Ephesians, iv. 2, 3.
WITH ALL LOWLINESS AND MEEKNESS, WITH
LONG-SUFFERING, FORBEARING ONE ANOTHER IN LOVE; ENDEAVOURING TO
KEEP THE UNITY OF THE SPIRIT IN THE BOND OF PEACE.
Although in performance of the
duties of our sacred calling, we, the ministers of the Gospel,
are habituated to the practice of delivering our discourses in
public; and although those of us especially, who have been for
some time in the ministry, may be justly supposed to have
conquered that inherent diffidence, which more or less
embarrasses a tyro in elocution; yet nevertheless, upon an
occasion like the present, when one of a public body, whatever be
his standing, is called upon to address, for the first time, an
assembly of those of his own order—those of whose piety,
learning, research, and ability, he must be fully sensible; he
will necessarily enter upon the task with feelings of more than
ordinary anxiety, distrustful of his power for an undertaking of
so much, and so critical importance.
It would,
my Reverend Brethren, be an unworthy and presumptuous affectation
of confidence on my part, if I did not confess how sensibly I am
at this moment impressed with this feeling; if I did not assure
you how gladly I would have forgone the honor to which I have
been called by our respected Archdeacon—of this day
addressing myself to you. At any period it would
have been to me a service of deep anxiety; how ten-fold more so
do I feel it at this eventful epoch, when it is impossible for
any candid observer to deny that there is much in the actual
condition of the Church of England, to inspire the most intense
solicitude for the future. Deeply must we all participate
in the agitation which now affects her, and which has so
attracted the notice of several of the most eminent Bishops of
our Church, as to cause them to make it the almost exclusive
subject-matter of their recent Charges to their Clergy.
Intently must he, who has the welfare of our Zion at heart, view
the present aspect of a controversy which threatens to shake the
English Church to the centre; but which I feel the most perfect
confidence will, under the sanctifying influence of Divine grace,
issue in her greater and more glorious prosperity—that it
will tend to refine her from many of those defects in practice,
which now make up the measure of her fallibility; and cause her
to emerge from the ordeal more becoming the radiant type of the
Church triumphant, against which, we have the assurance
of our blessed Lord, “the gates of hell shall not
prevail.” [9a]
Fain, however, as I would have avoided the position I now
occupy, I felt that it was impossible—I felt that I had a
double duty to perform, from which it would have been unbecoming
in me to shrink. The respect I owe, in common with you all,
to our justly-esteemed Archdeacon, would alone have deterred me
from declining his request to officiate at this Visitation; but
beyond this—that paramount duty I owe to our blessed Lord
and Master as His ordained Minister, now, and at all times,
inspires me to attempt to discharge, to the utmost of my ability,
the performance of any duty in His cause, which may lie within
the humble sphere of my usefulness. Conscious however, as I
am, how many of you, my Reverend Brethren, far more competent
than myself to this task, might have been selected for addressing
you to-day; yet strong in the conviction of integrity of purpose,
and yielding to no one in zeal for the unity and prosperity of
the Church of Christ, I rely mainly on that Divine support
which can supply strength to the weak, sanctifying them to be
“meet for the Master’s use, and prepared unto every
good work;” [9b]—and next, I look with confidence
to the candid and generous indulgence of you, my Reverend
Brethren, whom I am now addressing, whose holy Christian calling
so pre-eminently qualifies you to carry out that
divinely-taught precept of doing unto others as you yourselves
would be done by,—to grant me the meed of lenient
criticism, and believe me when I assert that, in any thing which
I may this day address to you, I am earnestly desirous of
avoiding all personality, or seeking to give offence to
any—that in my humble endeavour to promote the good of the
Church and the glory of God, I am solicitous of bearing in mind
that I am addressing Ministers of Christ, acting, with myself,
under the same Apostolical commission—pledged all to walk
by the same rule, and to speak the same thing—bound all by
the same vows, with interests, and pursuits, and duties
identical; and that we should all be guided by those words of the
great gentle Apostle, which I have selected for my
