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CHURCH-RATES AND PRESENTMENTS.

It is singular that in the middle of the nineteenth century, while Dissenters are aspiring to the privileges of religious equality, they should find the fundamental principle of religious liberty assailed, and should be constrained to look to the spirit of the age and the protection of Parliament for the continuance of the freedom they have so hardly won.

The Burial Service of the Established Church, which gives the sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life, to the man whose mortal life has exhibited a violation of every law, has been a stumbling block to a large body of its conscientious ministers, and the most strenuous efforts have been made to obtain a revision of it. But there is a strong feeling of repugnance to any alteration whatever, among those who govern the Church, and they are anxious to escape the difficulty by "a cautious and moderate exercise of Godly discipline by means of the courts of the Church." To effect this object, it would be necessary, in their opinion, "that Episcopal and other visitations should be restored to greater efficiency, and that the presentments required to be made should not be regarded as empty forms, but be carefully prepared by the churchwardens, and proceedings duly taken upon them by the ordinaries." The presentments, to be of any value, must necessarily be followed up by prosecutions and penalties.

What might be the effect on the interests of Dissenters of this restoration of Godly discipline, by means of presentments, we are not left to conjecture. A pregnant exemplification of it is presented in a pamphlet sent to us, which details the recent

proceedings at Staplehurst, in the county of Kent. A church-rate, it appears, was made in that parish a year or two ago, which the Congregational minister, the Reverend Elisha Balley, declined to pay. He was accordingly summoned before the bench of magistrates, but they declined to convict him. In May, 1863, another rate was made, which Mr. Balley likewise refused to discharge. In Easter of the present year, Mr. Henry Hoare, a magistrate, was elected churchwarden. Of this gentleman, who is considered by the clergy a pattern of a Churchman, the Archbishop of Canterbury, in April last, said, "that it was impossible to speak too highly of his earnest zeal in the cause of the Church." On the first visitation of the Archdeacon, after Mr. Hoare's election, he made a presentment, in which he stated that of the rate of £87, which had been made, more than a fourth had been withheld; that the principal opposition arose from "one Elisha Balley, a lay teacher of what he deems the religion of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, in a certain conventicle or meeting-house, called or known by the name of the Independent or Congregational Chapel, who had refused to pay the sum of three shillings assessed upon him, and that he deemed it his duty not only himself thus to rebel against the laws of his country, but also to instruct or encourage others in the theory and practise of a similar rebellion." He stated, moreover, that "the said Elisha Balley, with some of the leading conspirators who support him in such rebellion, was on a former occasion summoned before certain magistrates assembled in Petty Sessions at Cranbrook, who did then and there de

cline to convict them, so far as is known, simply because the chairman of the vestry meeting had refused to put a certain amendment from the chair, which amendment, under the circumstances, has been accounted irrelevant, and therefore unlawful to be put, viz., That the amount required by the churchwardens should be raised by voluntary contributions." And as it might almost appear to some a mockery to make a second appeal to a bench of magistrates, who had once given countenance to any such plea, he advised that "every bishop should be solicited to hold a diocesan synod annually, with the view of obtaining from Parliament such legislation as might from time to time be required in order to put down rebellion, and to promote the interests of virtue, morality, and true religion." Those who offered any plea for refusing church-rates he charged with "perpetrating fraud, and defeating the ends of justice." He asserted that "the rebellion in question appeared to be widely spread through the land," and that "the arguments now used by parties in favour of their said rebellion, were no other than were used in the seventeenth century; when, as is well known, they resulted in deeds of cruelty and barbarity from which humanity shudders, the King being eventually deposed and murdered, and the tyrant Cromwell being made Sovereign Protector in place of his lawful successor."

On the first sight of this extract, the reader might be led to suppose that we were imposing on him with a quotation from Punch. But we must ask him to give credit to our assurance that the presentment is perfectly genuine; that it must have been fortified by an affidavit, if Mr. Hoare paid due regard to Canon 119; that it was attested by the two official assessors, and duly presented to "the

