same way as monastic houses claimed a similar exemption in former days for the device is in reality of Popish growthmuch as if, at the present time, while half of the clergy in Cornwall were under the sway of its Bishop, the other half, independent of his authority, were to be subject immediately to the management of local or London committees, with a sort of general distant supervision to be exercised by the Archbishop of Canterbury. The spirit of independence and disunion that is breathed in such a proposal would be mighty in mischief should a strong temptation be presented to the Society, with its welldisciplined organization, to become the centre, organ, and guide of a large party. It is, indeed, the temptation to which all selfformed powerful bodies are exposed, to set themselves above the system out of which they sprung. Even now we cannot but fear -nay, we see slight indications of the tendency-that if this ill-advised demonstration of the Committee should be met, as it ought to be met, by a protest from members of the Society, it will be immediately constituted a party question; opponents will be denounced as Tractarians, and the Committee be elevated to the rank of Confessors for the liberty of the Gospel and Protestant freedom of conscience. Still, notwithstanding this-and this is the real practical point-we do think that it is the duty of, at least, the members of the Committee, those clergy who are such by their office, to give this subject candid and deliberate attention; to form and to express their opinion whether they intend to adopt the view promulgated in their name, that in the early stages of missions episcopal authority, present and active in them, is to be dispensed with; that no additional diocese is to be erected in heathen lands till the proper authorities' sanction a code of rules and canons, by which a new polity for the ordering of Bishops and Missionaries is to be provided; and so these missions be reduced virtually to a department of State action and machinery. We are bold to say that such is not their view, not their determination; we believe that others have abused their confidence, and spoken in their name without their concurrencethat they have been betrayed; and therefore we venture to submit to them whether it is not incumbent on them to free themselves from the imputation thus recklessly cast upon them. More especially, we deem it the duty of the Prelates, who are Vice-Presidents of the Society, and prominent members of the Committee, to declare and to clear themselves in this matter. They are greatly compromised by this manifesto, and placed in a most discreditable contradiction to themselves. The very position and value of their own order in one of the most important, nay, in the apostolic functions of the Church, is called in question and repudiated. Their inherent rights are challenged in their

brethren. For it is not merely the question whether or not an addition to the Episcopate in India-and especially a Bishop in Tinnevelly--is needed, that is raised; but whether a portion of their spiritual authority is not to be curtailed, and surrendered to the new rights claimed by committees and societies in virtue of their acting as almoners in the supply of funds.1 Of course, the Committee would eagerly assert that they wish these new canons and rules to apply only to missionary operations in heathen lands, and not to touch the polity of the Church at home. But the question cannot be so restricted; what is good and just for a society supporting clergy or catechists in their ministry abroad, is equally good and just for a society maintaining clergy and readers, or other agencies, in the very same kind of ministry at home. And if our spiritual rulers are content to see their authority encroached upon abroad, they must be prepared to see a similar inroad upon it made at home. They must expect that a like demand-and we do not see how they can oppose the demand once conceded to one Society-will be made in behalf of the Church Pastoral-Aid, or the Additional Curates' Society, who are engaged among our paganized populations at home, as the Church Missionary Society is engaged among the pagan populations in India. They must expect committees to urge the 'rights' of the societies who supply the funds, and of themselves in particular, who hold the purse-strings.' They must look for a protest that the 'clergy of the Society' are not to be treated as merely stipendiary-mere licensed-curates. They must prepare to hear of the 'undefined,' 'arbitrary' power of Bishops, and their 'idiosyncrasies' and 'partialities, and the trouble they have given rise to. And should they innocently and blandly interfere in some case involving the character of the Society's clergy,' they must abide to be cavalierly and laconically requested by the secretary to 'confine themselves to official information'! We doubt whether they are yet prepared for this; but if they would avert it, they must interpose now: for their authority is invaded. We are not amongst those who make an idol of Episcopacy. As Catholic Christians, we are something more than mere Episcopalians. Still, we do feel this; that the assertion and maintenance of our episcopal polity, besides proving a special

1 While, however, we would vindicate the rightful authority of the Bishop, we are far from calling in question the special duty which belongs to every Society as trustee of charitable funds, of the disposal of which it must give full and strict account. Every Missionary Society is bound, in fidelity to its contributors, to satisfy itself that proper agents are chosen to engage in the work. When chosen, they are under the Bishop's jurisdiction: but the Society is still bound to ascertain, by communications from themselves, that they are engaged in work of the character contemplated by the Society, and to inform itself of the results of such work.

blessing inherent in its ministry, has been and is our great protection against tyranny, whether of one or of a multitude. The first stroke of a rising, encroaching tyranny in the Church has ever been to depress the Episcopate; and this act has been the prelude of great subsequent disorder. It indicates the presence of some corrupt or anomalous growth in the system. The Pope depressed the Bishops in order to strengthen his own power; the mendicant friars and monastic houses then claimed exemption from episcopal control; and the end of all this, in England at least, we all know. The Jesuits, again-submissive at first, and professing, as the Committee of the Church Missionary Society profess, the sense of the great value of episcopal supervision-when they grew strong, asserted a proud independence; they would not be interfered with; and in Paraguay and India they were engaged in most unseemly and disastrous conflicts with Prelates first, and then with the Pope, which threw the whole Church into disorder.

