Charge to the clergy of the Diocese of Bangor : delivered in the month of September, 1843
=sS ^ G3 C « .^ :^SaA7' i .iJCfiCi - <c:: <l . ft' (T , CL'^A^C 7 CHARGE CLERGY OF THE DIOCESE OF BANGOR, DELIVERED IN THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER, 1843. CHRISTOPHER, LORD BISHOP OF BANGOR. PUBLISHED AT THE REQUEST OF THE CLERGY. LONDON: PRINTED FOR J. G. F. & J. RIVINGTON, ST. Paul's church yard, AND WATERLOO PLACE, PALL MALL. 1843. LONDON : OILI'.F.KT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTKRS, ST. John's square CLERGY OF THF] DIOCESE OF BANGOR, THIS CHARGE, PUBLISHED AT THEIR REQUEST, IS DEDICATED, BY THEIR AFFECTIONATE FRIEND AND BROTHER, C. BANGOR. UIUC '-'kr^^^ CHARGE, My Reverend Brethren, It has pleased a gracious Providence to permit me to undertake a fifth visitation of this Diocese. It is always with satisfaction, tempered with strong feelings of responsibility, and a consciousness of my own defects, that I see the Clergy assembled around me on these occasions. Such feelings naturally in- crease upon us as we advance onward in life, espe- cially when, as is the case with myself, we have measured W'hat the Psalmist calls the days of our years ^ Considerable changes have taken place in our body, not only since my primary visitation in 1831, but during the three years that have passed away since I last met you. Even within a few months some of our brethren have been cut off in the prime of life. And if we are still spared, and ' Psalm xc. 10. 6 blessed with health and strength, and faculties of body and mind undecayed, it is our duty to devote the remainder of our days to His service, who has thus spared and blessed us, in the faithful discharge of those obligations which we have contracted to Him, and to His Church, who is " the Shepherd and Bishop of our souls." The question which has occasioned much interest in the northern Counties of the Principality, and has been regarded with no little sympathy by numerous friends of our Church in the English Dioceses ; the repeal, I mean, of the law which has provided for the union of the Sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, still continues in suspense. It has been opposed, as you are aware, in influential quaiters, where it was hoped that it might have been favourably entertained. But though I would by no means encourage very sanguine expectations, I will not despair of the ulti- mate success of your appeals to the justice and good feelings of the Government and Legislature. In the mean while an Act has passed for regulating the Cathedrals of Wales, which will, I am disposed to believe, prove satisfactory. It provides that there shall be in each of our Cathedrals four Canonries, two of which are to be annexed to Archdeaconries : and that a house shall be built for the accommoda- tion of the Canons during the time of their residence. This scheme is free from those strong and well- founded objections, which were entertained to the plan proposed in the Report of the Commissioners of Ecclesiastical inquiry. Some time must probably pass before this Act can be brought into full opera- tion, especially as regards the payment of Canons Residentiary, and the erection of a residence house. An immediate advantage arising from the passing of it is, that our Dioceses will now be placed on the same footiniif with those of Eno^land and South Wales in the distribution of the funds for the augmentation of poor benefices, which are at the disposal of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The Societies in immediate connexion with our Church are carrying on their operations, as far as their resources will permit, with zeal and success, and are fully entitled to your support and co-opera- tion. You are so well acquainted with the consti- tution and objects of these Societies, and the nature and extent of their exertions, that I need not take up your time in enlarging on them. I must how- ever again congratulate you on the benefits which have resulted from the establishment of our Diocesan Society for building and repairing Churches. It has given an impulse to the desire that has been long felt, to improve the condition of our Parish Churches and Chapels, and to render them more worthy of the purposes to which they are dedicated. Much has been done and is doing in this branch of improve- ment, though much more, it must be confessed, still remains to be done. I have to regret that the great w^ork of educa- tion, conducted on the j^rinciples of our Church ; of 8 religious and useful education, I may add, in all forms and phases has not made such advances in this Diocese as we anxiously desire. In some places our National Schools have been conducted with activity and success. But I fear that in our country Parishes the education of the children of the poor is carried on in a very imperfect manner, and in many places, as far as daily schools are concerned, has not even been attempted. I know the difficulties with which the Clergy have to contend in their endeavours to create Parochial Schools ; and how often they are prevented from carrying their wishes into execution, either by the poverty of the parishioners, or by the little im- portance which they attach to education, and what is its natural consequence, their backwardness to con- tribute to the support of useful and efficient schools. It is