only those who complied with these requirements were eligible to place or rank, if political heresy doomed a man to perpetual ostracism from office and honour, and if thus a broad line of demarcation were drawn between the two classes of political thinkers, is it not possible, or more than possible, that Conformists, perhaps unconsciously elated with a sense of their inherent superiority, and Dissenters irritated by a feeling of the injustice to which they were subjected, might be as much divided as Churchmen and Dissenters have hitherto been? Nonconformists have long felt that these divisions are a scandal to our common Christianity, and they have never desired to perpetuate them. But if it is supposed that their desire for a frank and manly interchange of thought, or fellowship in Christian work, with the bishops and clergy of the Established Church, implies even a tacit acquiescence in the continued supremacy of one Church, it will be necessary for them to guard against such possible misconstruction of their conduct. The bishop, indeed, does not actually suggest anything of the kind, but it is impossible, in reading his paper, to get rid of the impression that he hopes to find in the more friendly sentiments awakened among certain Nonconformist communities an additional defence for the Establishment.

I might hesitate before attaching such a meaning to his words, were it not that it is in perfect harmony with the views of some of his friends. It is implied in the distinction so continually set up between political and religious Dissenters. It was the underlying thought in the singularly offensive comparison instituted by the Primate between the 'platform orators' of Dissent, whom he placed on the same level with the writers in Church journals, whose folly and malevolence continually travesty and disgrace the Church, which, so far as they can, they misrepresent,' and the large and powerful deputation of the chief Nonconformist ministers' who had conferred with him at the palace. It is an idea which finds favour with Church defenders, who try to persuade themselves that the opposition to the Establishment meets with no sympathy from those Dissenters who are most eminent for piety and culture. Their reasoning, indeed, revolves in a circle, and that a very narrow one. They assume that piety and culture are incompatible with antagonism to the Establishment. When, therefore, they meet a Dissenter who is possessed of these qualities, they at once take it for granted that he is not a political Dissenter. When, on the other side, they hear of a political Dissenter, they proceed immediately to the conclusion that he is deficient either in grace or in learning, and probably in both. What might happen if they were unexpectedly to meet one known to belong to this obnoxious class, and to discover that his piety was as sincere, his culture as extensive, and even his charity as broad and sympathetic as that of his brethren whom they had judged specially religious, it is hard to say.

A free conference between Churchmen and these political Dissenters, however, might not be undesirable. It is quite possible that their antagonism is irreconcilable. The one party is not likely to abandon the supremacy which it has enjoyed so long that it has come to regard it as an heirloom of which it could not be deprived without injustice. The other is as little prepared to confess its native inferiority and forego its claims to civic equality. But, at least, the comparison of the opposing views might produce, on both sides, more of that sober and reasonable toleration' of which the bishop thinks so much. If it did nothing more, it might show that the assailants of ecclesiastical privilege are not necessarily ecclesiastical malignants any more than their defenders, and that political Dissent, even in its most decided forms, does not imply a want of religious earnestness or an incapacity to appreciate whatever is noble and good in the Established Church or its clergy. I remember hearing, some years ago, of an excellent clergyman who was expressing his great distress at the deterioration in the character of Dissenting ministers. Once,' said the good man, they were distinguished by their spirituality, but now they have sacrificed all that in their eagerness to claim equality with the clergy.' A Dissenting minister, who happened to be present, quietly asked, 'Is it not possible that the determination to maintain ascendency may be just as indicative of a lack of spirituality on the part of the clergy?' As a retort this was surely fair, though it may be that both it and the original suggestion were equally untrue to fact. The supporters and the assailants of the Establishment alike hold a principle for which they would contend irrespectively of its bearings on their personal position, and the frank recognition of this on both sides is the first condition of a satisfactory treatment of the great question at issue. The Primate may rest assured that he does not contribute anything to the defence of his Church by a passing sneer at the 'violence of platform orators,' or a suggestion that those whom he invites to confer with him on the great conflict with modern unbelief have no sympathy with these wilder spirits of the Dissenting communities.

It is absolutely necessary that there should be plain speaking on this subject, and that the bishops should understand that, so far as the Congregational and Baptist Churches are concerned, there is no division into two parties, the one religious and the other political Dissenters. There are diversities of taste and temperament which lead some men to stand aloof from the conflict in which others are engaged; but if the Primate and his friends believe that there is a party in either of these great bodies which looks on the Establishment with favour and desires its continuance, they are labouring under a gross delusion. Individuals there may be who differ from the mass of their brethren as to the lawfulness of State Churches in general, and as to the wisdom of upholding that of this country in

particular; but if there be they are too few to be regarded as a party. Twenty years ago there was a considerable section of Congregationalists which, for various reasons, disapproved of aggressive action for the overthrow of an Establishment to which they were, nevertheless, conscientiously opposed; but the course of events during that period, and especially the growth of Ritualism and of the High Church temper and influence which has been fostered by it, has told so powerfully that only a small remnant of that school is now to be found. There are a few who pay the Church the high compliment (for which it is to be hoped the bishops are duly grateful, and accept as a fruit of that religious Dissent which they can tolerate) of suggesting that the explosive forces within her are so powerful that they have only to be left alone in order to accomplish her destruction. It may possibly be some idiosyncrasy that would lead me to prefer the earnest opponent, who at least gives me credit for a faith and a determination to contend for it, and challenges me to meet him in the open field, to the more subtle foe, who treats me to a semblance of friendship because he has the secret conviction that I am so feeble that it needs no effort of his to hasten my coming destruction. But this is what the abstinence of those who are invidiously called the religious Dissenters among Congregationalists really means. They do not like an Establishment in which sacerdotalism becomes more rampant every day, but neither do they like the unpleasant incidents of the struggle which is necessary to overthrow it. They know the penalty which they have to pay who venture to take prominent part in a movement which is of necessity unpopular among many with whom they desire to be on terms of friendship, and they shrink from it. Far be it from me even to hint a censure upon them. I want only to point out how far their refusal to take part in the work of political Dissent proceeds from sympathy with the Establishment. It is not that they love it more than those who are in the heat of the conflict, but simply that they like the conflict less, and believe that they may safely stand aloof, as the State Church is doomed to self-destruction.

