^^^%.. .^
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS 
 
 DENOMINATIONAL WOESHIP 
 
 THE NATIONAL CHUECH 
 
 THREE ESSAYS 
 
 BY THE 
 
 EIGHT HOiSr. J. Ct. HUBBAED, M.P. 
 
 LONDON 
 LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 
 
 1882
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 The Nonconformist and Independent of January 6, 1881, 
 bestowed upon the following essay, just printed in the Nineteenth 
 Century^ a highly uncomplimentary notice, in which were indi- 
 cated two errors of which I had been guilty. 
 
 My first sin was this (p. 14) — I had erred in contrasting 
 Mr. Mann's return in 1851 of 20,390 Nonconformist Buildings 
 with the number of Eegistered Chapels given in the Registrar- 
 General's Eeport of 1877 at 19,064. The Eeport (I am now 
 told) excludes a class of Chapels included in Mi*. Mann's return, 
 I accept this correction, and I note it as evidence of the futility 
 of founding conclusions upon a comparison of diflferent unofficial 
 statistics. 
 
 My second sin was that I had inadvertently affixed the date of 
 1870 to Lord Palmerston's speech of June 11, 1860. I repair 
 the error, and seize the opportunity of doing fuller justice to 
 Lord Palmerston's speech (Hansard, No. 159, p. 1734). 
 
 Lord Palmerston, concurring with Mr. Baines in thinking 
 there is a value in a periodical enumeration of the different 
 sections of the Christian Church, continued : " I do not agree with 
 " him as to the mode of obtaining the information, because 
 " nothing could be more fallacious than the mode adopted in 
 "1851. . . . No inference of value could be drawn from 
 " such information, and I protest against adopting such a mode, 
 " attended with trouble and leading to no reasonable conclusion. 
 "... With respect to the enumeration of 1851, I do not 
 " believe that there was fraud practised, but I cannot but think 
 " that there is no truth whatever in the conclusions which have 
 " been drawn from it. . . . With all respect to the noncon- 
 
 A 2
 
 4 PREFACE. 
 
 " formiDg body I still entertain the opinion that their objections 
 "... are not borne out by any reasons that will bear the 
 " test of argument. We defer to their feelings, but we cannot 
 " assent to their reasoning." 
 
 Lord Palmerston, though he issued no official instruction, 
 had no doubt verbally assented to the Regis trar-G-eneral's inquiry 
 into the accommodation for religious worship. How greatly he 
 desired a genuine Religious Census, and how entirely unsatis- 
 factory as a substitute he thought the Worship inquiry, can be 
 doubted by no one who reads the speech or the above extracts. 
 Lord Palmerston' s protest against conclusions drawn from a 
 census of worship is forcibly illustrated by a contrast of Mr. 
 Miall's return of " Attendances," and Canon Hume's record of 
 '' Religious Profession," accomplished during the past year with 
 great care and labour, and now published as an " Ecclesiastical 
 " Census of LiverpooW 
 
 Mr. C. Miall's statistics mentioned at page 23 include those 
 of Liverpool, with its population of 552,425; and he divides 
 the entire attendances at public worship of 146,012 between — 
 Church of England, 54,551, or 37*4 per cent. ; Other denomi- 
 nations, 91,461, or 62-6 per cent. 
 
 Canon Hume in the same area numbered (owing to the 
 floating population) only 499,042 souls, whose religious pro- 
 fessions were — Dissenters and others, 88,861, or 17*8 per cent. ; 
 Roman Catholics, 140,115, or 28-1 per cent.; Religion unknown, 
 5,398, or M per cent.; Other than Church of England, 234,374, 
 or 47 per cent. ; Church of England, 264,668, or 53 per cent. 
 
 Rectifying Mr. C. Miall's grand total for 70 towns by the 
 test of Liverpool, the proportions would be — Churchmen, not 
 38*66, but 54*78 per cent. ; Other denominations, not 61*34, but 
 45*22 per cent. All England and Wales would, if polled, 
 present a still wider variation from his computations. 
 
 24 Prince's Gate, 2Ut March, 1882. 

 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS.' 
 
 " Whether we regard a people merely in their secular capacity, 
 " as partners in a great association for promoting the stability, 
 *• the opulence, the peaceful glory of a state ; or view them in 
 " their loftier character as subjects of a higher kingdom — swift 
 " and momentary travellers towards a never-ending destiny ; in 
 " either aspect the degree and the direction of religious sentiment 
 " in a community are subjects of the weightiest import — in the 
 " one case to the temporal guardians of a nation — to its spiritual 
 " teachers in the other. Statesmen — aware to what a great 
 " extent the liberty or bondage, industry or indolence, prosperity 
 " or poverty of any people, are the fruits of its religious creed, 
 " and knowing also how extensively religious feelings tinge 
 " political opinions — find an accurate acquaintance with the 
 ** various degrees and forms in which religious sentiment is 
 " manifested indispensable to a correct appreciation either of 
 " the country's actual condition or of its prospective tendency, 
 " and equally essential to enable them to legislate with safety 
 " upon questions where religious principles or prejudices are 
 " inextricably involved." 
 
 A more appropriate introduction to our subject will not 
 easily be found than the above extract from the second page of 
 Mr. Horace Mann's Report to the Kegistrar- General upon the 
 accommodation for religious worship in 1851, Having read it, 
 it is hard to conceive that any question should be raised as to 
 the principle involved, or as to the expediency of adopting the 
 most direct and efficient means for obtaining the desired infor- 
 mation upon the religion of the nation. 
 
 In our neglect of a Eeligious Census we stand nearly, if not 
 quite, alone amidst civilised nations. England is unfavourably 
 distinguished, not only from foreign countries, but from an 
 
 * Keprinted (by permission) from Nineteenth Century of January 1881.
 
 6 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 important portion of the United Kingdom. Ireland has a 
 Religious Census — why should England be deprived of the 
 advantage which a knowledge of the religion of the people 
 brings to their good government ? The Irish Census Act 
 provides that an account in writing be taken of the religious 
 profession of every person; but this item of information is 
 omitted from the list of requisites to be answered in the 
 English schedule. 
 
 Why is the system pursued on this side of the Irish Channel 
 different from that pursued on the other ? The importance of the 
 question has only come into prominence within the last thirty 
 years, and its investigation need not therefore carry our retros- 
 pect beyond that period. 
 
 The Census Bill of 1850 gave the Secretary of State power 
 to issue questions referring, not alone to the numbers, ages, and 
 occupations of the people, but also to such " fm-ther particulars " 
 as might seem to him advisable, and the Registrar-Greneral was 
 disposed to adopt as an interpretation of " further particulars " 
 the collection of intelligence as to the " number, varieties, and 
 " capabilities " of the religious and scholastic institutions of the 
 country. The House of Peers, however, raised an objection to 
 the proposed inquiry in connection with the penal sections of 
 the Act, and the objection being confirmed by the law officers 
 of the Crown, the proposed extension of the inquiry under 
 statutory obligation was relinquished. 
 