to be regretted that the landed proprietors do not take a warmer and more general interest in this cause. To provide for the moral and religious edu- cation of those classes of the community, whose labours minister to their opulence, appears to be an unquestionable and obvious duty. And even if they are not swayed by a sense of duty, or by sympathy and Christian love, their own interest might point out to them the advantages that would accrue from having their lands cultivated by a peasantry, trained to orderly habits, and brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Even where there are schools in Parishes of this description, they are, generally speaking, very imperfectly conducted, from the want 9 of adequate funds to remunerate a better educated and more efficient class of Masters. The impulse, however, which has been given within the last few years to the progress of education, not only in the poorer, but in the middling classes, will, we may hope, be gradually communicated to these distant quarters of our Island ; and I am satisfied that, as far as circumstances will permit, the Clergy are, and always will be, anxious to promote the establishment and success of these laudable Institutions. Without calling in question the advantages which have at- tended on Sunday schools, it is evident that a system of education confined within such narrow limits of time, and conducted, as is commonly the case, by persons of little knowledge, and little skill in the art of teaching, must be exceedingly scanty and de- fective. The state of the children employed in mines and factories, and especially their lamentable want of moral and religious instruction, has of late years attracted much attention and sympathy. The provi- sions of an Act of Parliament intended to secure to the poor children in the factories some sort of educa- tion having been much and generally evaded, a bill was brought into the House of Commons in the course of the last Session, one object of which was to render those provisions more stringent, and to establish a system of education suited to the exigence of the case, in those neglected regions. I will not dwell upon the extraordinary movement by which that 10 measure was defeated, nor on the strange misrepre- sentations which led many of our neighbours to join in that outcry. When they were told that the real object of the educational clauses of this bill was to shut up the schools conducted by Methodists and Dissenters, and to compel the children of the poor, both in the factories and elsewhere, to attend the schools of the Established Church, though we may feel some surprise at their credulity, we cannot wonder at their opposition to a measure which, as they were led to believe, aimed a blow at those liberties, which Dissenters of every denomination had long enjoyed. But though I have no doubt that, had this bill passed, the Clergy of those districts would have lent their aid in carrying its provisions into effect, the clauses in question were by no means in accordance with their views, nor with the system followed in our National Schools : nor, however anx- ious they have always been to promote the moral and religious training of these poor and neglected children, had they any share, to the best of my knowledge and belief, in advising or constructing this misrepresented measure. But while we regret the miscarriage of this plan, not as having originated with ourselves, or as being in unison with our own views, but as having been calculated with all its defects to apply some remedy to a moral disease of no little virulence, it is satis- factory to know that exertions are making to supply in some degree the failure of the government measure. n Considerable funds have been already raised, and, as we hope, will go on increasing, for the establishment of schools in connexion with the National Society, and under the superintendence of the Parochial Clergy, in our manufacturing and mining districts. These voluntary exertions (if exertions springing from obedience to God's will, and the binding obliga- tions of Christian love may be called voluntary) will, we trust, under the Divine blessing, be success- ful in accomplishing some part, at least, of their object; and will help to stem that torrent of im- morality and irreligion which must necessarily come down with increasing force and impetuosity, if the rising generations are left unheeded and uninstructed, in ignorance of God and His ways, and of their own duties and responsibilities. Of the present state of our Church in the Diocese, or of any strong signs of a returning attachment to it, I cannot speak with satisfaction. There has been a considerable increase of Meeting-houses belonging to Sectaries of different denominations, and it would seem to be a standing rule of these societies, that wherever one sect has established itself, another shall break ground, and endeavour to form a rival establishment. Meeting-houses are often built, not because the neighbourhood contains members of the sect by which they are erected, but with the hope of forming congregations, and making proselytes. As population advances, and collections of houses are built. Meeting-houses almost invariably 12 spring up, and we know with what ease, and on what terms funds are procured for raising those cheap and homely buildings. These are things