the whole Christian people of this realm..... There can be little doubt that it is intended as an insult to the Sovereign and Church of this country."

Thus being for a time on the popular side, the Bishop received the praises of the press for his firm and dignified attitude, and maintenance of Protestant principles. But the "papal aggression" agitation soon began to drift away from its original object, and to assume a form which aggravated the difficulties and embarrassments of Bishop Blomfield. The new turn was first given to the popular feeling by Lord John Russell, in his Letter to the Bishop of Durham, which contained the following passage:

"There is a danger, however, which alarms me much more than any aggression of a foreign sovereign. Clergymen of our own Church, who have subscribed the Thirty-nine Articles, and acknowledged in explicit terms the Queen's supremacy, have been the most forward in leading their flocks, ' step by step, to the very verge of the precipice.' The honour paid to saints, the claim of infallibility for the Church, the superstitious use of the sign of the Cross, the muttering of the Liturgy, so as to disguise the language in which it was written, the recommendation of auricular confession, and the administration of penance and absolution—all these things are pointed out by clergymen of the Church of England as worthy of adoption, and are now openly reprehended by the Bishop of London in his Charge to the clergy of his diocese.

What, then, is the danger to be apprehended from a foreign prince of no great power, compared to the danger within the gates from the unworthy sons of the Church of England herself?

I have little hope that the propounders and framers of these innovations will desist from their insidious course. But I rely with confidence on the people of England, and I will not bate a jot of heart or hope so long as the glorious principles and the immortal martyrs of the Reformation shall be held in reverence by a nation which looks with contempt on the mummeries of superstition, and with scorn at the laborious. endeavours which are now making to confine the intellect and enslave the soul."

In this document, the words "step by step, to the very verge of the precipice," were a quotation from Bishop Blomfield's recently delivered Charge; and the representation given of the contents of that Charge was partially true for though the Bishop had reprehended, not "the honour paid to saints," but the doctrine of the mediation of the saints, and had made no allusion to "muttering the Liturgy," he had spoken in very strong terms of some of the other practices adverted to by Lord John.

"These innovations," he had said, "have, in some instances, been carried to such a length as to render the Church-service almost histrionic. I really cannot characterize by any gentler term the continual changes of postures, the frequent genuflexions, the crossings, the peculiarities of dress, and some of the decorations of churches, to which I allude. They are, after all, a poor imitation of the Roman ceremonial, and furnish, I have no doubt, to the observant members of that Church, a subject, on the one hand, of ridicule, as being a faint and meagre copy of their own gaudy ritual; and, on the other hand, of exultation, as preparing those who take delight in them to seek a further gratification of their tastes in the Roman Communion."

And after quoting his opinion on these points, as already expressed on several occasions, the Bishop added:

"I had hoped that these distinct expressions of my opinions would have the effect of checking the innovations alluded to, and of awakening those of the clergy of my diocese who had departed the furthest from the simplicity of our reformed ritual, to a sense of the danger of all endeavours to assimilate it to the Roman ceremonial, and to the inconsistency of such endeavours with their own obligations as ministers of our Reformed Church, bound by solemn pledges to observe her rules, and to carry out her intentions. That expectation has been disappointed: neither my public exhortations, nor my private admonitions, have produced the desired effect. I have been told that I had no authority to forbid anything which was not in express terms forbidden by law; and that practices which, though purposely laid aside by the Church, and so by implication condemned, have not been actually prohibited, are therefore lawful; and that canonical obedience to a bishop is only that which he can enforce in a court of law; and so the innovations which I objected to have been persisted in, with additional changes from time to time, with the manifest purpose of assimilating the services of our Reformed Church as nearly as possible to those of the Roman. Once more I declare my entire disapproval of such practices, and my earnest wish that, while every direction of the rubric and canons is observed where it is possible, no form should be introduced into the celebration of public worship which is not expressly prescribed by them, or sanctioned by long-established usage.'

It is probable that even had the Bishop foreseen the use which would be made of these expressions, he would

still have felt it his duty to give utterance to them. But the turn which matters were now about to take doubly embarrassed his position. The words of Lord John Russell were speedily applied to the case of St. Barnabas; and then began a series of disturbances at that unfortunate church, which have been only surpassed since by the disgraceful proceedings at St. George's East. The Protestant cause was taken up, as in the later case, by those to whom all religions were equally indifferent, and all excuses for a riot equally acceptable; and every Sunday saw the church doors besieged by a mob of disorderly supporters of the Reformation, and the services interrupted by their groans or hisses. The public press urged on the mob by invectives against all who symbolized with Mr. Bennett. "We trust," said the Times, "that we see in the expressions of Lord John Russell signs of a purpose, not yet perhaps fully matured, but rapidly growing towards completion—the purpose of cleansing our Church from the discredit cast upon her quite as much by the treachery as by the schism of her members-the purpose of rendering our Universities something better than schools of popery and mysticism-the purpose of restoring to us our Church such as the Reformation gave it to us, the child of light and reason, unclouded by superstition, undegraded by priestcraft, clear and comprehensive in her doctrines, built upon truth, and abhorring falsehood." "The Rubric must be altered," chimed in the Morning Herald; "if the Church is to be restored to its integrity, the fragments of Romanism which the compromise of the Reformation left in our Liturgy-those spots for the growth of poisonous plants-must be removed."

Mr. Bennett, finding himself under the pressure of a mob, was less disposed to accede to the Bishop's wishes than ever; the rioters continued to shout and groan, the Times thundered, the Bishop remonstrated, and so things stood at the time when, as we have already seen, he called upon Mr. Bennett to redeem his pledge of resignation. The resignation was not finally made till March, 1851, but it was determined on in December, 1850. The immediate consequences were that certain changes were at once made in the ritual of St. Barnabas, and that Mr. Bennett retired for a while from the scene. But to the Bishop, at least, no peace ensued. He was beset from all quarters. On one side he was thanked by a host of anonymous correspondents, and by others whose names generally added no weight to their communications, for having gained, in the retirement of Mr. Bennett, the spolia opima of the Protestant cause; on the other hand, deputations of the churchwardens and parishioners of St. Paul's represented to him in voluminous documents the loss which they would sustain by the departure of their incumbent; while others openly reproached him for deserting the cause of the Church, and "began to think that it might be nothing but God's especial Providence which had brought new Bishops from Rome a second time, to supersede the offices of the cowardly guardians of a failing Church." The Guardian, generally considered as the organ of High Churchmen, though deprecating the retirement of Mr. Bennett, admitted that "his claim to regulate the ritual of his Church as he pleased, in matters on which the law is silent, without sanction and even in defiance of his Bishop, is altogether unprecedented and