 It was intended that the deficiencies of the Census Act of 
 1850 should be supplied in the Census Act of 1860, and the Bill 
 was accordingly presented to the House of Commons with a 
 provision for obtaining the religious profession, as well as the 
 age, sex, and occupation of every individual. This provision 
 was opposed by the Nonconformists, and its omission was moved 
 by Mr. Edward Baines, the respected member for Leeds, in a 
 speech embodying all the arguments that ingenuity and imagi- 
 nation could suggest. He was answered by Sir George C- 
 Lewis, the then Home Secretary. Sir George began by show- 
 ing that all presumptions were in favour of a Religious Census 
 — an accessory and assistance to good government which had 
 four.d place in the general practice of civilised states ; and he
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 7 
 
 gave reasons for believing that the difficulties which were appre- 
 hended would disappear in the face of a well-organised system 
 of enumeration. Sir Greorge Lewis, with a warmth unusual in 
 him, contemptuously spurned the insinuation that the Eeligious 
 Census would be perverted into a means of oppression through 
 undue influence ; he reproved the inconsistency with which the 
 several sects protested against the record of their religious 
 profession in the national census, while their very protests were 
 made with an ostentatious display of their nonconformity ; but 
 he concluded by withdrawing the provision for the record of a 
 Eeligious Profession. Lord Palmerston closed the discussion 
 of the Dissenters' objections in these words : " We have deferred 
 " to their feelings, but we cannot assent to their reasons." The 
 same subserviency to Dissent was exhibited by the Govern- 
 ment in 1870. The introduction of a return of Eeligious 
 Professions into the Census Bill of 1870 was again opposed 
 by Mr. Baines, who succeeded in negativing the proposal in 
 the Commons. The House of Lords subsequently inserted a 
 provision for taking a Census of Eeligious, but the clause was 
 struck out by the Commons before they passed the Bill at the 
 close of the Session on the 8th of August. There was little 
 reason to expect that the Census Bill of 1880 would require 
 a return of religious professions. The Liberation Society had 
 issued its prohibition, and the Grovernment of Mr. Gladstone 
 were too considerate for the wishes of their Nonconformist 
 friends to offend them by a discovery of truths vitally con- 
 nected with the science of legislation, but dreaded for their 
 exposure of statistical delusions. The Census Bills (which had 
 they been earlier laid before the Commons would have provoked 
 discussion) were prudently kept back till the last days of the 
 Session, and the brief debate which then ensued was on the side 
 of the Government confined to the assertion of two most inade- 
 quate objections to a Eeligious Census. 
 
 First, that the expense of the Census would be increased. 
 Secondly, that the publication of the Census would be delayed. 
 To the first objection it may be replied that the cost of an 
 additional column to the form of return, and the consequent 
 labour of filling it up, would be infinitesimally small compared
 
 8 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 with the whole cost of the Census, and not for a moment to be 
 weighed against the national utility of the information it would 
 convey. To the second, the reply would be that a decennial 
 Census is not like a weather forecast, whose virtue vanishes with 
 every hour of delay in its publication, and that assuming the very 
 problematical result of an appreciable delay, that delay would not 
 impair the utility of the return for any practical purpose. 
 
 The complete indictment of a Keligious Census is con- 
 spicuously set forth in the Nonconformist of the 29th of July, 
 1880, which reprints what it describes " as the excellent epitome 
 "• of objections published in a separate form by the Liberation 
 " Society." This document, important as expressing the prin- 
 ciples, convictions, and arguments of the Liberation Society, 
 of the eminent Nonconformists who are members of the House 
 of Commons, and of their ably conducted journal, shall be given 
 in extenso. 
 
 Objections to a Census of Religious Peofession. 
 
 1. The inquinj is umvarrantahle. What right have Government officials 
 to question us about our religious, any more than about our political pro- 
 fessions ? The only place where they can be legitimately elicited is in the 
 polling booth. 
 
 2. The inquiry is absurd, or unreasonable. How can every hotel-keeper, 
 every lodging-house keeper, every master, and every head of a hospital, or 
 prison, or poor-house, make a truthful return of the religious profession of 
 " every living person " who happens to have slept under a certain roof on a 
 particular night ? The inquiry would in many cases be resented as an im- 
 pertinence, and if the facts were guessed at, instead of ascertained, they 
 would frequently be, not facts, but fictions. It would be unjust to house- 
 holders find inmates alike. 
 
 3. The result ivould he misleading, because of the ambiguity of the inquiry. 
 What is '' religious profession " ? Is it what a man believes, or only what he 
 professes, or what he says that he professes ? Or if it means, what religious 
 body does he belong to, what is belonging to a religious body ? Then there are 
 many persons who cannot really define their religious profession, and why 
 should they be obliged to attempt to do so, or be punished if they refuse to 
 make the attempt ? 
 
 4. The retwn would he incomjilete, because it is well known that a large 
 number of persons would, on conscientious grounds, feel bound to refuse the 
 information sought for, and many would refuse on other grounds. And if 
 the enumerators attempted to supply it, they would inevitably blunder. 
 
 5. The return would iwove fallacious and grossly misleading. Large 
 masses of the people make no religious profession ; but, because they will
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 9 
 
 not like to acknowledge the fact, they will reply, " Church of England." 
 The effect would be to produce the impression that the Church of England 
 has a far greater body of adherents than all the other religious bodies have, 
 and that is the object of the suggested Religious Census. It is wished to use 
 what would be really inaccurate, and in many cases dishonest returns, for a 
 political purpose. 
 
 6. The inquiry would lead to coercion and sectarian rivalry, and would 
 occasion great bitterness of feeling. Many of the Established clergy and their 
 adherents would use all their influence to induce their dependents and the 
 poor to return themselves as Churchmen, and numbers of persons would be 
 too ignorant or too weak to resist such pressure. 
 
 7. The inquiry woidd be contrary to the true jmrjwse of a census. That 
 purpose is to obtain statistics which are likely to be accurate, and to ascer- 
 tain facts which can be verified, and not opinions or professions which are 
 necessarily vague and ambiguous, or unascertainable. A census of the popu- 
 lation ought to be taken with the good will of the population : whereas such 
 a Religious Census as is suggested would excite anger and resistance, and 
 make the census odious to a large class of the people. 
 
 And now what are these objections worth ? They shall be 
 answered seriatim, 
 
 1. A government is warranted in requiring for the public 
 advantage information which it may be irksome for individuals 
 to give ; but since a declaration of religious profession would 
 necessarily be voluntary and uncontroverted, it could not 
 involve any infringement of conscientious scruple. 
 
 2. Every householder could ask, and every adult inmate of 
 every tenement could reply to, the question which concerns his 
 religious profession. Parents would be responsible for their 
 children. 
 
 3. The object of the inquiry is to ascertain every man's 
 account of his religious profession if he has any. It is im- 
 possible to believe that men would wantonly and aimlessly 
 misrepresent their profession, and still more to imagine that 
 either intentional or casual errors could be so many as to affect 
 the essential purpose of the inquiry. 
 
 4. A refusal on conscientious or capricious grounds to 
 answer the inquiry might leave the return incomplete numeri- 
 cally as regards the entire population, but complete and exact 
 as an exposition of the relative proportions of the several de- 
 nominations. 
 
 5. If masses of the people choose to describe their religious 
 profession as that of the Church of England, it would be the
 
 10 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 height of tyranny to preclude their doing so. The objection fore- 
 tells " that the effect (of the inquiry) would be to produce an 
 " impression that the Church of England has a far greater body 
 " of adherents than all the other bodies have." The prophecy 
 is probably correct, and we have it here confessed that the 
 objection of the Liberation Society to a Religious Census is 
 that it would enable the majority of the English to declare 
 themselves members of the Church of England. 
 
 6. Coercion, it is insinuated, can be exercised only by the 
 clergy and their adherents ; and, on the other hand, only the 
 Dissenting poor are described as so weak and ignorant as to 
 succumb to the influence which would be exercised to make 
 them appear Churchmen. Instead of imagining this double 
 slander, it would be wiser and truer to believe that Churchmen 
 respect the convictions of those whom they employ, and that 
 Englishmen, whether Churchmen or Dissenters, would scorn to 
 dissemble their religious belief. 
 