text:—“With all lowliness and meekness, with
long-suffering, forbearing one another in love, and endeavouring
to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.” [10]
At no period could such an exhortation be more
requisite. I have said—and I believe it will be
conceded by all of you—that this is an eventful epoch of
the English Church. The religious spirit of the age seems
to be singularly marked by extremely opposite
characters—Enthusiasm and Rationalism; the
former betraying its votaries into wild excesses of fanatical
extravagance; and the latter so unduly exalting human wisdom, as
to undervalue the doctrine of Holy Scripture. There is abroad
also a spirit of Latitudinarianism—a species of
counterfeit liberality, which, in the vain desire of
conciliation, increases division, and multiplies heresy, by
palliating the guilt of schism, or by diminishing the number and
undervaluing the importance of the fundamental doctrines of
Christianity. Of the alarming magnitude of the peril
arising from this source, we ought to be made duly sensible, when
we remark some of those, whose sincere faith in the Holy Gospel
would seem to be above suspicion, who are, nevertheless, betrayed
into lending their aid and countenance in furtherance of this
unfortunate scheme. Captivated by the amiable desire, but
fallacious hope, of uniting in bonds of brotherhood, faith and
scepticism, truth and heresy, they are insensibly beguiled by
this deluding phantom into the net of infidelity, and are
themselves entangled in its meshes ere they are alive to the
consequences of so dangerous and unholy an alliance. The
leading prejudice, the very key-stone of this falsely called
liberality, is the notion that sincerity is all in all; that,
provided we are secure of our “integrity before God,”
and conscientiously embrace religion under the form that best
accords with our own views, it matters not whether we be of
this or that communion; or whether we be of any
communion at all. But however charitable this may be in
theory, it has proved itself most erroneous in
practice. Conceding truth to error, on the ground of
expediency—or when, for the sake of obtaining the semblance
of peace, and the reputation of liberality, we would veil that
marked boundary which separates between those who are and
who are not, of what we know and believe to be the true
Church of Christ,—never yet has been, and yet never will
be, the means of securing unity in the Christian Church: in plain
words, it will fail, as it has failed, in making Churchmen of
Dissenters.
We should bear in mind, my Reverend Brethren, that unity of
spirit is not the only thing to be thought of and
promoted; we are to have regard also to the unity of the
body. Now, if the Church be a body, a visible
incorporated society, she must, like other incorporations, be
under the government of certain rulers, and under the guidance of
certain regulations. And so, in fact, we find the Church to
be: she has all the marks of a visible incorporated
society.—She has a regular form of admission: the Sacrament
of Baptism.—She has a constant badge of membership: the
Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.—She has peculiar
duties: repentance, faith, and obedience.—She has peculiar
privileges: forgiveness of sins, present grace, and future
glory.—And she was placed, by our Lord, her founder, under
officers of His own appointment, the Apostles and their Episcopal
Successors, by whom the affairs of the Community are to be
regulated from time to time. Now, if the Church be thus a
body, we must preserve her unity by deference to her laws, her articles,
and canons, in their plain, literal, and grammatical acceptation,
and by obedience to her constituted authorities.
The Church, under God, is our nursing mother; and the only
image of the Church Catholic which we know of, is that which
she embodies to us. She is the representative of
Christ; she consigns us with provident care to the protection of
our Lord, even before we are conscious of the blessing; she
teaches us to lisp in holy words; she dedicates our youth to God;
and, in her pure and comprehensive discipline, trains us up into
our spiritual manhood. Even then she inspires our devotion,
while she regulates our faith, and accompanies us from the cradle
to the grave in that grand circle of offices to which I have just
alluded, and which embraces every vicissitude and condition of
life, instructing us how to improve them, how to sanctify even
earthly occupations, by impregnating them with a divine spirit,
and conferring a consecration from Heaven upon them all.