which give much pain to those who know, that in the will of God, and the design of our blessed Master, the Church is a city that is at unity in itself, a spiritual body, in which there ought to be no schism, no divisions in the public worship of God, no differences of faith or practice, no breaches of Christian fellowship and union. I find in some of the returns which you have lately made to me, two reasons assigned for the appearance of an increase of alienation from our Catholic and Apostolic communion. The one is the ferment which has been occasioned by those clauses of the Factory Bill on which I have already touched. The other, a notion which has been instilled into the minds of the people, that a large portion of our clergy have adopted opinions at variance with the principles of the Reformation, and are rapidly falhng back into the worst errors of the Papists. Of these opinions I shall speak presently. But though the minds of ignorant and credulous persons may be led astray by these representations, I feel confident that you, my reverend brethren, do not partake of what I will venture to call such groundless apprehensions. Whatever may be the errors and extravagancies of some individuals, our Church will remain grounded and settled in the faith ; she will maintain her prin- ciples unshaken, and will not suffer herself " to be 8 13 entangled again with the yoke of bondageS" from which a merciful Providence has made her free. Convinced then as we are of the soundness of our Church's doctrine, and of the Apostolical form of her Polity, and being persuaded that she will never shrink from her professions and engagements, we look forward with hope, and trust to a time when our Christian brethren, who are now, more or less, estranged from her, will take refuge in her bosom from fluctuations of opinions, and the conflicts of rival parties; when "the mountain of the Lord's house," humbled, as it may now seem to be, in these regions " shall be established on the top of the moun- tains, and exalted above the hills, and all our people shall flow into it \" Though this, however, is a hope, which God's promises to His Church may well justify us in encou- raging, it is a state of things which even the youngest of you, my reverend brethren, cannot expect to witness. Yet you must do your best to hasten this consummation, and to subserve the designs of God's providence by zeal and earnestness in religion, a faithful discharge of your pastoral duties and obliga- tions, a blameless conversation, and a pure and holy life. For every neglect of duty, and not only the taint, but even the suspicion of immorality, is a drawback on ministerial usefulness, and a hindrance of the means by which God accomplishes His ends, and promotes the safety and welfare of His Church. - Gal. V. 1. * Isaiah ii. 2. 14 We cannot, however, set forward this unity, nor hope to revive an attachment to the teaching and services of the Church, unless we are at unity in ourselves, and hold fast with one mind and consent the form of doctrine delivered to us, the rules and orders of our Church, that government which we believe to be Apostolical, and the principles of that Reformation which was, as we are persuaded, a great and blessed work of Divine Providence. If we sepa- rate ourselves into parties, and give ourselves party names and distinctions, or call our brethren by names which they disclaim and repudiate, we shall be bad advocates of Christian unity. If among the signs of the times, we see or apprehend fresh excitements, or new causes of division in our own body, we must endeavour, as far as we can, without compromising the truth, or swerving from our principles, to bring the conflicting parties to a better understanding ; and should we be constrained to censure or con- demn, we must " let our moderation," our gentleness, and charitable consideration for the errors and infir- mities of our brethren, "be known unto all men'." My Reverend Brethren, though I have not accus- tomed myself in my triennial addresses to you, to enter largely into theological controversies ; indeed, had I been ever so much disposed to do so, the important matters to which I have been compelled to draw your attention, would have precluded me * Phil. iv. 5. TO £7ri£tk£c hfjuor. 15 from embarking at any leng-th in such discussions ; the state of excitement to which the writings and opinions usually called Tractarian, have given occa- sion, and the notice that has been taken of them by several of my Right Reverend brethren, seem to require that I should not omit all mention of these subjects of debate and disagreement. These discus- sions have caused much uneasiness to reflecting Churchmen, and lovers of moderate counsels, not only because they give our adversaries an occasion of misrepresenting and speaking evil of us, nor only because they have given birth to divisions among those who are servants of the same Lord, and minis- ters at the same altar, but because those divisions have encouraged a tone of feeling and language not well calculated to strengthen that bond of i)eace, and to promote that unity of the Spirit with which we, who are ambassadors for Christ, should keep the faith, and hold fast that good thing that has been committed to us. In the early stages of what has been since called this religious movement, there were, I believe, few