 7. Certainly a Census should be taken with the good will of 
 the population, and so it would be if they knew that its object 
 was — not such as it is represented by the Liberation Societ}^ — but 
 one aiming at the more just, more tolerant, more religious 
 government of the whole nation. The Liberation Society 
 allege, indeed, that although they have strenuously and success- 
 fully opposed a " Eeligious Profession " Census, they are heartily 
 in favour of the " fullest and fairest Eeligious Census " in a repe- 
 tition of that taken in 1851. Well, let us inquire into the so- 
 called Eeligious Census of 1851. 
 
 When Sir Morton Peto brought forward his Burials Bill in 
 1861, he announced that he proposed that measure in the name 
 of the majority of the English people. Challenged for his 
 authority, he referred to the Eeligious Census of 1851. The 
 book which he so designated is really entitled " Census of Grreat 
 " Britain, 1851, Eeligious Worship," and in a note prefixed to the 
 Eeport, Mr. Graham, the Eegistrar-General, addresses the Secre- 
 tary of State for the Home Department thus : " My Lord, — 
 " When the census of Grreat Britain was taken in 1851, I received 
 " instructions from Her Majesty's Government to endeavour to 
 " procure information as to the existing accommodation for public
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 11 
 
 " religious worship." Sir George Cornewall Lewis, the then Home 
 Secretary, readily assented to a motion by a member of the 
 House for a copy of the " instructions " referred to by the 
 Eegistrar-Greneral ; but after some delay he informed his querist 
 that " no copy of the instructions could be produced, for that no 
 " such instructions existed." Mr. Graham could not of course 
 have written as he did without some warrant, and the proba- 
 bility is that although no parliamentary authority had been 
 given, yet that Lord Palmerston had verbally assented to the 
 suggestion of his zealous subordinate. The ability with which 
 Mr. Horace Mann performed the laborious task confided to him 
 by the Eegistrar-General has never been doubted, but his Eeport 
 upon " Eeligious Worship " is destitute of parliamentary sanc- 
 tion, and cannot be quoted as having official authority: its 
 accuracy has been impugned, but it would be unreasonable to 
 impute to dishonesty in the compiler errors attributable to 
 deceitful materials. 
 
 Apart from any question as to Mr. Mann's use of the returns 
 furnished to him, it is important carefully to scrutinise the 
 nature of those returns, and the conclusions drawn from them 
 for an object quite distinct from the purpose of the inquiry. 
 
 Mr. Mann's statistics profess to present returns of the number 
 of churches and chapels, the number of sittings provided, and 
 the number of attendants at public worship, on the Census 
 
 Sunday, viz. : — 
 
 Accommodation for Worship^ 
 
 Buildings Seats 
 
 Church of England 14,077 5,317,915 
 
 Nonconformist 20,399 4,894,648 
 
 Attendance at Worship {sujjplying by estimate defects in the Returns). 
 
 Morning Afternoon Evening 
 
 Church of England . . 2,541,244 1,890,764 860,543 
 
 Nonconformists . . 2,106,238 1,293,371 2,203,906 
 
 4,647,482 3,184,135 3,064,449 
 
 By assuming that, of the afternoon attendants, one half, and of 
 
 the evening attendants, one third, had not been at the morning 
 
 service, Mr. Mann obtains a total of 
 
 Worshippers in the Church of England . . . 3,773,474 
 Worshippers of other denominations .... 3,487,558
 
 12 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 or in the proportion of fifty-two Churchmen to forty-eight Non- 
 conformists. Upon these doubtful data the Liberation Society 
 constructed their computations, eventuating in the discovery 
 that Nonconformists constituted a majority of the people of 
 England and Wales. To reach this result, some efforts of 
 imagination became necessary. (1) The relative number of 
 the adherents of the several denominations worshipping on a 
 particular day was to be applicable as a scale for determining 
 the denomination of all the rest of the population. (2) The 
 asserted increase of Nonconformist chapels prior to 1851 was to 
 be continuous subsequent to 1851. 
 
 (1) This assumption demands most careful scrutiny, seeing 
 that Mr. Mann's figures include only 7,261,032, and that the 
 population was 18,000,000. How are the ten millions and 
 more, who were not at chapel or church on Census Sunday, to 
 be dealt with ? Are they to be scored off as of no religion, or be 
 apportioned by the simple operation of a rule-of-three amongst 
 the one hundred and odd denominations tabulated by Mr. Mann ? 
 Neither course would be satisfactory. There must be many 
 thousands of those who did not worship publicly on Census 
 Sunday who would still be quite prepared to declare their reli- 
 gious profession ; while, again, an arithmetical distribution of 
 the non-worshippers would yield a most fallacious impression of 
 the convictions or preferences personally entertained. 
 
 Nonconformity, or separation from the Church, is in its 
 origin an evidence of spiritual activity, and its existence is for 
 the most part accompanied by earnestness and resolution in the 
 public discharge of religious duties. ^\Tien men become separatists 
 from the denomination of which they have been members, they 
 are, by the very freshness of their engagements, inspired with 
 zeal and perseverance for their punctual fulfilment ; and thus, 
 as a rule, the newer the sect, the larger will be the proportion 
 of its members attending its public services. The Wesleyans, 
 as one of the newest and most vigorous denominations, would 
 naturally have been represented at their services on Census 
 Sunday in larger proportions than the Established Church. Mr. 
 Voysey's followers, to take a very novel sect, might almost all 
 be worshipping in Langham Hall, but it would be unwarrant-
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 13 
 
 able to assume that for every seven persons counted there, 
 eleven others elsewhere would own him as their pastor. 
 
 (2) The Liberation Society affirm that Nonconformity, in 
 the number of its places of worship and its worshippers, has 
 gi'own much faster than the Church since 1851. No authentic 
 information exists which can justify this conclusion, but such 
 as it has offered may advantageously be considered. Mr. H. 
 Mann extended his inquiry retrospectively from 1851 to the 
 commencement of the century, but the data at his command 
 were imperfect and unreliable, and he frankly offers the results 
 with serious misgiving. The Nonconformists, however, pur- 
 sued a mode of computation so flattering to their own progress, 
 and instituted in the years 1872, 1873, through their own 
 agents, an inquiry, embracing, it is true, only some 141 towns, 
 but establishing upon the statistics thus obtained, as to both 
 church and chapel, a result, out of 100 sittings, of 41*2 pro- 
 vided by the Church, and of 58-8 provided by Nonconformists 
 — the numerical increase of sittings being, for the Church, 
 293,493 ; for Nonconformists, 621,699 ; and upon the strength 
 of this statement Nonconformists assert that " there is ample 
 " ground for concluding that the Established Church of England 
 " and Wales is now the Chm:ch of a decided minority of the 
 " population." 
 
 The information on which this momentous declaration is 
 hazarded has been often found so gravely inaccurate, that no 
 confidence can be placed on the conclusions to which it leads ; 
 the individual details are beyond the reach of private investi- 
 gation, but the conclusions can be dealt with upon independent, 
 but thoroughly authentic evidence. 
 