These, my Reverend Brethren, are powerful claims upon the heart
and judgment of all reasonable and sound-thinking men, to do
their utmost to promote the unity of the Church; and should make
every Churchman, and especially every Minister of the Church,
pause long and ponder well ere they disparage her claim to
Catholicity, or to humour the subtle scruples of Separatists,
they presume to dishonour her formularies, and risk, we know not
what
ultimate results, or what calamitous consequences to the Church
and to the Nation, by overthrowing the ancient landmarks of
opinion, and sapping the traditional faith and the undoubted
loyalty of men to her communion.
The movement in the Anglican Church, which, at the present
time, has occasioned that violent oscillation between two
extremes, has, as we all know, been set in action by the energy
of a body of pious and eminently learned Divines of the
University of Oxford; and whatever difference of sentiment may
exist, as to their opinions and judgment, I believe I may safely
assert, that the meed of commendation which has been awarded them
by those Dignitaries of our Church who have alluded to their
writings, is universally and most justly conceded to them by all
candid and unprejudiced persons, viz. that they are men of
acknowledged piety and sincerity, of unsullied morality, and
profound learning and research.
I have said that the duty allotted to me this day is one from
which I would fain have been absolved; but there is a
circumstance connected with it, which affords me much personal
satisfaction—and it is this:—that while I thus most
freely and cheerfully bear this testimony to the character and
ability of the authors of the “Tracts far the
Times;”—while I do not shrink from declaring, but
am rejoiced to acknowledge, the good service they have, in my
humble estimation, in many ways rendered to the Church;—I, at
the same time, am far from subscribing to all their
opinions: nay, I deplore most sincerely much that they
have written, much they have done—only
too painfully proving how fallible even the best-informed and
best-intentioned amongst men may be. While they viewed with
just alarm and grief the spirit of Latitudinarianism which was
rapidly leavening the Church of England, they fearlessly and
honestly stood forth to arrest a torrent which was undermining
the foundation of that venerable fabric, and awakened us to the
danger of that schismatic poison which was insidiously stealing
through the whole frame of her system. They have recalled
us to the sacred obligations we are under to regard and uphold
the fundamental doctrines of the Church of Christ, in the beauty
of their pristine purity, as restored to us at the
Reformation—they have vindicated the two Sacraments, and
especially that of Baptism, from the deadening and false
interpretation with which it has been attempted to obscure
them—they have revived a spirit of zeal into the
ministrations of the Church, and rescued from oblivion the many
portions of her beautiful services which had too generally fallen
into desuetude—they have, as it were, purified the temples
of our native land, dedicated and consecrated to the service of
God, from a laxity which had lamentably paralysed the
spirituality of the services of the sanctuary. These
things, amongst many others I could name, they have done;—for
these we have reason to feel gratitude to them for their labours
of love;—but, in the plenitude of zeal, they have, alas!
outstepped the bounds of moderation—in some of the later
Tracts, and particularly in the Ninetieth, they have justly
alarmed all sober-minded members of the Established Church of
England. In defending the Catholic truth, inherited from
our immediate forefathers in the faith—the Reformers of our
Church, and through them from the Apostles themselves—they
have, I lament to say, ventured to adopt some odious corruptions
of Romanism, glossing over their most prominent deformities, and
investing them with the name of Catholicity; and then endeavoured
to maintain their position in the Church, by arguing the
approximation of our Articles to the Decrees of the Council of
Trent. Nothing can be more lamentable, nothing more
reprehensible than this;—as well as the adoption of some
external ceremonials of no intrinsic value, but which savour of
an unworthy fondness for the outward pomps and ceremonies of the
Romish Church. Grieved as I am to be compelled
conscientiously to make these acknowledgments, I am yet happy to
have this public opportunity of expressing my sentiments on the
subject; because, I regret to say, I have, individually, been
most unchristianly and uncharitably maligned as a bigoted
disciple of the so-called Oxford School; and I trust, therefore,
this free and unreserved declaration of my decided dissent
from their errors, will exonerate me in future from the unkind
and unjust aspersions, which have been so unwarrantably and
lavishly heaped upon me.