members of our Church, of moderate views, and attached to no party interests, who did not look with some degree of favour on these writings. They gave prominence to those sound Ecclesiastical princi- ples, which, though they had never been lost sight of, and had been advocated down to the time when these tracts made their appearance by writers of eminence, (note A. Appendix,) had nevertheless been 16 very generally overlooked, and had lost much of their influence. The nature, I mean, and constitution of the Christian Church ; the origin and descent of the Christian ministry, tracing backward its commission in a direct line to the Apostles of Christ, and through them to Christ Himself; and the efficacy of the Sacraments, not as signs merely, but as eiFectual signs, channels or conveyances, of that grace which they symbolize. They endeavoured to impress on the minds of Theological students the importance of Ecclesiastical history, and the writings of the early Christians, as sources of information well calculated, on grounds of reason and approved criticism, to assist them in ascertaining the sense of those passages of Scripture, which have given most occasion to debates and differences of opinion: the very mode, be it remembered, which our Reformers adopted, when they drew the line between the primitive doctrine and discipline of the Catholic Church, and the errors and corruptions of the Church of Rome. They drew the attention of the clergy to some laws and regu- lations of our ovm Church, which had too generally fallen into disuse and neglect. At the same time, their writings manifested an earnest desire to raise the standard of holiness, and to lead men to a safer and more scriptural method of ascertaining their own spiritual state and prospects, than that which had obtained, and still, I fear, continues to obtain much currency and popularity. There were, indeed, intermixed with these just 17 views and sound prirciples, passages to be found, even in their early writings, liable to strong excep- tions, and statements which they who looked with favour on their publications, were willing to hope would be revised and corrected. In this expectation they have been disappointed, and prominence has been given to those objectionable points, which it was hoped might, on fuller consideration, have been modified or retracted. (Note B, Appendix.) In forming therefore a judgment of the merits and demerits of these writers, we must not condemn them indiscriminately, nor join in those harsh and ill-advised general censures, which have been so lavishly bestowed on them. Many, I fear, of those who have spoken of them and their tenets in the most bitter terms, have known little of their writings beyond what they have collected from hearsay, or at second hand, and from very questionable authority ; the authority, for instance, of anonymous pamphlets, and newspapers, and publications of that description, in which much fairness of discussion is not to be expected, and where religious controversies are often handled in the spirit of political partisanship. Nor can it be denied, that the learning, and piety, and irreproachable character of the individuals, who are best known as the writers of these Tracts, entitle them to much respect and forbearance. Perhaps, indeed, the wrong direction which their opinions have taken, may be owing in some measure to the nature of the opposition which they have encoun- B 18 tered. For experience proves, that men are apt to be confirmed in their prejudices and ways of thinking, however erroneous they may be, when their opponents treat them with unfairness and unkindness, and under the plea of zeal divest themselves of Christian condescension and charity. But after making every allowance for the upright- ness and good intentions of the writers, the sound- ness and orthodoxy of many of the principles which they have advocated, and the advantages which have resulted from their labours, it must be con- fessed that their opinions have in many respects taken a wrong direction, and assumed an exag- gerated, and therefore an erroneous form ; and that much of what they have written is, under the most favourable construction, liable to just exceptions and censure. In an address of this kind, I cannot, of course, enter into an analysis of their writings and opinions ; but must content myself with animad- verting on a few of those leading features of their Theological school (if I may so express myself,) which seem to me to be exceedingly objectionable. In the first place they appear to have thrown (the phrase is, I believe, their own) themselves into a system, or, I should rather say, have been following the phantom of a system, which they call Catholic, and hold up to admiration as something infinitely superior to the imperfect and lifeless Catholicism of our own Church. For I cannot discover that they have any clear or definite notion of the system which 19 they admire, or have drawn any precise line between Catholic truths and traditions, and Uncatholic errors and corruptions of doctrine and discipline. We must not, however, suffer ourselves to be led astray by the cloudy grandeur of this or any system. We, at least, who have neither leisure nor opportunities for fol- lowing it out in detail, and tracing it upward to its sources, shall content ourselves with regarding that branch of