 In 1851 Mr. Mann estimated the accommodation for reli- 
 gious worship to be : — 
 
 Buildings Sittings 
 
 Churcli of England 14,077 5,317,915 
 
 Other denominations 20,390 4,894,648 
 
 The yearly accession of Dissenting chapels to the registered 
 list may be counted by hundreds. In 1875 it was 534, in 
 1876 it was 543. How is it, therefore, that the number from 
 time to time is widely fluctuating, and that in the register, on 
 31st of December, 1878, it is only 19,977? The explanation
 
 14 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 is to be found in the circumstance that Dissenters' chapels have 
 no permanent character. Being unconsecrated and unasso^ 
 ciated with any religious sentiment, the bulk of them can be 
 treated as interest and convenience dictate. They may be 
 diverted to purely secular uses, or their temporary hire for 
 religious worship may be discontinued. Of Nonconformist 
 chapels there were — 
 
 Registered on the 1st of January, 1875 . . • . . 19,946 
 
 The additions registered in 1875 were .... 534 
 
 1876 „ . . . . ^ 
 
 Which would have raised the number on Ist of January, 
 
 1877, to . . 21,023 
 
 But that the expurgation of the register which takes place 
 
 from time to time led to the excision in 1876 of . 1,959 
 
 Leaving an effective total of 19,064 
 
 (or 1,326 less than the number stated by Mr. Mann, and adopted 
 by the Liberation Society in 1851. What solution of this dis- 
 crepancy is to be accepted ? (1) Must Mr. Mann's estimate 
 be admitted to be an exaggeration, and so discrediting all 
 the statistical computations founded on it? or (2) Must the 
 Registrar-G-eneral's Keport of 1877 force upon us the conviction 
 that Nonconformity, as exhibited in the number of its places 
 of worship, has decreased since 1851 ?*) 
 
 The obscurity attending the consideration of these ques- 
 tions can be materially dissipated by a study of the " List of 
 " Places of Meeting for Keligious Worship " certified to the 
 " Kegistrar-General, and on the Kegister of the 31st of March, 
 " 1876." The total remaining on the Eegister is given at 18,723, 
 and as the number of chapels once registered exceeds 22,750, 
 it follows that more than 4,000 must have been struck off at 
 various revisions. Nor is it wonderful that this necessity should 
 have arisen, when the character of the buildings registered for 
 religious services is scrutinised, including as they do : " School • 
 " rooms," " music-halls," " amphitheatres," " vestries," " tem- 
 « perance halls," " occupied houses," " rooms in a house," 
 " cottages," " club-rooms," " railway arches," « bakehouses," 
 
 * Vide remarks in Preface on this paragraph.
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIOXS. 15 
 
 " malt-kilns," " town halls," &c., &c. A selection from the list 
 itself will faithfully illustrate the varied and ephemeral nature 
 of these " places of public worship." The page of the Blue Book 
 is prefixed to the description of the certified meeting-place. 
 
 Page 
 
 G. A dwelling-house in the occupation of John Poor, labourer, Old Park, 
 near Bramdean. 
 16. A room in a house belonging to Mr. R. S. Boyt (Uxbridge), Subscrip- 
 tion Reading-room, Lyme-Regis. 
 
 23. Loft belonging to Robert Roe, Lynton. 
 
 24. Primitive Methodist preaching-room, owned by Henry Nuttall, Esq. 
 
 (Barkby). 
 27. "The Room" in the occupation of Henry George Childs (Milbury 
 
 Osmond). 
 30. Club-room, Pelican Inn, New Town, Ebbw Vale. 
 33. Nos. 75 and 76 Railway Arches, under the Eastern Counties Railway, 
 North Street, Bethnal Green. 
 Amicable Hall. 
 
 Christian Community Memorial Hall. 
 People's Hall. 
 Albion Grammar School. 
 42. Great and Little Bolton Co-operative Hall. 
 44. Boston Sunday School Union School-room. 
 46. Hall of Freedom. 
 62. A dwelling known by the name of Benjamin Wilkins's Dwelling-House, 
 
 Chilton Polden. 
 54. People's Hall. 
 Assembly Rooms. 
 Bethel Arch. 
 Royal British Schools. 
 56. Assembly Rooms, Fox and Goose Inn, Redditch. 
 62. Girls' British School in the rear of the Church, 
 68. Bakehouse attached to the dwelling-house of Mr. Jacob Crabb. 
 100. Noah's Ark. 
 
 124. New Pubhc Hall, Godalming. 
 
 133. Mr. Tanner's Lecture Room, Bohemia Mews, Hastings. 
 143. Royal Amphitheatre, 85 High Holborn. 
 Doughty Hall, 14 Bedford Row. 
 
 Claremont Hall, Penton Street, Islington, a hall owned by Mr. John 
 Stabb. 
 166. Gladstone Music Hall (Leicester). 
 184. Buildings in the occupation of Hezekiah Kitchmaid. 
 233. Black Horse Inn Long Room, Reading. 
 
 Foresters' Assembly Rooms, Reading. 
 243. Co-operative Assembly Rooms, Delph. 
 
 A wooden movable building owned by Mr. Edwin Austin, farmer 
 (Little Bride, Rye, Kent).
 
 16 A CENSUS OF RELIGION*. 
 
 245. Justice Eoom, back of the Porcupine Inn, Tywordoeath. 
 
 248. The Great Hall of Freemasons' Tavern, London. 
 Royal Music Hall, Holhorn, London. 
 
 249. The Ark, Victoria Rooms. 
 350. A Railway Arch, Walworth. 
 
 Ten buildings in the occupation of Joseph Floyd at Mirfield, Ossett, 
 Thornhill Lees, Ossett Common, Gawthorpe, Ohickenly, Whitley, 
 Thornhill, Briestfield, Batley Carr, all in Dewsbury Union. 
 
 These extracts suffice to indicate how widely consecrated 
 Churches are distinguished by their immutability from the 
 registered buildings, and how impossible it is to construct from 
 numbers alone any comparison of the position and progress of 
 the Church and of Dissenters. 
 
 As regards the mere fabrics, the cost of the National Churches 
 far exceeds that of Dissenting Chapels, although of late, as 
 regards these last, a great advance must have been observed in 
 their solidity, their constructional excellence, and their archi- 
 tectural propriety. " Steeple-houses " is no longer the nickname 
 of National Churches, and the most rigid ecclesiologist might be 
 satisfied with the externals, at all events, of many a Noncon- 
 formist Chapel. The contrast between the conditions on which 
 the National Churches and Nonconformist buildings are respec- 
 tively constituted and utilised is very striking. A consecrated 
 Church must be free from debt, it must, under certain Acts, be 
 endowed with 5,000^., and the property must be permanently 
 vested in the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. A Dissenting 
 Chapel may be built with borrowed money, and be mortgaged 
 for its full value ; it may be hired for purposes of worship 
 exclusively, or for worship alternately with any other purposes, 
 however secular. The economy of this community of use 
 is obvious, and no less is the vantage ground which it 
 provides for the display of Nonconformist statistics. A Church 
 with 1,000 seats may have cost 10,000/., and the endowment 
 raises the outlay to 15,000/., but a lecture-room or music- 
 saloon with the same capacity may be hired for the whole or 
 part of Sunday, and besides the rent, the only condition needful 
 to ensure its registration is a fee of 2s. 6d. 
 
 The Sunday rent of the Islington Agricultural Hall would be 
 trivial compared with its capacity, but what a masterly stroke
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 17 
 
 of policy to balance by a fee of half-a- crown the vast area of 
 the Agricultural Hall registered as " a place of meeting for 
 " public worship " against the spacious and solemn nave of St. 
 Paul's Cathedral. 
 
 Althougli the fee for registering a meeting-house for worship 
 is only 2s. 6d., its registration as licensed for the celebration of 
 marriages costs 31. Of Chapels now licensed for marriages there 
 are 8,413, including probably the more important and durable 
 buildings, so that there are more than 10,000 for which this 
 privilege of performing marriages has not been provided. 
 Such are the characteristics of the so-called " Eeligious Census " 
 of 1851, a repetition of which the Nonconformists anxiously 
 desire. 
 