Let our position, then, be fairly understood. We are all opposed to the Establishment, and we are all equally ready to admire and honour whatever is good in the Church-that is, within the Establishment. The Spectator recently said, in a note upon a letter from a Welsh Dissenter: The Liberationists are never tired of doing homage to the virtues and moral earnestness of the great majority of the English clergy. Only they say they would be a great deal better if they were disestablished.' I am not sure whether this qualification is often added to the sincere and hearty recognition of the piety and zeal of a large proportion of the clergy. What is more generally said is that even their personal goodness constitutes no argument in favour of their being established. But the Spectator is so far right that the anxious desire of Liberationists-that is, of the political Dissenters

is to make a clear distinction between a system and its supporters. In short (and this is the point on which I am most anxious to insist), they are not less alive to any virtues which may belong to the Episcopal polity or to the forms of worship in the Anglican Church, nor are they at all more insensible to the value of noble work which is being done by numbers of the clergy than those who are credited with greater moderation and even more piety, because, for various reasons, they are not so prominent in the struggle for religious equality. They have the same appreciation of all the rich contributions to the theology and literature and the devotional life of the Church of Christ which have been made by the great sons of the Church; they are as able and as anxious to claim spiritual kindred with all good and noble men, even those from whose ecclesiastical views they most widely differ; they are as ready to recognise the debt which England owes to Churchmen and Cavaliers as well as to Puritans and Roundheads; they are as ardent in their patriotism and as catholic in their religious sympathies as their friends to whom the brand of political Dissent is affixed. The latter, on the other hand, are not less opposed to the theory of a National Church, or more ready to concede that supremacy which its hierarchy quietly assume. Those who do not sympathise in the aims of the Liberation Society, and would not rejoice in its triumph, though they do not feel themselves called upon to engage in its struggles, are extremely few, and certainly are not those who are generally looked up to as the leaders of Congregationalism.

If I seem to need an apology for devoting so much space to a point that may at first appear to be of secondary importance, my excuse is that it really touches the very essence of the question. If the opposition to the Establishment were really of the kind which is hinted in the incidental suggestions of some Church dignitaries, and distinctly asserted by others, it would be too weak, alike in moral force and numerical support, to have any reasonable prospect of success. A few extreme Nonconformists, under the dominion of envy, jealousy, and all uncharitableness, so blinded by sectarian prejudice as to be unable to see the great good which the Established Church is doing, or so dominated by their miserable hatred of everything superior to themselves that they would run the risk of robbing the nation of its faith in order to gratify their own evil passions, so dead to every sense of right that they were prepared to rob the Church of her own property, and so wanting in all chivalrous feeling that they would not shrink from inflicting on the clergy not only personal loss, but the bitter sorrow of seeing the desecration of their loved and venerated churches, are predestined to ignominious failure. Of course they would not be sustained by the body of religious men who may feel bound to dissent from the Establishment, but have no desire to do injustice to those who are able to conform. Indeed, it is not easy

to see where they would find their strength. If there is one thing for which Englishmen have a contempt, it is sectarian rivalry, and when that discovers itself in its most obnoxious form it is very improbable that it would long meet with much countenance even from excitable mobs. Such would be the inherent weakness of these agitators that the only question that suggests itself is whether it would be worth while to meet them with any organised resistance.

It is a great misfortune that the question of property is so prominent in a controversy which has to do with something far more vital to the well-being of the nation and the power of Christianity in it than any dispute as to the possession of houses and lands. To Nonconformists the subject is of importance only because they are continually told that a Church with such vast revenues as those enjoyed by the Anglican Church must be under the control of the State; and as it is impossible to secure that control without giving her the position of a National Church, Dissenters should patiently submit to the inferiority to which they are thus doomed, and regard it as a sacrifice made on the altar of the national good. It is politicians who object, and not without apparent reason, to give absolute freedom to a Church so strongly organised and so richly endowed. I believe that too much weight has been given to the argument, that the supposed control at present enjoyed is an idea, and that in a free Church, unless the endowments were absolutely in the hands of the hierarchy, the laity might be trusted to prevent the abuses so properly dreaded. Indeed, it seems to me that it would not be very difficult to prove that the present state of things is about the worst that could be devised, inasmuch as it maintains a semblance of lay control which really amounts to nothing. The clergy enjoy the favour of the State, with all the emoluments and dignities which that implies. They claim priestly prerogative, and do it in the name and as representatives of the State, which distinctly recognises them as entitled in every parish to exercise that priestly commission which they have received at the hands of the bishop. Their orders, of course, come from the Church, but the exclusive privilege which attaches to their position is the gift of the State. The Roman Catholic priest makes the same pretensions, and behind him is the authority of the ancient Church which he represents; but the Anglican priest by his side, whose spiritual claims he treats so lightly, speaks in the name of the State of England also. The State sets down in every parish a priest, and he is there, not as a private individual or as a clergyman claiming such deference as is due from the members of his Church, and seeking, as occasion offers, to secure the allegiance of those who hitherto have been outside, but as the official religious representative of the nation. So thoroughly is this the case that all who do not submit to his teaching are labelled as Dissenters, and we are told on high authority that he is entitled to regard them as nuisances. All this the State