My Reverend Brethren, I must calmly, yet earnestly protest
against the injustice and inconsistency of men, either of the
Clergy or Laity, who are ready to hurl anathemas against those
who, mindful of the solemn vows made at their ordination, as
Ministers of the Reformed Religion, are conscientiously resolved
to observe, as fully and exactly as they are able, the Rubrical
injunctions of the Church. Because they do so, are they,
with any shadow of justice or charity, to be roundly taxed with
embracing all the erroneous opinions of the Oxford Divines?
Are they to be stigmatized as “papistical” and
“superstitious” in their ministrations and
doctrines? The reverse is the truth. They
thereby prove themselves the most safe and zealous advocates of
the reformed faith; they present the most undaunted front against
the hateful errors of Rome on the one hand, and the no less
dangerous and insidious underminings of Geneva on the
other. In defence and justification of their practice, I
may be permitted to make the following short extract of a Charge
delivered by one of the present eminently pious and learned
Dignitaries of our Church. He says,—“A strict
and punctual conformity with the Liturgy and Articles of our
Church is
a duty to which we have bound ourselves by a solemn promise; and
which, while we continue in the ministry, we must scrupulously
fulfil. Conformity to the Liturgy implies, of course, an
exact observance of the Rubric. We are no more at liberty
to vary the mode of performing any part of public worship, than
we are to preach doctrines at variance with the Articles of
Religion. If there be any direction for the public service
of the Church, with which a Clergyman cannot conscientiously
comply, he is at liberty to withdraw from her ministry; but not
to violate the solemn compact he has made with her.” [18] Now I apprehend every
conscientious English Clergyman will act upon this
principle:—that while Scripture, and Scripture only is his
rule of faith, he is, in the interpretation of Scripture, to
defer to the Ritual, Liturgy, Articles, and Formularies of the
Church of England; he is to promote the glory of God in the
highest—peace upon earth, and good-will amongst men; but to
do so, not in the way which he may imagine to be the
wisest, but according to the Regulations, Canons, Rubrics, and
Customs of his Church;—to these he is bound by vows the
most solemn to conform. These, my Reverend Brethren,
I have conscientiously endeavoured to make my
rule;—and where are we to look for Unity, if we find it not
here? And what terms of reprobation can be sufficiently
strong to designate the conduct of those, who, by causing discord
among brethren who in principle are united, would thereby make
harmony for our enemies? Alas! in every community such
persons are found to exist, whose element is strife; who live by
faction; who, mistaking party spirit for Christian zeal, in their
contest for what they allege to be truth, forget that
Christianity is also a religion of Peace and Love. At the
present time such persons are busy among ourselves; some openly
avow their wish to prevent a union among the Clergy; in the
bitterness of their hatred towards the Established Religion, they
conceive that the cause of Truth can only be supported by the
formation of hostile confederacies within the Church: others
covertly, and with the semblance even of friendship
towards us—the better to disguise their real
malignity—yet exert their utmost unholy endeavours to arm
brother against brother, in the hope of waging a worse than civil
war, with the deadly weapons of theological hatred. Few in
number, they would scarcely be deserving of notice, if, by
anonymous misrepresentations—which ought never to be
credited until they have been fully examined—and by wilful
and gross exaggerations, which from their very absurdity ought to
excite the scepticism of charity; they had not partially
succeeded in inflaming the passions, and exciting the prejudices,
of many good and zealous, but ill-judging and mistaken men,
who, instead of regarding measures, respect
persons; who confound opinions with principles; and who,
in an exclusive fondness for latitude of interpretation and
practice, refuse even the meed of integrity and sincerity to
those with whom they differ, even though they are acting in
obedient accordance with their plighted vows.