 Nonconformists invite us, indeed, in an apologetic strain to 
 admit that imperfect as the inquiry of 1851 may be, " it is still 
 " to be accepted as the best system attainable." Churchmen 
 distinctly decline this admission, and they point to the "per- 
 " sonal religious profession " as the only honest, truthful, accurate 
 mode of attaining the desired end. The opportunity for that 
 really effective inquiry unfortunately cannot recur for another 
 ten years, but it is quite possible to adduce evidence official 
 and unimpeachable, which, although indirect, is quite appro- 
 priate. 
 
 We turn for a part of our denominational statistics to the 
 year 1870. Owing to the subsequent fusion of denominations 
 in School Boards, that is the latest date at which would be found 
 official returns of the religious classification of the children 
 attending primary schools. In the year 1870, according to the 
 Keport of the Education Department, there were under inspec- 
 tion in primary schools 1,434,765 children, of whom 72*6 per 
 100 were in Church schools. 
 
 Of 190,054 marriages in 1878,* 72-6 per 100 were of the 
 Church. 
 
 Of 32,361 seamen and mariners employed in 1875, the per- 
 centage of Churchmen was 75*5. f 
 
 The army of 183,024 men, having in 1870 as many as 24*0 
 
 * Registrar-General's 41st Report. f P. 132, September, 1876. 
 
 B
 
 18 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 per 100 Roman Catholics, still showed a proportion of Church- 
 men equal to 62*5 per cent.* 
 
 Of 101,458 adult inmates of workhouses in 1875, the pro- 
 portion of Church people was 79 per cent.f 
 
 Of 22,677 prisoners in gaol in 1867, the proportion re- 
 turned as Churchmen was 75 per 100. t 
 
 The number of Nonconformist Chapels supplied to Mr. 
 Mann contras^ts strangely with the number of "Ministers" re- 
 corded in the enumerated Professions of the Official Census of 
 1851. In that Report the Clergy of the Church are stated at 
 17,320, and the Ministers of all other denominations at 8,658. 
 
 One expects to find some proportion between the number 
 of the shepherds and the number of the folds into which they 
 gather their sheep ; but while the Clergy considerably exceeded 
 in number the Churches in which they officiated. Nonconformist 
 ministers of all sects do not in number equal one-half of the 
 buildiugs for worship which are said to have been provided for 
 them and are appealed to as an evidence of progress. 
 
 The official statistics quoted above challenge attention, not 
 by their numerical magnitude, but by their authenticity and 
 their appositeness as a reliable test within the respective spheres 
 of observation, and the very diversity of their origin strengthens 
 the conclusion that a genuine Census of Religions would record 
 about one-fourth of the people of England and Wales as alien 
 from the National Church. 
 
 Some of these statements, when referred to in the House 
 of Commons, provoked a very amusing commentary from Mr. 
 Bright. 
 
 Mr. Bright had been assuming, as usual, that Nonconformity 
 could claim more than half the people of England, and when 
 checked by a reference to these returns, including those from 
 gaols and workhouses, he rejoined: " Oh, I do not deny that the 
 " great majority in gaols and workhouses are members of the 
 " Established Church." The reply was ready, clever, and telling, 
 and it came with especial appropriateness from Mr. Bright, 
 whose pre-eminently respectable " Society of Friends " would 
 
 * P. 170, September 1871. f ^' 257, September 1876. 
 
 I P. 284 September 1868.
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. ][) 
 
 probably not find a '• Quaker " in either gaol or workhouse, for 
 the best of all reasons — an erring Friend would have been ex- 
 communicated before he could reach either of those destinations. 
 With an admirable charity, the " Society of Friends " supports 
 its members when impoverished through misfortune, and with 
 inflexible discipline it pronounces the expulsion of those who 
 " walk disorderly " long before the Friend becomes a criminal. 
 Accidents, however, will happen in the best societies, and 
 there is on record one instance of a Quaker being hanged for 
 murder. 
 
 But how does Mr. Bright's pleasantry leave the question as 
 a serious consideration for statesmen ? Can the millions of 
 non-worshippers on Census Sunday be ignored in legislation ? 
 Have they no rights, no claims upon the State, upon the Church, 
 upon their fellow-countrymen of all denominations? These 
 claims may be disregarded by some of the sects ; they certainly 
 are not by all ; they certainly are not by the Church ; and 
 assuredly the people's right to declare their own religious pro- 
 fession is one which ought to be respected. How can it best be 
 ascertained? By arbitrary inferences? from statements un- 
 authorised in their origin, and irrelevant in their character ? or 
 by the simple process of giving to every man the opportunity of 
 declaring voluntarily the denomination to which he belongs ? 
 That such a personal profession must be voluntary is obvious, 
 for there can be no means of enforcing it, and any but a spon- 
 taneous profession would be worse than useless. As much or 
 more than any other inquiry, that of religious profession should 
 be free and truthful, and the character of the census is per- 
 verted when its results can be presented only as statistics of 
 devotions. What, then, are the opposing views of Churchmen 
 and Nonconformists touching a Eeligious Census ? The Libera- 
 tion Society shall explain their own. In their epitome already 
 quoted, they say, "The effect would be to produce the impression 
 *' that the Church of England has a far greater body of adherents 
 " than all the other relioious bodies have, and that is the object 
 ^' of the suggested Religious Census. It is wished to use what 
 " would really be inaccurate, and in many cases, dishonest returns 
 '^ for a political purpose." 
 
 b2
 
 20 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 
 
 The general objects of a Religious Census in the view of 
 Churchmen are clearly stated in the passage from Mr. Mann's 
 Report prefixed to this paper. Political "purpose they have 
 non".. Religious liberty with Churchmen of the present day is 
 not a phrase, and they contend that, whether Nonconformists 
 were proved by a Religious Census to be fewer than a quarter, 
 or more than half the population, they are equally entitled to 
 the fullest measure of liberty of conscience, liberty of worship, 
 and to personal equality before the law. Churchmen cherish 
 no enmity and design no injury to Dissenters, but they would 
 seriously deprecate and resolutely oppose political movements 
 tending to damnify the national religion. The immediate and 
 direct purpose of Churchmen in asking for a true Religious 
 Census was undoubtedly to demolish by positive evidence the 
 delusive statistics unwarrantably grafted upon Mr. Mann's 
 Report. Independently of a love of truth and thirst for know- 
 ledge, they wished to arrest the mischief which has been elabo- 
 rated from that greatly misused publication. The capricious 
 manipulation of Mr. Mann's figures would have been harmless 
 enough, had they not led (borrowing the phrase from the 
 Liberator) " to inaccurate returns used for a political purpose," 
 and the fabrication of deceptive computations to the detriment 
 of the Church. Ever since 1860 Burials Bills have been 
 presented to the House of Commons as measures promoted 
 in the interest of a Nonconformist majority of the people of 
 England, and every legislative measure bearing on the national 
 religion has been offered for discussion under the same false 
 colours. State departments, and the commissions connected 
 with them, exhibited the effects of this sinister prepossession, 
 especially conspicuous in the proceedings of the Education 
 Department, the Charity Commissioners, and the Endowed 
 Schools Commission. The operation of this sentiment is aptly 
 illustrated by a letter to the Times of the loth of May, 1875, 
 from Mr. Roby, the able Secretary and inspiring genius of the 
 Endowed Schools Commission. Mr. Roby, writing in dis- 
 approval of the scheme proposed for Crewkerne Grrammar 
 School, " protests against ticketing national institutions with 
 " the symbols of what is now the faith of only half the nation."
 
 A CENSUS OF RELIGIONS. 21 
 
 If statesmen and influential officials like Mr. Eoby can 
 imagine the natioDality of the Church of England to depend 
 upon her outnumbering 150 sects, it is not surprising that the 
 Liberation Society, in the name of '.he more aggressive of those 
 sects, should strain every nerve to exhibit a preponderance of 
 numbers adverse to the Church ; for on their success in obtain- 
 ing a general belief in that assumption depends, as they think, 
 their crowning victory in the Disestablishment and Disendow- 
 ment of the Church. 
 