the Church Catholic and Apostolic to which our services are devoted, as the representative of Catholic truth and the Catholic system ; as hold- ing those doctrines and possessing that form of go- vernment which the whole Church of Christ, dis- persed throughout the world, held and possessed in her best and purest ages. And we shall not allow ourselves to admire or long after any tenets or prac- tices which our Church has rejected as superstitious, or laid aside as unnecessary, under the imposing name of parts of the great Catholic system. The next point to which I will advert is the use which they make of the Fathers (as they are usually called) ; the Christian writers, that is, of the earlier ages of the Church, whose writings have been handed down to us. (Note C, Appendix.) I have mentioned with approbation their endeavours to direct the atten- tion of Theological students to these sources of infor- mation, and the advantages which may be expected to arise from this course of study. But we shall err widely in another direction if, as seems to be the case with these writers, we consider their decisions b2 20 as authoritative, and throw ourselves upon them with unqualified deference and submission. Their works should be examined by the same rules of judgment by which we examine those of later Divines, or of authors in other departments of literature. We owe them great respect as witnesses of the prevailing opinions and practices of their own times, and of what the Church Catholic then taught and received. But we must not look on them as men exempt from the bias of human passions and infirmities, nor as infallible judges of controversies. It must be remem- bered, too, that the farther the streams flow off from the fountain-head, the less pure and wholesome they become : that the seeds of many of the worst cor- ruptions of doctrine and ceremonies which have de- faced the beauty and comeliness of the Church were already sown in the days of some of the most re- nowned of these Fathers ; and that several of those gross errors which were abandoned and expunged by our Church at the era of the Reformation, had their origin in the glowing rhetoric and exaggerated lan- guage of these pious writers. Hence the attempt that has been made to recommend to our notice and sympathy the applauses which they bestow on celi- bacy, ascetism, and the monastic life, and their vene- ration for relics ; and the approach, at least, to ap- probation with which their prayers for the dead, and the invocation of the saints which they practised and encouraged, have been spoken of by the writers of these tracts and their followers, appear to me inju- 'Jl dicious and offensive. On the same ground, I am bound to express my disapprobation of the course which has been sometimes pursued of accumulating and giving prominence to those rhetorical amplifica- tions which are often found in the writings of the Fathers, when they speak of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. (Note D, Appendix.) For though these passages may admit of what I would venture to call a Catholic interpretation, a sense, I mean, consistent with the doctrine and practice of the Universal Church before these modes of expres- sion came into vogue, still it can scarcely be doubted that those gross corruptions of the truth, the doc- trine of the corporal presence, of transubstantiation, of the sacrifice in the mass for the dead and the living, and the whole train of superstitious opinions and practices which have been grounded on it, ori- ginated in these rhetorical exaggerations. But the writers of this school have exposed them- .selves to very grave reprehensions, by endeavouring to soften down and extenuate those errors and cor- ruptions of the Church of Rome, which our own 9-^ Church, and the other reformed Churches, have un- equivocally condemned. A remarkable specimen of this unhappy bias, and of a misapplication of talents and ingenuity, and skilfulness in controversial tac- tics, is to be found in the last number of the Tracts for the Times. In that Tract, among other objec- tionable positions, incompatible, as it would seem, with those principles of the Reformation which our Church has embraced, an attempt has been made to show that " the Romish doctrine," condemned in our twenty-second Article of religion, " concerning pur- gatory, pardons, worshipping, and adoration, as well of images as of relics, as also invocation of the saints," is not the doctrine publicly professed by the Church of Rome, and ultimately sanctioned by the decrees of the Council of Trent, but certain super- stitious practices and opinions, which, though tole- rated and winked at by that Church, form no part of its system. The inference drawn from these state- ments appears to be, that, I will not say Protestants (for this is a term which these writers have of late taken great pains to obelize and repudiate), but members of the Church of England, may safely hold this doctrine, as it is authoritatively taught by the Church of Rome, without contravening the doctrine of our own Church, or offending against the spirit of this Article of religion. Now no one who is ac- quainted with the history of those times, can doubt that it was the intention of the Reformers to con- demn unreservedly these doctrines, as they were held 23 and acted upon in the Church of Rome at