It is not my intention upon this occasion to enter upon a
minute investigation of those points of controversy which have
recently been, and at present are, the subject of so much and
general discussion. The limit to which I must confine my
present Discourse precludes my doing so; nor do I consider the
inability I am thus under of serious moment. I am not,
however, intending to say, that in this variance of opinion,
there is nothing of importance. If we were assembled in
Convocation, empowered to make further reforms in our Church, or
to discuss the need of them, our opinions with respect to the
value of tradition, as a supplementary explication of Scripture,
would be important in the extreme; so would be our opinions
concerning the efficacy of the Sacraments, and the relative value
of primitive ceremonies, if we were reconstructing our Baptismal
and Liturgical offices: nor of less importance would be our
opinions on the Apostolical Succession, if the decision were to
rest with us whether the Church should recognise the ministerial
functions of men not episcopally ordained. But, happily for
us, these questions have been decided for us by the Church; and to
the decision of the Church, by the very fact of our being her
ordained ministers, we are bound unanimously to obey, and must
receive her decisions as our common principle: this, I presume,
none of you, my Reverend Brethren, will attempt to gainsay.
I may be allowed, however, briefly to remark upon one or two of
the most prominent topics of dispute; and first, then, as to the
Apostolical Succession. Upon this subject, it is
indisputable, there was no controversy up to the period of the
Reformation. It was then, as it had been for fifteen
hundred years, taken for granted that no man might presume to
minister in sacred things, unless he were first appointed to the
office by persons having authority to make the appointment, by
their regular succession from the Apostles. Upon this point
no one is more eloquent or more decided than our reforming
Archbishop, Dr. Cranmer. [21] Accordingly,
when in the reign of Elizabeth, the thirty-nine Articles were
agreed upon in a Convocation of our Clergy, this doctrine was
assumed:—“It is not lawful for any man to take upon
him the office of public preaching or administering the
Sacraments in the congregation, before he be lawfully called, and
sent to execute the same. And those we ought to judge
lawfully called and sent, which be chosen and called to this
work, by men who have public authority given unto them
IN”—not BY, but “IN”—“the congregation,
to call and send ministers into the Lord’s vineyard.”
[22a] And accordingly, in legislating
on this subject, the Church of England ordains that, “no
one shall be accounted and taken to be a lawful Bishop, Priest,
or Deacon among us; or be suffered to execute any of the
ministerial functions, except he be called, tried, examined, and
admitted thereunto, according to our form of Episcopal
Ordination; or hath had formerly Episcopal Consecration or
Ordination.” [22b] Now I
conceive, a more complete answer to the question—“Who
are they that have authority in the congregation?” could
not be given by a Church which, as we believe and declare,
reverences Scripture and the ancient authors. And hence it
is that, while a Minister of the Roman Church officiates among
us, upon a recantation and renunciation of his errors, without
further ordination; a converted Dissenting Minister is
unable to do so; the one having had—and the
other not having had—Episcopal Ordination. The
time will not allow me to enter into that part of the discussion,
whether an exact personal succession of Episcopally
ordained Ministers, can, or cannot be proved. Suffice it
however for us, that we are incontestibly assured, that the
Institution itself has descended by an evident succession,
even from the Apostles to ourselves. While men uncalled and
uncommissioned venture to approach and minister at the
altar—while our Apostolical descent is gainsayed, and the
necessity of rightful ordination set at nought—it is
bounden on us, my Reverend Brethren, who are Episcopally
ordained, to show that we bear no visionary dignity—no
barren privilege—but a most sacred office, full of
divinely-appointed power to strengthen and to sanctify those that
in faith discharge it. Let us show, by God’s
help, in our lives and labours that, in the Apostolical
Ministry, there resides a living influence, stamping it as the
ordinance of Christ, and conforming His servants to
Himself. If others must account for assuming a
commission never given to them, we must account if we
abuse and neglect that we have received; and ours will be
the heavier reckoning. Let us then consider one another,
within and without, to provoke unto love and to good works.
Here is rivalry without collision—contention without
strife. And God grant that a more abundant measure of a
holier spirit, and a closer conformity to our Master’s
pattern, impressed as a countersign upon our testimony, may
henceforth and ever bear witness unto us, that if any are
Christ’s, so are we Christ’s.