 This is not the place for discussing the conditions which 
 would eventuate in Disestablishment, but it may be easily shown 
 that Disestablishment can be no necessary result of a nice 
 numerical comparison between Churchmen and the aggrega- 
 tion of dissentients. If any one of the sects attained a larger 
 following than the Church, it might, by a general concensus, 
 supersede it as the expression of the religious profession of the 
 country, and take its place in the Constitution ; but short of 
 such transposition, the perpetuation of the Monarchy involves 
 the perpetuation of the National Church, with which it has been 
 welded by statute with the special object of " securing our 
 " religion, laws, and liberties." 
 
 Disestablishment, the indispensable precursor of " religious 
 " equalit}^ " (a phrase which, if it differs in meaning from " re- 
 " ligious liberty," means " equality of religions "), may or may 
 not enter into the category of the practical subjects of the day ; 
 but a course of policy injurious to the National Church, to its 
 rights of property, and to its religious liberty, has been pursued 
 for some years, prompted and promoted by the allegation " that 
 " the Church, being outnumbered by the sects, was no longer 
 " the National Church." 
 
 The allegation that a majority of the people were strange to 
 the Church would not, even if true, justify the purpose to which 
 it was applied ; but being wholly destitute of proof, it has, 
 nevertheless, been allowed to vitiate legislation and prejudice 
 the administration of the law in matters which concerned 
 religion and education. 
 
 The " irrevocable past " stands but too frequently pointing to 
 opportunities neglected, and to years which in their recurrent
 
 22 A CENSUS OF EELIGIONS. 
 
 cycles offered again and again a power of doing wisely and 
 justly, to be again and again misused. Another decade must 
 pass before a truer liberality on the part of those who profess 
 to be Liberals, or greater courage and independence of party 
 in the Government of the day, permits the realisation of a 
 Eeligious Census for England. In the interval it cannot be 
 unreasonable to express a hope that the Queen's MiDisters 
 (whoever they may be) will no longer permit the laws of 
 England to be moulded and administered under the influence 
 of a gross misrepresentation of the religious profession of the 
 people. 
 
 Note. — The Census of Ireland has a column for those who 
 decline to declare their religious profession, and the same pro- 
 vision occurs in the Census Tables of each of the Colonies. 
 
 It never was intended in an English Census to coerce people 
 to a declaration of their faith.
 
 DENOMINATIONAL WOESHIP. 
 
 Mr. C. S. Miall had the privilege of promulgating through 
 the columns of the Times of 26th December last the discoveries 
 touching attendance at Church and Chapel which he had 
 already confided to the readers of the Nonconformist and Inde- 
 pendent, and to them he has, iu his paper of 2nd February, 1882, 
 communicated the more complete results of an inquiry into the 
 accommodation for, and the attendance at, religious worship in 
 seventy towns with a population of 3,629,200. His conclusions 
 are, that of that population a percentage of 29*5 only attended 
 public worship, and that of the l,0o2,521 so attending, 38*66 
 per cent, attended the services of the Church of England, and 
 61 '34 per cent, those of all other religious bodies. 
 
 As an indication that a very large portion of the population 
 attend no reli;^ious service, these statements confirm what was 
 already a sadly notorious fact, and they show that tl]e p^st 
 efforts of all religious bodies have failed to accomplish the 
 evangelisation of the masses. 
 
 But is this the only or the chief conclusion to which these 
 private statistics are meant to lead '-' Mr. Miall is explicit on 
 this point. He states very frankly in his letter to the Ti/aes : — 
 " The meaning (of these figures) is that the Church of England 
 '• in a numerical sense is no longer the ' National Church.' " 
 Tliis seems a very formidable sentence, but the premises are 
 qucdtiunable, and have no necessary connection with the con- 
 clusion. 
 
 How does Mr. Miall prove that the Church of England 
 embraces only a minority of the population ? His statistics, if 
 correct, record that in seventy towns, out of 3,629,200 persons, 
 1,062,521 attended public worship, and that of them only 
 410,770 attended the Church services; but of the uncounted
 
 24 DENOMINATIONAL WORSHIP. 
 
 25,000,000 in England and Wales we have no record, and it is 
 out of all reason to suppose that questions of general and deep 
 importance could be solved by such a fractional investio;ation, 
 even though it were thoroughly pertinent. Statistics bearing 
 on public interests should, when they are not official, be sup- 
 plied through a medium strictly impartial and disinterested, 
 but what is the origin and history of this movement ? 
 
 Mr. Edward Miall, once M.P. for Bradford, came to London 
 in 1841, and founded tlie Nonconfoi^mist ne\Ysipsiiper with the 
 avowed object of enlisting public feeling, especially among Dis- 
 senters, in favour of the separation of Church and State. Mr. 
 Miall soon gathered around him a vigorous school of what have 
 been designated " political Dissenters," and, mainly as the result 
 of his teaching, tbe British Anti-State Church Association was 
 formed in 1843, which still exists under the more familiar title 
 of the "Liberation Society." During his exclusion from Parlia- 
 ment, Mr. Miall took a foremost part in the movement for the 
 abolition of Church Kates, and lived to see all of what were called 
 " Dissenters' grievances " removed. Twice when in Parliament 
 Mr. Miall moved a resolution in favour of the disestablishment 
 of the Englisli Churcli. During his public career Mr. Miall 
 twice received from his many friends substantial marks of their 
 appreciation of his services. In 1863 he was presented with 
 five thousand guineas, and in 1870 the sum of ten thousand 
 guineas was put in trust on behalf of himself and his family. 
 (Times, May 2, 1881.) 
 
 About six years before his death, he transferred the editorship 
 of the Nonconformist to his younger brother, Mr. Charles S. 
 Miall, who has shown no lack of zeal in the cause in which his 
 brother's services were so highly appreciated. In 1873 he 
 published in the Nonconformist returns of religious accommo- 
 dation in 125 cities and boi'oughs— it having fallen to his lot 
 to procure, arrange, and defend a huge mass of statistics, and 
 now he assumes the task of summarising the returns which 
 have appeared from time to time in JocaJ newspapers for the 
 information of the public. 
 
 Does not this retrospect forcibly suggest that Mr. I^iall's 
 paramount object has been, and is, the Disestablishment of
 
 DENOMINATIONAL AYORSHir. 25 
 
 the Church, and that the laboui's of the last thirty years have 
 been, as he thinks, crowned by the discovery that, according to 
 computations founded upon private observation of dominical 
 devotions, the Church of England is in a numerical minority, 
 and so, in a numerical sense, ceases to be the National 
 Church ? Even in this qualified sense Mr. Miall is penetrated 
 with the gravity of the situation : he knows that he is verging 
 on a burning question, but, rightly thinking that it is best for 
 all parties " that the real truth should be known," he delivers 
 himself of his portentous verdict — '' the Church of England in 
 " a numerical sense is no longer the ' National Church ; ' " and 
 then continues, " I do not ask further space to comment on this 
 " suggestive fact." How disappointing ! It was really cruel of 
 Mr. Miall thus to keep in suspense the hopes of his allies and 
 the fears of timorous Churchmen, and not, at all events, to have 
 distinctly stated whether the assumed numerical defect was 
 of itself fatal to the Church's pretensions. But, indeed, if it 
 were not so considered, there would be no point in his hesitating 
 approach to " a burning question ; " there would have been no 
 pretence for delaying the further " comment on a suggestive 
 " fact " in the disclosure of a scheme for the disruption of tlie 
 Church. 
 