the time when God's providence called them to their great and necessary work : nor can it be doubted that it was the object of that Council to give sanction and fresh authority to the doctrine which she had taught, and which had been rejected and condemned by the Reformers. It has been urged that the line of argument pur- sued in this Tract, and the sense there affixed to the several articles of our Church brought under review, were intended to confirm in their attachment to the Church of England certain persons whose minds were going astray in the direction of Rome. But I feel convinced that the tendency of this Tract is to draw such minds still nearer to Rome, by palliating the evils of her doctrine and practice, and cutting from under our feet that ground of necessity, and of an imperious sense of obligation, on which our Reformation is based. (Note E, Appendix.) But while the writers of this school have been taking pains to soften down the corruptions, and to throw a veil over the tyranny and usurpations of the Romish Church, it has been a part of their system. 24 in its more advanced stages, to depreciate not only the Reformation in general, but the Reformation of our own branch of the Church Catholic ; and to treat, what we have been accustomed to consider a signal work of God's good providence, as a misfortune or a calamity. The principles of the Reformation have been arraigned as unsound, if not schismatical, and the characters and conduct of some of those great Prelates and Divines, who had a leading share in this great work, have been assailed in harsh and unbe- coming terms. They have done much, likewise, to set ardent and inexperienced minds adrift in pursuit of an unity that is utterly unattainable, while the Church of Rome continues what she is, and the Church of England remains true to her principles. While we maintain, to a certain extent, an union with that Church, in the fundamental truths, I mean, of Christianity, as expressed in our Creeds, and de- fined by the four first general councils, we can have no communion with her in her errors and corrup- tions, nor in her superstitious and (for such they are to us) idolatrous practices. We cannot purchase unity at the expense of acknowledging Rome to be the mother and mistress of all Churches, and her bishop to be the centre of unity, and the Vicar of Christ, having authority over His whole Church, and entitled to the deference and obedience of all Chris- tians. (Note F, Appendix.) Another point to which I must draw your atten- tion, is the habit which they have contracted of 25 speaking of Protestantism in terms of almost unmea- sured obloquy, as a system inconsistent, as they seem to think, with Evangelical truth and Apostolical Polity. Without adverting to the occasion on which this word was first adopted as a symbol of a religious party, we know that those Churches which withdrew themselves from the obedience and renounced the errors of the Church of Rome in the sixteenth cen- tury, have been called by the common name of Pro- testant, and that the members of those Churches have been called Protestants. But whatever differences may have existed between these Churches in other matters, they all maintained with earnestness and unanimity the fundamental principles of Christian doctrine, and, as far as these principles are concerned, to be a Protestant was to be an orthodox Christian. Hence we find those eminent Divines of the seven- teenth century, with whom these writers seem will- ing to identify themselves, professing to be, and glo- rying in the name of Protestants. If some of those who call themselves Protestants have since fallen into heterodox, or latitudinarian, or rationalistic opi- nions, or if some Protestants have carried to an unwarrantable length the principle of private judg- ment in opposition to the authoritative teaching of the Church, their errors, however much we may lament them, are no impeachment of Protestantism itself, nor any proof of the unsoundness of the posi- tions on which it made its stand against papal per- version. Into whatever excesses some persons or 26 sects calling themselves Protestant may have been hurried, we shall not on that account consent to unprotestantize our Church either in substance or in name, no more than we will consent to disavow being Catholic Christians because Rome claims for herself an exclusive right to Catholicity, and invests her corrupt doctrines and practices with that vene- rable title. There are other matters in the writings that have emanated from this school to which I might have directed your attention ; but I must content myself with animadverting thus briefly on what seem to me to be some of the most objectionable peculia- rities of their teaching. Whatever opinions you may have formed on the general merits or demerits of these publications, I am willing to persuade my- self that you will go along with me in the observa- tions which I have made on them. I feel confident that you will look to your own Church as a faithful representative of the Catholic system ; and to her authoritative teaching as a standard of Catholic truth : that while you yield a just and reasonable deference to the remains of Christian antiquity, you will examine the writings of the Fathers, or the statements which are laid before you as containing the substance of what they believed