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Venerable Benjamin Harrison, M.A.,
Archdeacon of Maidstone, and to all
and singular whom it may concern,"
and that it was, moreover, transmitted
to the Archbishop of Canterbury,
doubtless as an example of that
"earnest zeal in the cause of the
Church," which his Grace had so
highly extolled four weeks before.
We are informed that this supercili-
ous treatment of Mr. Balley by a
magistrate holding an important office
in the Church, and countenanced by
its highest dignitary, is deprecated by
the members of the Congregational
Church over which he presides, as
being calculated to lower him in the
estimation of the village population,
who receive religious instruction from
his lips. But any such idea can be
attributed only to their great igno-
rance of ecclesiastical history, and
their minds will be relieved from all
disquietude when they come to un-
Rome, as
derstand the real truth.
we all know, is the original fountain.
of all ecclesiastical dignity and autho-
rity, and those who claim the right
to teach by apostolical succession,
must derive their orders from that
source. Now, the Cardinal who has
been sent over to represent the suc-
cessor of St. Peter in England, has
declared that according to the prin-
ciples of ecclesiastical antiquity and
law, the bishops who now hold, by
authority of law, the sees of England,
have not and never have had since
the Reformation any ecclesiastical
hierarchical or apostolic jurisprudence
whatever in matters religious or
spiritual, and that there is
lawful order or consecration in the
laying on of their hands more than of
a layman's. Why then should we be
surprised if they seek consolation in
meting out to others the measur
which is meted to them?

no

Whether the presentment of M Hoare springs from the simple spiri of bigotry, or from a morbid cravin

for notoriety, it might be safely dismissed with contempt as the production of a weak mind. But it acquires no small importance when viewed in connection with the recent attempt of Convocation to make such presentments "something more than empty forms," and to follow them up by "proceedings." A score or two of presentments like those of Mr. Hoare would be sufficient to set the country in a blaze, which would speedily burn up the cords which bind the Church to the State. And the Convocation may be certain that if they once let loose the genius of bigotry, they will never succeed in reducing it again to the dimensions of the barrel, and,—to pursue the oriental simile, that it will assuredly destroy the body which has unloosed it. This proposal for the re-establishment of a godly discipline, and the restoration of the spiritual Courts and their proceedings, opens a large and portentous question, over which the nation would do well to ponder. It is little else than the revival of the ecclesiastical despotism of the seventeenth century, though of a milder type. Those who refuse to pay churchrates would be among the first victims; then would come the turn of those who resist Easter dues: Canon 112 would not of course be forgotten, and every parishioner, man or woman, who did not receive the communion at Easter, would become the subject of a presentment. But, in addition to these delinquents, every "bad liver in the parish must also be brought before the spiritual court by the churchwarden. It is not improbable, as Canon Kennaway remarked during the debate in Convocation, that the churchwardens themselves may need to be presented; but, supposing them all to be as exemplary as Mr. Hoare, are they likely to present the Squire from drunkenness and debaucherywe are referring simply to the com

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mon weakness of humanity. Will it, therefore, we ask, be wise and prudent to establish a court of inquisition in every diocese, and a familiar in every parish, and to exhibit the unjust distinction between wealth and poverty, in the most odious and irritating form?

But these spiritual courts must have the power of inflicting penalties, or they will be a mere mockery. The days are passed when a "schism maker in the church, and a sedition sower in the commonwealth," like Mr. Balley, could be treated as the High Commission Court treated Prynne, like "a mad dog, who, though he cannot bite, will foam," and condemned to be branded on the forehead, and slit in the nose, and to have his ears chopped off, and consigned to perpetual imprisonment. The only weapon the courts could now employ to enforce their decisions is a sentence of excommunication, to take effect on the lifeless body of the criminal. And this is to be the remedy for the anomalies of the Burial Service! When the system of "full and sufficient presentments" which Canon Wordsworth calls for, has been established in every parish, and endowed with vitality by "proceedings," it is expected that the clergyman will be enabled to discern with unerring accuracy to whom the last rites of the Church are to be granted, and, with a safe conscience, bury every man in the odour of sanctity who does not "die excommunicate." We greatly question the propriety of bringing this perilous machinery into operation, and have our doubts whether the country will stand it a twelvemonth. In the service, as it is now used, there is at least this redeeming feature, that there is no distinction of persons at the grave. The man who expires of delirium tremens on his stately bed of down, and the man who dies from the same cause

under the ale-spigot, are alike buried in sure and certain hope of the joyful resurrection to eternal life. But the case will be entirely altered as soon as the scheme of excommunication begins to operate. An invidious distinction will be introduced into the offices of the Church. The aristocratic sinner will drive his coach through the network of godly discipline, and receive sepulture with all the solemnities of the Church, while the plebeian "bad liver" will be caught in its meshes, and consigned to an unhonoured grave. The national sensibilities are always most keenly touched by any indignity to the dead, and when, as in this case, it is combined with an act of flagrant injustice, the indignation of the country will, we are certain, be kindled to a degree which will startle even the two Houses of Convocation.