 Before leaving Mr. Miall's Survey and Summary of Domini- 
 cal Devotions, which he offers as a sequel to what he calls 
 "the Eeligious Census of 1851," but which is really entitled 
 " Census of Eeligious Worship," I refer to what I have said at 
 pp. 10, 11 of this Paper as to the character of that publication. 
 Mr. Mann never ascribed to his inquiry the purpose ascribed to 
 it by ]\Ir. Miall. In his letters to the Times of July 1860 and 
 July 1870 Mr. Mann declared that " there was no intention 
 " or attempt to enumerate the adherents of different denomina- 
 " tions ; " " no attempt to estimate the comparative numerical 
 " strength of different religious communions;" and he deprecated 
 the " fallacious deductions " which might be drawn from a 
 perverted use of his returns. 
 
 The fallacious deductions deprecated by Mr. Mann, by Lord 
 Palmerston, and by Sir G-. C. Lewis, unite in the portentous 
 discovery trumpeted by Mr. C. Miall.
 
 26 DEI^OMINATIONAL WORSHIP. 
 
 No such statistics as either Mr. Mann's or Mr. Miall's can 
 affect the title of the Church of England to be called National. 
 Mr. Miall remarks that the accuracy of the statistics he 
 summarises has " not been challenged.*' The answer is obvious. 
 They are irrelevant to the great issue he would found upon them. 
 If the nationality of the Church depended purely upon numbers, 
 where shall the test line be drawn ? Mr. Miall would draw it 
 at 50 per cent., and if the numbering of tlie people yielded a 
 return of 49 per cent, of Churchmen, he declares the Church to 
 be no longer National. The only truly National Church must, 
 on the consideration of numbers, be one in which Church and 
 State effectually combine to repress every deviation of religious 
 teaching, and tolerate no exception from the public worship of the 
 Church. Such a Church in this country we may find in the 
 days of Mary and Elizabeth : does Mr. Miall regret those days ? 
 I confess that I do not, and that I prize religious liberty as a boon 
 not to be outweighed by the agitation of even 150 sects. 
 
 The inferences drawn, whether from Mr. Mann's or Mr. 
 Miall's returns, as to the relative adherents of Church and Dissent, 
 are quite irreconcilable with the evidence adduced at pp. 17, 18 
 from official statistics. These returns show a percentage of 
 72*5 Churchmen against 27*5 Nonconformists of all sects ; and 
 if gaols, workhouses, and schools are slightingly spoken of as 
 comprising the lower and poorer classes, the same exception 
 cannot be taken to marriages, which, applying to all classes, show 
 similar proportions, or to the London " Sunday Hospital " 
 receipts, which in 1881 showed that Church congregations have 
 contributed rather more than three-fourths of the whole 
 amount (£22,863 out of £30,U7). 
 
 Nonconformists question these proportions, and ask exult- 
 ingly : Why, if Churchmen are three to one, have they been 
 defeated over and over again in Parliament on Church Eates, 
 Burial Bills, &c., &c. ? The answer is obvious : the House of 
 Commons includes not only 493 English members, but 60 Scotch 
 and 105 Irish, and both Scotch and Irish members do generally 
 vote with the political Dissenters. Upon the results of a 
 personal Census Mr. Miall has no doubt it would exhibit a 
 decided preponderance in the number of Churchmen. "The
 
 DIONOMINATIOXAL WORSHIP. 27 
 
 *' result cannot for a moment be doubted ; " but the result, he 
 implies, would have been obtained by the tyrannical influence 
 of Churchmen. Surely undue influence is not more to be 
 feared from Churchmen, who act purely on the defensive, 
 than from Dissenters, vigorously aggressive, who have for their 
 object the disruption of the Church. They have held that a 
 Church which has ceased to be co-extensive with the Nation 
 has ceased to be the National Church, and Mr. Miall has 
 thought, by exhibiting its numerical proportion reduced to less 
 than a moiety, to obtain an acceptance of his theory, and 
 compensation to his zealous toils. 
 
 It will be disappointing to Mi*. Miall that his theory has 
 not met with the reception he anticipated. To comprise within 
 its folds the majority of the people is not the sole nor the chief 
 title of a Church to be designated National. A Church becomes 
 National when the nation wills it so to be, and the nation's 
 will finds unmistakable expression in its laws. A single illus- 
 tration shall suffice, and I borrow it from Mr. V. Harcourt's 
 speech on Mr.E. Miall's motion for disestablishment on the 16th 
 May, 1873, when he designated that motion " as being in effect 
 " a proposal to overturn the entire fabric of the Constitution, 
 " resting, as it did, on the Act for the further Limitation of the 
 " Crown (Act 12, 13 Will. III. c. 2, a.d. 1700), which ran in 
 " these terms : ' AMiereas it is requisite and necessary that some 
 " further provision be made for securing our religious laws and 
 " liberties . . . be it enacted, That whosoever shall come to 
 " the possession of this Crown shall join in communion with the 
 '* Church of England as by law established.' Arguing the 
 " question on political grounds, not because he undervalued its 
 " religious aspect, but because the former seemed most appro- 
 " priate for discussion in this House, he had a right to ask 
 " whether the hon. member meant to maintain the Protestant 
 " settlement of the Crown. If so, how did he mean to reconcile 
 ** it with those docrines of religious equality upon which he had 
 " enlarged ? To confine the Crown to a particular form of 
 " religious opinion was a clear violation of the principles he had 
 " laid down." 
 
 If Sir William Harcourt's opinion of 1873 is sound — and I
 
 28 DIINOMIJ^ATIONAL WORSHIP. 
 
 cannot doubt it- —Mr. Miall must really resign himself to leaving 
 the Church of England in possession of her nationality. Is that 
 an intolerable grievance ? I trust not. I have already noticed 
 how Mr. Edward Miall was credited last year with having 
 outlived all " Dissenters' grievances." His biographer must 
 have overlooked the " National Church," which still survives, 
 and while this country is a Monarchy, will still live on. The 
 late Sir Charles Eeed, on his return from the United States 
 — the land of " religious equality " — complained that in England 
 he was a Bissenter; in America he said there were no Dis- 
 senters. Let this remaik indicate the hopelessness of the cry 
 of " religious equality " which is now eclioed through the Non- 
 conformist camp. The cry used to be ' religious liberty,' but 
 religious liberty has been obtained, and is now enjoyed to the full. 
 Upright Nonconformists, like Mr. S. Morley, admit that they 
 possess absolute liberty, and have no grievance. So the cry is 
 " religious equality," which, if it means other than religious 
 liberty, means equality of religions, and such a cry cannot be 
 satisfied while we maintain a constitutional Monarchy, under 
 which the people enjoy perfect freedom in their civil and reli- 
 gious concerns. It remains for Mr. Miall and the Liberation 
 Society to determine whether they will continue to agitate for 
 the realisation of an impossibility, or desperately seek to reach 
 the " religious equality " they covet through the destructive 
 ordeal of a revolution. 
 
 Eminent Protestant Dissenters have already certified their 
 disinterestedness by proclaiming that on no account would 
 they consent to occupy the position of a State Church. Thus 
 forewarned, we are able the more clearly to discern that the 
 alternative to a Sovereign in communion with the Church of 
 England must be a Eepublic.
 
 THE NATIONAL CHUECH. 
 