And now with regard to the doctrine of Baptismal
Regeneration. I am really at a loss to conceive how any
Member of the Established Religion, who candidly and without
mental reservation subscribes to the Articles of our Church, can
entertain any doubt upon it; and more particularly when the
Offices for Baptism and Confirmation are so clearly, so
absolutely, and so decidedly worded. That Regeneration at
Baptism is the positive doctrine of the English Church, I cannot
suppose will be denied. All those of our present bishops,
who have alluded to it in their Charges, have distinctly declared
and admitted this to be the case, as laid down in the
twenty-seventh Article. Now the Regius-Professor of
Divinity at Oxford (himself an opposer of the Authors of the
Tracts for the Times), thus speaks:—“No
subscription to the Articles can be honest and true, which falls
short of an assent to the Doctrines contained in them, or which
is made with any reservation. They are expressly set forth
for the avoiding of diversities of opinions, and establishing
true consent in religion.” At your ordination
“The Articles are proposed to you, as giving the right
sense of Scripture; and you are supposed, when you subscribe to
them, to have accepted them as such. No qualification,
therefore, no restriction is to be admitted, in the act of
subscription to the Articles, however drawn from pious
considerations of what is due to Scripture. They must then
be interpreted by themselves, by the phraseology of the Church,
and a knowledge of its intention in drawing them up, and
proposing them to its members.” [24] It is clear
then, my Reverend Brethren, as long as we continue in the
ministry of the Established Church, we have no liberty of
interpreting the Doctrines of that Church, in any other
way than those Articles decide, to which we have solemnly
subscribed. If we do so, we can with no honesty or consistency
continue ourselves recipients of her honours and emoluments.
As to the efficacy of the rite of Baptism in infants, what
need we, again, stronger or more satisfactory proof of the
doctrine of our Church than these words of our Office which we
are directed to use? “Seeing now, that this
child IS REGENERATE and grafted
into the body of Christ’s Church;” and again,
“we yield thanks to God, that it HATH pleased Him to REGENERATE the infant with His Holy
Spirit.”—It is a futile evasion to say, these
words are used upon the faith of the Sponsors, and in the
charitable spirit of anticipation by the Congregation,
that the Infant may be hereafter regenerated;—for
the very same prayer is enjoined to be offered up after
Private Baptism, where there are no Sponsors and
no Congregation.
But why are not the opposers of this positive doctrine of
Baptismal Regeneration consistent?—In other cases,
when arguing against those who are anxious to preserve the
discipline of the Church, they insist upon “a literal
and grammatical explanation;”—but here, the
doctrine of the Article and Office not according with
their sentiments, they are solicitous to evade this
rule. In Dr. Cardwell’s History of Conferences
connected with the revision of the Book of Common Prayer, it
is stated that, at that of the Savoy in 1661, when it was
suggested by the opposers of Regeneration at Infant Baptism, that
the wording of the Office should be altered to signify that
Regeneration might hereafter ensue;—it was decided
by the Commission, composed of the Bishops and other learned Divines,
that such alteration could not be sanctioned; that “the
denial” of Regeneration at Infant Baptism “tends to
anabaptism and contempt of the Holy Sacrament;” and
therefore, that the Office, as it now stands, was strictly in
accordance with the Holy Institution, and consequently the true
doctrine of the Reformed Church. [26a]
I must here, however, limit my observations on controversial
points of doctrine. Suffice it to say, as I have before
remarked, that in all matters of doubt, we cannot do better than
fulfil the vows we have made, and be guided by the plain and
literal directions of the Articles and Rubrics of our Church,
rather than trust to our own fanciful and fallible
interpretations. No safer guide, my Reverend Brethren, can
we follow;—for if she is at once the descendant of the
purest, truest representative of the Church Apostolical—if
the Articles of her faith be all of them proveable to
demonstration, from the word of God, as the primitive times
interpreted it—and if she has only done her duty to God and
man, by refusing either to add to this sacred deposit, or to
diminish aught from it—if she has rejected nothing of the
forms of preceding ages, but their superstition, or, of their
creed, but its novelties; and emancipating herself from a
fictitious antiquity, has taken her stand at once on the times of
our Saviour and His Apostles—if, in refusing to lord it
over Christ’s heritage, she only leaves us “the
liberty wherewith Christ has made us free,” [26b] after teaching us how to use
it—if, in discarding earthly mediators and the protection
of angels, she brings us directly to our King and Saviour, to the
over-shadowing wings of Him who loved us, and the strength of the
living God—if, in the majestic austerity off her