and taught, by the light of Scriptural truth, and weigh them in the balance of a sound and judicious criticism : and that you will look with suspicion on all attempts that may be made to palliate and excuse the real errors •27 and corruptions, the arrogant claims, and supersti- tious usages of the Church of Rome ; and to depre- ciate that Reformation which we acknowledge to be God's work, and a blessing for which we cannot be too thankful. While you lament that so large a portion of the Christian world, whether we look to the eastern or the western Churches, should adhere to opinions and practices with which you can hold no communion, you will not allow your minds to be turned adrift after a theoretical unity, which, in the present state of those Churches, is impracticable. You will pray, as your Church teaches you, for the revival of that unity which Christ designed to be the badge of His disciples; but you will not sacrifice substantial truth to an unreal unity. But while you feel no sympathy with the erro- neous views and opinions which have emanated from this school of Theology, you will be equally on your guard against the latitudinarian practices and opi- nions which they have opposed with earnestness and success. You will not rank among the errors of Tractarianism a strong attachment to the polity and orders of your own Church, as a faithful representa- tive of the Church Catholic and Apostolic ; a vene- ration for her liturgy, and attention to her forms, and ceremonies, and directions ; a just sense of the dig- nity and efficacy of the Sacraments ; and a convic- tion that preaching is not the only means of grace, nor hearing sermons the main part of religion. Whilst you acknowledge the necessity of the in- 28 structions of the pulpit, and assign to them their due weight and importance, you will consider com- munion in sacraments and prayers, and the worship of God in spirit and in truth, as the chief and most urgent business of our Christian assemblies. You will not brand with this name a strong persuasion of the dangers and mischiefs of schism, nor of the in- jurious consequences of the misuse of the right inhe- rent in our nature ; of which no man can in reality divest himself; the right, I mean, of private judg- ment in questions of religion, and the concerns of the soul. At the same time, I feel confident that you will not commit yourselves to the harsh language and uncharitable tone of censure with which these writers have been sometimes visited ; nor will you impeach their motives nor speak disrespectfully of their per- sons. However widely they may have departed from the straight path, we need not call the uprightness of their intentions in question. Much, for instance, as I disapprove of the mode of reasoning employed in the 90th "Tract for the Times ;" the attempting, I mean, to explain away facts and statements, the meaning of which is sufficiently clear and intelligible, by ingenious arguments and evasive distinctions, I cannot charge the writer with bad faith or dishonest evasion. Unfortunately it is a mode of reasoning which men deeply embarked in controversy are but too ready to adopt ; of which specimens may be found in the writinirs of eminent divines : and to which some of 29 those who in this case have used the strongest terms of disapprobation, have, perhaps, in other cases, un- consciously, as I am ready to believe, resorted. (Note G, Appendix.) I do not, I confess, look on this movement with the same apprehension and alarm, with which many persons for whom I have great respect seem to reofard it. Amonof those who have on the whole looked on these writers with some sort of favour, their publications have been received with very dif- ferent degrees of approbation. Few men, I believe, of judgment and experience have gone all lengths with them, and thrown themselves unreservedly into their system. — It is not surprising that many young men should have been dazzled by their talents, or led to a more unqualified admiration of their opi- nions by their earnestness in religion and exemplary lives. But it is to be hoped that years and expe- rience, and that more sober and practical view of Christian truth which will attend on the exercise of their pastoral functions, collision with other minds, and an acquaintance with the sentiments of other men, will weaken these early impressions, and cor- rect any wrong direction that may have been given to their views of religion. My Reverend Brethren, — While I thus remind you, in the remarks which I have made on the writ- ings of this school, of the duty of a conscientious adherence to the principles, and to the rules and regulations of our Church, I am compelled to ex- press a fear that in some, I trust a very few cases, within this Diocese (I am of course speaking of those to whom these principles ought to be dear, and these laws binding), those principles have sometimes been thrown into the back-ground, and those laws and regulations overlooked. I have on former occasions spoken of certain irregularities in the performance of the public services of the Church, in full confidence that they would be remedied. But I have since heard that considerable portions of those services, of the morning service especially, are sometimes omitted. On the reasons which may be assigned for such omissions I will not dilate. Whether they