the highest ecclesiastic authority, to inquire into, and adjudicate upon, the canonical fitness of the nominees of the Crown for the Episcopal office, before conferring on them the spiritual power and commission of that office, was peremptorily denied, the question ceased to be a personal one; it became a great constitutional question, on which it is open to the humblest lay or clerical member of the Church, who has made the Constitution of the Church his study, to offer his opinion. Nevertheless, the Author of the following pages, deeply engaged at the time in other literary labours, would hardly have resumed his pen on this subject, had he not been urged, in terms which scarcely admitted of a refusal, to publish a second edition of the treatise published by him last year, on the Supremacy Question. This was all that he contemplated, when he took up his pen; but he soon found that in order to do justice to the questions connected with Episcopal promotions, on which he had but slightly touched in his previous publication, it became necessary, not only to recast the old materials, but to make most extensive additions. In this manner the present volume has arisen, in which all the historical information on Church Synods contained in the pamphlet on the Supremacy Question is incorporated; while the few matters which were extraneous to the main argument on the Synodal power of the Church and the Episcopal office are omitted; and to the last-named subject all the prominence is given which is called for by recent occurrences. The author has thought it right to offer this expla nation to the public; and he has now, in conclusion, only to express his fervent hope, that all who value the character of our Church, and the truth and grace of Christ, whereof she is the witness and dispenser, will unite together in claiming for the Church that liberty of legislating for herself, and administering her own affairs, in submission to the temporal Sovereign personally, as God's Minister, which is enjoyed absolutely, and without such submission, by every other religious body in the community. Above all, his hope and prayer is, that the Church may be preserved from the ruin and disgrace which must come upon her, if any portion of her sons should be tempted, by the hope of gaining a party advantage within the Church, sinfully to betray the spouse of Christ into the hands of a constitutionally godless democracy. INTRODUCTION. THE Construction which has recently been put by the Prime Minister upon the Royal Supremacy over the Church, which has been acted upon by the Ecclesiastical Judges in the Archbishop's Court,-which has been supported by the pleadings of the law-officers of the Crown in the Court of Queen's Bench,—and which has neither been affirmed nor denied by that court, the opinions of the Judges being equally divided,—is either correct, or it is not correct. If it is not correct, it is evident that the law is painfully uncertain in a matter touching not only the dearest and most sacred interests which men can have upon earth, but their eternal interests, which are inseparable from the preservation of "the good deposit," the παρακαταθήκη ', committed by the Apostles to their successors in the government of the Church; and not only that the law is painfully uncertain, but that there exists, in hands extremely unfit to be entrusted with it, a fearful power of intimidation and coercion contrary to the law. 1 2 Tim. i. 14. B In that supposition the Church has an indisputable right to demand, that the law shall be clearly defined, and protected from the possibility of being overruled by an exertion of arbitrary power. If, on the contrary, the construction put upon the law is correct, it is equally evident that the Church has for the last three hundred years been subject,—without knowing it, never having been made to feel it,—to an intolerable tyranny, wholly subversive of the character of the Church as a spiritual institution, which derives its commission from the Lord Jesus Christ, and its powers from the Holy Ghost. For, if that construction is correct, the Church is placed in the following position. 1. The individual who has fought his way in political conflict to the leadership of the majority in the House of Commons, and thereby, in due course of parliamentary warfare, to the position of First Lord of the Treasury,-whoever he may be, and whatever his creed, Presbyterian or Independent, Quaker or Baptist, Methodist or Irvingite, Papist or Socinian, Jew or Infidel,-is, by virtue of his political office, entitled to exercise the Royal Supremacy over the English Church; he is, to all practical intents and purposes, Supreme Governor of the Church." 66 2. This "Supreme Governor," for the time being, "of the Church," can cause any person he pleases, being in priest's orders, to be elected to any bishopric 2 That is, supposing him willing to abide by the universal rule and custom of the Church. But if he should see fit to set that custom aside, to appoint a deacon, (which, by the way, has actually been |