formularies, she chastises the imagination and the attractiveness
of will-worship, only to offer up the sacrifice of ourselves, our
souls and bodies, in words which are the perfection of a reason
elevated by faith, and modelled upon inspiration—if she
refuses to limit the Saviour’s offices, or modify the
Gospel message, because she dares not rationalize upon the ways
of God, or tamper with her commission—if she discards the
pomp and trappings of an external ceremonial, that she may not
obscure the simplicity of the truth, and that she may be clothed
in the Church’s true glory, the righteousness of
Christ;—if such be the Church of England, as our fathers
and fathers’ fathers have held her to be; and such, as
while Scripture remains in its integrity, and sole authority over
faith, nay, as long as the primitive fathers remain to interpret
it, she can prove herself to be against all gainsayers; great
will be the sin upon our heads if we refuse obedience to her as
our guide, and great the crime towards those who come after us,
of whose inheritance we are the guardians, if we permit so much
as one stone of our holy house to be moved—if we suffer the
efficacy of her Sacraments to be neutralized by modern
scepticism—her offices to be mutilated by doubting priests
and self-elected interpreters—and the beauty of her Unity
to be marred by the Latitudinarian spirit of concession and
expediency.
There
is one practice which has so unhappily, in my humble opinion,
obtained extensive usage as to render a notice of it, I conceive,
very important; but that I might not be deemed presumptuous or
illiberal in doing so, I will lay it before you in the very words
of the present Bishop of St. David’s, as they occur in his
last Charge, merely prefacing them by saying, I am confident the
practice they condemn is a fruitful source of promoting disunion
in the Church; and though it emanates, I am willing to
acknowledge, from zeal in the cause of religion, it is a zeal
without discretion, palatable, indeed, to Separatists, and
consequently productive of schism. These are Dr.
Thirlwall’s words:—“There are, I fear, not a
few cases in which a lecture in a school-room, or some other
common building, is substituted for the Church service, while the
Church remains closed. Such a practice appears to me
equivalent to an admission that our form of prayer is really a
bar, not a help, to devotion, and may be
advantageously superseded by the minister’s occasional
effusions. I cannot distinguish such meetings from
conventicles; the presence and presidency of the Clergyman only
renders the implied admission more glaring and pernicious.
It is a breach of faith to the Church, as well as a violation of
an express engagement. The same remark applies to every
departure from the Rubric, grounded on no other motive than
deference to the taste and prejudices of a part of the
congregation.” [28] Now I will not
weaken the force of these powerful and sensible remarks of
Dr. Thirlwall, by any further comment of my own on this
point.
So much has been said lately of the necessity of our carrying
out all the Rubric and Services of our Book of Common
Prayer, that I must be allowed to make a brief allusion to
it. No doubt, it is very desirable that we should do so;
but I conceive, the lengthened omission of many of the
injunctions of our Church, which has been suffered tacitly to
take place, now renders their restoration exceedingly difficult,
if not impossible. I am sure it would indeed be futile, and
nearly impracticable, in most of our rural parishes, many with a
widely-scattered population, consisting of the humblest rank of
agricultural labourers. For instance, it is enjoined in our
Rubric, that we should have daily service; and this, in
towns and populous places, is highly proper, and ought, without
doubt, to be carried into practice; but with many of us, whose
flocks depend on the fullest measure of daily labour they are
able to perform for their daily bread, it is not possible or
reasonable to expect them to sacrifice their existence, and that
of their families, to attend daily service in a Church, and that
Church often remote from their place of employment. To such
a case as this, the maxim of “Necessitas non habet
legem” is manifestly applicable. But, my Reverend
Brethren, do not let us shelter our laxity of ministration
under one tangible and reasonable excuse: if we are unable
to do all we are enjoined, let us at least show our zeal
and sincerity in our holy calling, by doing what is in our
power. I do maintain, then, that we ought to celebrate
divine service in our Churches, upon each of the days on which
we commemorate the leading events of the history of our Blessed
Lord; not only His Nativity, Crucifixion, and Resurrection, but
His Circumcision, His Manifestation to the Gentiles, and His
glorious Ascension. I think, too, it is especially
incumbent on us to pay a stricter regard to the solemn season of
Lent than is generally done; that we should open our Churches for
divine service on Ash Wednesday, and every Wednesday and Friday
during that penitential Fast, which our Church most piously and
reverently sets apart for self-examination and humiliation.