It is no ingenuity in tracing mischief that leads us to note the working of the same spirit of self-aggrandizement and of faction, the same disloyalty to authority, recourse to all secular means to support its influence, and a disingenuous evasiveness, in the proceedings of a body so eminently Protestant as that which is under review. Nor will less evil arise from this dissocializing temper. An irregular power can only be strong when the legitimate is weak. And should the conflict, which so many signs seem to portend, draw on, such a spirit must inevitably be found in opposition to the Episcopate; and it will hasten on and infinitely aggravate the danger of that crisis in which the organization of the Church, and its existence as an establishment, will be at stake. We have long learnt, in the midst of many sad forebodings at home, to cast our eyes abroad, and to be gladdened at the sight of so many daughter Churches springing up in due symmetry, with their legitimate authority rightly developed, and perpetuating unimpaired the apostolic inheritance of truth and order, which we have received from our forefathers, in lands which they knew not of. No less a boon we desire for some of our missions in the East; and most earnestly do we hope that those who have hitherto laboured, with such consistency of aim, to consolidate and enlarge our young communities of Christians in the south of India, will continue to urge their righteous purpose. We do fervently desire to see these missions grow into a Church,-to witness the twenty-nine clergy among their 52,000 converts multiplied two, or three, or four fold, as they undoubtedly would be, under the paternal rule of a man of apostolic spirit,-some of those numerous catechists received into the diaconate,-the feeble pliant temper of the converts strengthened by their being

1

incorporated into one body, a spirit of evangelization go forth from them to gather in multitudes of the surrounding, and not ill-disposed, heathen; and the whole of that southern promontory formed into a distinct principality in Christ's kingdom. We believe, at the present moment, it would be fraught with an effect which we can hardly venture to conceive on the Christianity of India. It would be a citadel of light, and a tower of strength, from which the strongholds of darkness stretching northward might be assailed. It would exhibit our Christian polity as it is, and in the form most suited to the native mind. It would tend more than the most skilfully devised scheme of secular government to bind those various races to our rule, our laws, our civilisation, and ourselves. It would give an impulse to the missionary spirit at home, and realize what many Christian hearts have longed to witness, what was foremost among the forecastings of Heber, and the aspirations of his earnest successor, just taken

to his rest.

102

ART. IV.-1. The Life and Institute of the Jesuits. By the Rev. Father DE RAVIGNAN. Translated by CHARLES SEAGER, &c. London: Charles Dolman.

1844.

2. Rules of the Society of S. Vincent-de-Paul. the Provincial Council of England. 1857.

Published by

3. Rules of the Catholic Young Men's Society. Manchester:

Dolman.

4. Character: an Address to the Students in the Wesleyan Training Institution, Westminster. By the Rev. JOHN SCOTT. London: John Mason.

1858.

5. Plea for Class Meetings. By JOHN HARTLEY. London: John Mason. 1858.

6. What is the Young Men's Christian Association?' London: 1856.

THE whole Church is one great Society, and the Communion of Saints is an article of its creed. The images used by our Lord and the Apostles, to represent the mutual dependence of all members of the Church one upon another, with the sympathy that unites all under one Divine head, are specially adapted to bring out, as a characteristic of the Church, a strong social element. Nor have Christians been at any time unmindful of this. An isolated solitary religion-though it has its nominal advocates, who may talk of the heart's deep communion with God only, or use other expressions that convey a one-sided view of religion, and omit the power of human sympathy is practically acknowledged, by all who call themselves Christians, to be wholly inconsistent with the teaching of the Bible, or the religious instincts which nature suggests. Men lean one upon another in everything which affects character. Each one makes his own place in the world, and, in so doing, looks much to the praise or blame of others, is stirred up by emulation, and repulsed by indifference or dislike. Having made his place, having assumed his shape and form, he is kept firm and steady in it by the pressure of those around him, by the very difficulty and awkwardness of assuming before his neighbours and friends another character. Man, therefore, is a social animal; and the Church is a social institution, whose theory and principles are thoroughly adapted to cultivate and develop his nature. But the Church, in its large organization, its vast system of unity, its necessity of looking first to the great laws of its government and the stability of its institutions, has the same tendency to leave such details as personal sympathies