounts including the whole of these large sums appear to have been audited by two of the standing committee . Of course every thing may be properly expended , but it looks ill for the men .

    who have had the handling of the rnonies and the whole control or the society to audit their own accounts , to be their own check , to affirm their own honestjv Again , the Church Missionary Society shows in its balance sheet interest on investments , £ 3600 ; but the same balance sheet shows investments , the interest on which ought to amount to considerably more ; and in this case also the auditors appear to be two of tlie standing committee and one life governor . In the Merchant Seamen ' s Orphan Society there is an item put down as receivable which is really a defalcation by the secretary ; that is , they reckon as an asset a sum of money which has been stolen .

    We have an old adage ,, that when things get to the worst they will mend , and it may surely bo hoped that these sham audits , both in benevolent societies ana joint stock companies , have nearly reached " their worst phase . The situation of auditor . is' a niost responsible and a most difficult one , but the interests involved in an honest or dishonest audit are so immense ; that any dereliction of duty ought to send the auditor to , succeed Sir John Dean Paui . at knitting nightcaps , or to Western Australia to join Leoi'OLD Redjpath . . An auditor is generally a salaried officer , . who in return for his appointment too often feels inclined to humour the officials whose conduct he ought to check ; and then an audit , instead of beipg a searching investigation into every item of expenditure , so as to decide if it is proper or improper in land and amount , becomes simply a test of tlie correctness of certain columns of compound such

    addition , all else boing assumed to bo quite proper . But if auditing leads people to invest in insolvent concerns , by representing rotten investments as sound , then assuredly the Fraudulent Trustees Act ought to operate . against the fraudulent auditor . Tlie Juw ot privileged communications would quite justify pny exposure by an auditor to subscribers or shareholders for the protection of their property , and jf he obtains ; money under the false pretence of auditing when he really neglects to audit , ho deserves the heaviest punishment which the law can award . It is a sorry foot . that auditors , like other men , are sometimes punished for their truthfulness ; juid it is worse that the public should , neither move to compensate the loser nor to alter the system , in fact , bo far as the public cjepartmenta are concerned , truth to say * honesty is not the l > e » t policy in this world . J ? or instance , Mr . Bkutolaoci , late auditor of the Duchy of Lancaster , refused tocertiry that a certain property had been sold for tlie best pneo obtainable , because he was not furnished with the means of proving it , ana lor

    Untitled Article

    Feb . 18 , I 860 . ] Thev Leader ' and Saturday \ Analyst . 159

    The " Obdination Seuyice."

    THE " OBDINATION SEtlYICE . "

    What Is An Auditor?

    WHAT IS AN AUDITOR ?

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 18, 1860, page 159, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2334/page/11/