have taken place because where a Clergyman has to officiate in more than one church, the services tread closely one upon the other, or in order that longer time may be allowed for the Sermon, or from a wish to fall in with the tastes of the congregation, they 31 are equally inadmissible. Such practices are un- known, as far as my experience goes, in the English Dioceses ; they are offences against decency and good order ; they scandalize the friends of the Church, and brino' discredit on the Church itself. These practices, if they exist, must be discontinued, and such arrangements made for the discharge of those public duties as shall cut off the plea of necessity. Another statement has been made which, I trust, is not correct — that there are Clergymen who do not scruple attendance at Dissenting places of worship, thus giving their sanction to opinions that are, T fear, too commonly held, that there is no difference between the Church and the Meeting-house, and that there is no such sin as schism. But if there are any of the Clergy who allow themselves this liberty, they may be sure that, while they give offence to the sound part of their own Church and to thoughtful Christians of all denominations, they will not secure the good-will of those whom they expect to conciliate by this show of liberality. I have been compelled to make these remarks, because, as you are aware, statements to this effect have been publicly made, and have not, as far as I know, been sufficiently contradicted. (Note H, Ap- pendix.) But as I feel convinced that such cases of irregularity are few, so I trust that wherever they have occurred they will be at once and alto- gether abandoned. There are other topics to which, if the time had 32 permitted, I might have entreated your attention. But as I have already made a large demand upon your patience, I will now take my leave of you, praying both for you and for myself to the Fountain of all goodness, that we may have grace to strive together with one mind for the faith of the Gospel, to set forward among a Christian people, and to exhibit in ourselves, quietness, peace, and love, the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, a wise and seasonable moderation, a regard for our personal and professional character, and a just sense of the im- portance of our Ministry, as messengers, stewards, and watchmen of the Lord : keeping that which is committed to our trust, and striving, under all cir- cumstances that may befall us, through good report and evil report, whether we fail of success in the business to which we are called, or see the fruit of our travails, to do the work of Evangelists, and Pastors, and Teachers, and to make full proof of our Ministry. APPENDIX. Note A. — Page 15. The statements of these questions contained in the earlier publications of the writers of the Tracts, and the arguments employed in support of them, are the same as those used from the time of the Reformation by the eminent persons who have been looked up to as the most learned and orthodox of our Anglican Divines. Many persons who have taken part in these controversies have treated the opinions of the Tract writers on these questions as novel- ties or popish errors. On the other hand, some of their encomiasts have spoken of them as truths which had been forgotten and lost to the Church till they were rescued from oblivion by the writers of the Tracts. It may be allowed that they were kept much in the back-ground, and that many members of our Church seemed disposed to surrender them altogether ; but they never ceased to be held and avowed by a large body of both the Clergy and Laity of the Church of England. In illustration of this fact, we need only refer to the writings of Archdeacon Daubeny, and Mr. Jones of Nayland, whose works on the Church were widely circulated, and received with great approbation. The little tract of the last-named writer, called " A Catechism of the Church," contains in a small c 34 compass most of the arguments used by the writers of the Tracts when handUng these questions. But if it is absurd to call these doctrines forgotten truths, it is not less so to call them novelties or popish errors. However widely we may differ from the Church of Rome in matters of detail connected with these ques- tions, she agrees with us in the main principles which we advocate, because they are co-existent with the Church itself, — that the Church is a spiritual and visible body, founded by Christ for the maintenance and propagation of the truth, and the salvation of mankind ; that in subordi- nation to Christ it has been placed under rulers of its own, deriving their commission and authority in succession from the Apostles ; that it has power to decree rites and cere- monies, and authority in controversies of faith (a power which our own Church professes to exercise under certain limitations) ; and that sacraments are not merely signs, but efficacious signs of grace; signs, that is, which in a subordinate and instrumental manner effect that which they symbolize. But these opinions (if opinions they may be called) are not Popish, but Christian, coeval with the Church, and either implied in its very existence, or grounded on authority of Scripture. Note B. — Page 17. I quote a few objectionable passages from the early pub- lications of these writers. Tract V. page 2. 