These remarks are written in no party spirit. If we were to consult the interests of Dissent we should be disposed to remain altogether silent. No device could be conceived so admirably adapted to swell the ranks of Nonconformity as the establishment of these courts, and the encouragement of these presentments. One churchwarden like Mr. Hoare, with his charges of rebellion, fraud, and conspiracy, is of more value to Dissent than a dozen Dissenting ministers. It is, after all, the interests of the Church that are at stake. It has been truly observed that the Church could not survive three years of the full swing of Convocation under the inspiration of the Bishop of Oxford. The Bishop's zeal, however, might be tempered by discretion, but nothing most assuredly could avert the decline and fall of the Church under the action of these spiritual courts. If the voice of the "Baptist Magazine" could be heard in the Jerusalem Chamber, we should say to the prelates and

dignitaries,-better, a hundred times better, would it be to alter a few sentences in the Book of Common Prayer, and adapt the Burial Service on land to that used at sea, where there is no "sure and certain hope," than revive the obsolete system of godly discipline and presentments, and spiritual courts, and the action of the ordinary, and thus raise a commotion in which the Church would be the first and greatest sufferer. We are aware that there is a strong repugnance to touch the services of the Church because of the danger it might entail. Some minds are so sensitive and timid as to object to the disturbance of even a single brick, lest it should loosen and eventually bring down the whole ecclesiastical edifice. We are confident there is no ground for this apprehension. It is not long since. the Legislature expunged from the Book of Common Prayer three timehonoured services, to which the ministers of the Church of England had been constrained for nearly two centuries, to swear their unfeigned assent and consent. The Church has not suffered from the innovation.

Neither would it be weakened by the slight alteration required in a service, which we know many Dissenters regard as one of the most sublime of uninspired compositions, and exquisitely adapted to convey consolation to the bereaved and bleeding heart. The concession asked is trifling, but it would relieve the consciences of four thousand godly ministers; it would subserve the interests of public morality, and it would moreover relieve us from all apprehension of that machinery of spiritual courts with which the tranquility of the country is now menaced. In reference to this and all similar questions, the Church only does itself injury by rigidly alhering to a superannuated

policy. The liberal spirit of the age will, in the end, be found too strong for the conservatism of the Church, and it is wiser and safer to bend to it than to oppose it. That which might have been an element of strength in the seventeenth century, when the Conventicle Act was in full force, can only be an element of weakness in the nineteenth century, when nearly one-half the religious world goes to the conventicle. We have solved many questions which puzzled the brains of our ancestors. We have succeeded in reconciling the existence of a standing army with the civil liberties of the country, and the existence of an Established Church with its religious liberty. What we now require is the control of all extreme views, and the exercise of a spirit of liberality and modera

tion in all parties-Dissenters as
well as Churchmen-suited to the
character of the age. It is, therefore,
to be regretted that the Archbishop
of Canterbury, when appealed to on
this fanatic outburst of Mr. Hoare,
had not the moral courage to imitate
the example of his Great Master,
who, when His disciples were ready
to call down fire from heaven on
those who displeased them, rebuked
them for the malignity of their spirit.
For, after all, are not Dissenting
ministers engaged in
in the same
"labours of love" as the ministers of
the Establishment, while they en-
deavour to bring back the wandering
sheep to the fold of the great
Shepherd, and to render our beloved
land the model of a Christian com-
munity?

THE MISSIONARY OF THE WEISSHORN GLACIER.
FOUNDED ON FACT.

For an illustration of this wonderful wisdom of redeeming grace, let us, gentle reader, retrace our steps to the beginning of the fifth century, follow me to one of the loveliest spots in Europe, beautiful Switzerland, let us enter the little town of Sion, which is the capital of the canton of Valais. This is one of the southern cantons which border on Piedmont and Savoy, and which are rich in splendid mountains and fertile vine-clad valleys.

A TALE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE, WHEN moved with compassion for a dying world, the Lord of Glory left His throne on high-He did not assume the splendour of royalty; He came as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Foxes had their holes, birds their nests, but the Son of Man had not where to lay His head, and when His "glorious work was finished," He slept His mediatorial death-sleep in a borrowed tomb. And what were the chosen vessels which He chose to carry the message of mercy to the world. Poor despised fishermen and publicans; ;men, whose position and education seemed to make them altogether unfit for such a task of honour. But,

my ways are not your ways saith the Lord," and thus He chose the mean, despised things of the earth, to do His will that none might attribute to men that which is alone the work of the Spirit of God.

Already in the year 381, mention is made of a certain Bishop Theodorus, who dwelt then in Octodorum, the present" Martinach;" and in the fourth century the bishopric was removed to the town of Sion. But contrary to the laws of nature, the valleys were for long years basking in the bright beams of the Sun of Righteousness, while the scattered inhabitants of the glorious mountains around them were

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