I am quite confident it is not only practicable to obtain
congregations on those days, but that the opportunity offered to
our people of publicly worshipping God upon them, will be hailed
with gratification and thankfulness; not, perhaps, generally at
first, but yet progressively and encouragingly. I can
instance one parish, not very remote from our own neighbourhood,
where this has been essayed during the season of Lent now just
concluded; a small and purely rural parish, and one offering,
perhaps, as few features of encouragement to re-establish such a
practice as any of us could name: the average congregations on
the week days (exclusive of children) has been thirty-five,
which, for the first renewal of the practice, I think will be
allowed is a very satisfactory result; besides which, during and
since the Lent weeks, the Sabbath-day congregations have
manifestly and remarkably increased. Whatever may be said
of the apathetic religious spirit of the people, I hold them to
be, at
heart, inclined to sacred things, and sincerely attached
to the established reformed religion of this country. Let
not us, my Reverend Brethren, be wanting in the zealous,
earnest, and uniform practice of our duty, by carelessly
and heartlessly offering to our flocks that divine spiritual food
we have it in our power, under God, to supply, and we shall not
find them backward or lukewarm in accepting its
nourishment, and appreciating its value. We shall, in this
way, more effectually subdue that monstrous hydra, Schism,
which has reared its hundred-fold head amongst the heritage of
Christ, than by wielding acrimonious weapons of controversy, or
descending to heterodoxical concession and subserviency. As
ministers of religion, it is our paramount duty to lose no
practicable opportunity of impressing the vitality of its
exercise upon those committed to our spiritual charge—of
banishing all discord one with another—of evincing (not in
theory only) that we are ministers of divine love and peace, so
that it may be evident to all the world, in our conduct and
bearing, that we live together in christian harmony and
good-will.
Finally, my Reverend Brethren, in calling upon you to preserve
inviolate the bond of Union which should firmly knit us
together, who are the consecrated lawful Ministers and Stewards
of the mysteries of Jesus Christ—let us bear in mind what
awful responsibility rests upon us.—What is that
exalted station we here occupy. And whom amongst us shall
not these reflections constrain? To be the Lord’s
especial portion—a remnant quickened from the
dead—raised to a middle space between the throne of our
exalted Master, and the spirits of a world redeemed; to be the
visible representatives of an invisible Saviour, associated with
Him in the administration of His earthly kingdom; concluding
eternal peace, or denouncing eternal war, a savour of life unto
life, or of death unto death;—doomed ourselves to an
eternity of woe that cannot be deepened, or of glory that cannot
be exalted;—Who shall minister before Him and not
tremble? Who shall draw nigh to Him and not rejoice?
Who can forecast our condemnation without despair, or contemplate
our blessedness without an ecstacy?
Which of us that be worldly, heedless, unprofitable, shall
endure His withering scrutiny, when He shall be revealed from
heaven with fire?—or in the sunshine of His final
acceptance, remember our toil and labour? Who shall bear in
mind the contradiction and the cross, when the dead shall ascend
up out of the depths of the sea, spread over the plains, and
stand upon the mountains; when we and our people shall meet in
the day of that mighty gathering; when the judgment shall be
set—condemnation utter its thunders—and its voice die
away in the tranquil peace of Heaven; and the New
Jerusalem—the foundation and corner-stones whereof, with
Him we are—shall be for ever with the inconceivable glories
of Almighty God.
THE
END.
Sloman,
Printer, King-street, Yarmouth