 Chuechmen will be always ready and resolute in defending '' the 
 " religious laws and liberties " of their country, but as their 
 attitude is purely defensive, they desire neither to irritate nor 
 injure those whose assaults they must repel. The Church of 
 England maintains the true faith consistently with a charitable 
 toleration of systems which she must deem doctrinaily im- 
 perfect, and Churchmen holding her system to be most favour- 
 able to the nurture of social and spiritual excellence, can yet 
 gratefully acknowledge the zealous exertions of those, who with 
 fewer advantages have honestly laboured for the higher in- 
 terests of the people in quarters where the ancient endowments 
 of the Church have proved inadequate to provide for our rapidly 
 progressive population. 
 
 Churchmen are reproached with standing aloof in haughty 
 isolation, instead of realising a true Christian brotherhood in a 
 fraternity of all denominations. They may reply that this 
 isolation is due, not to political or social, but to doctrinal 
 causes which Dissenters themselves consider serious enough to 
 justify their separation, and that religious work cannot be 
 carried on in. common where there are grave differences as 
 to the nature and substance of religious truth. Still, so long 
 as a religious work conduces to Grod's glory in teaching men 
 to live honestly, purely, and peaceably, we wish it success, and 
 ask in return for nothing but fair treatment. 
 
 Mr. C. Miall's paper of oth January, 1881, concludes an 
 article on a Religious Census in these words : — 
 
 *' A State Church which has practically alienated two-tlnids 
 " of the community has forfeited its claim to the title of 
 " National ChLirch, and no arithmetical shams or Jesuitical 
 " wiles will hencefortli be permitted either to arrest its downfall 
 " or avert its final doom."
 
 30 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 The many pleas involved in this virulent impeachment may 
 be for judicial consideration separately stated, and without 
 reference to the offensive expletives. 
 
 The Liberation Society's charge involves these proposi- 
 tions : — 
 
 (a) The Church of England is the creation of the State ; 
 the Clergy are the servants of the State ; the regulation 
 of the faith and worship of the Church is a function 
 of the State. 
 
 (5) The property and revenues of the Church have been 
 supplied by the State, and may be repossessed by the 
 State, to be dealt with at its discretion as national pro- 
 perty and revenues. 
 
 (c) The Church of England having failed in its mission of 
 evangelising the nation, forfeits its title to be considered 
 National, and must be disestablished and disendowed. 
 
 To this indictment counter-propositions may be offered in 
 the following series : — 
 
 (a) The Church of England owns Christ only as her Head, 
 and her members submit to her authority as derived from her 
 Divine Founder. In civil matters Churchmen own obedience to 
 the law of the State. In spiritual matters they are bound by 
 the law of' tliis Church and Eealm," but to any authority asserted 
 by the State alone in matters touching faith and doctrine they 
 owe no submission. The Clergy exercise their sacred duties 
 within the districts prescribed to them, under the sanction of 
 the State. 
 
 (b) The property and revenues of the Church were given 
 and assigned to her use for Grod's service by Christian rulers 
 and their subjects. As every Englishman may attend public 
 worship and has a claim upon the ministrations of the Church, 
 the Church is called National. Her property and levenues are 
 National in their religious purpose, and may be dealt with in 
 concert by the authorities in Church and State, the better to 
 adapt them to their purpose of evangelizing the people. 
 
 (c) The Nationality of the Church, as representing the reli- 
 gious profession of the Sovereign and of the people, cannot be 
 nullified by arithmetical computations of the extent to which.
 
 THE NATIONAL CilUKCK. 31 
 
 in the exercise of religious liberty, individuals may have sepa- 
 rated themselves from her communion. 
 
 Without entering here upon the discussion of the conflicting 
 propositions, it may suffice to insist that whether the views of 
 Churchmen be admitted as accurate or not by their opponents, 
 they have a right to hold them, and to decline even to entertain 
 the consideration of changes which would be fatal to their con- 
 ception of a Divine institution. 
 
 For example, the JN'onconformist ingenuously records his 
 aspiration for a disestablishment, which should " require the 
 " State to regard all ministers of all denominations, including 
 " Episcopalians, as laymen, having their professional but no 
 " spiritual character;" i.e., he invites, on the part of the State, an 
 act which ignorantly or tyrannically would falsify the whole 
 history of Christendom, and revolt millions (not Anglicans only) 
 who believe in Christ as the Head and Founder of the Church, 
 and as the enduring source of its authority and life. 
 
 The practical question which has been raised can, however, 
 be considered without any far-reaching or abstruse investigations. 
 
 The origin of the Church's property has been vigorously 
 contested, and history has been lavishly quoted to prove that 
 the State gave it and that the State may take it awav. Upon 
 this particular question I will adduce from my own knowledge 
 illustrations, limited indeed, but thoroughly pertinent, as types 
 of both ancient and modern endowments. In the Clergy List 
 my name may be seen mentioned as the patron of two livings. 
 One is the Rectory of Adlington, the parish of my country 
 home ; the other is the Vicarage of St. Alban, Holborn. 
 
 Eobert Fitz Barnard, a.d. 1222, gave the advowson of St. 
 Mary's, Addington, to the Priory of St. John, Jerusalem. The 
 Priors of that Convent presented a Rector to the charge of 
 the parish imtil, upon the dissolution of the monasteries, 
 the patronage of the Rectory and the ownership of the estate 
 became vested in the ^ame lord of the manor, and they have 
 so continued. Each Rector of Addington has been in his turn 
 the life owner of the ben'.^fice into which he has been inducted 
 when instituted by the Bishop at the presentation of the Patr-\>n, 
 and subject to the condition of his ministering to the spiritual
 
 32 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 wants of the parishioners in accordance with the laws and 
 ordinances of the Church. The tithe (taken in kind at first, 
 and subsequently commuted for land or rent charge under 
 various statutes) has been ever recognised by the law and 
 secured for the sustenance of the Clergy and the satisfaction of 
 the spiritual necessities of the people. 
 
 St. Alban's is the name of a Church in Holborn, erected 
 in 1862, and to the charge of which, with a legally assigned 
 district of some 8,000 souls, a Minister was, upon my nomination, 
 appointed by the Bishop of London. The annual endowment 
 of the church was, as required by the Church Building Act, 
 £150, and I attached to it a clergy house and some adjacent 
 property, which may raise the value of the benefice to near 
 £300 a year. In return for this modest provision the Vicar of 
 St. Alban's and his curates spend their lives in the discharge of 
 their ministerial duties. The inhabitants of the district know 
 that the Church is ever freely open to them for worship and 
 instruction, and that they have a right to seek the ministrations 
 "of the Clergy without the risk of a refusal. 
 
 The parish churches of St. Mary's, Addington, and of St. 
 Alban's, Holborn, are but examples of the way in which the 
 ancient and modern ecclesiastical cures of the Church of 
 England originated. To their construction and to their 
 revenues neither the people locally interested nor the nation at 
 large ever contributed one farthing. The great bulk of the 
 Church revenues, and the construction of its sacred buildings 
 and parsonages, were provided in the same manner. The State 
 has at times made grants for Church building, and Mr. 
 Frederick Martin gives at £1,663,429 the amount of State grants 
 between 1801 and 18ol. Earlier than this century, he tells us, 
 " the aid of the State had not been given to any large extent." 
 " During the reign of Charles II., of William III., and of Anne, 
 " various Statutes provided for the erection of Churches, but they 
 " were mostly confined to the metropolis, and were of limited 
 " extent." In the same work, Mr. Martin states the annual 
 value of the possessions and revenues of the Church at six 
 millions, and its capital value at not less than one hundred 
 millions sterling.^ 
 
 * "The Property and Revenues of the English Churuh Establishment."
 
 THE NATIONAL CnURCH. 33 
 
 Whether this vast property should be called National depends 
 on the sense in which that term is defined. Personally, I do 
 not scruple to call it National, as the Church itself is National, 
 and I look to its future immunity from plunder or secularisation, 
 not to any theory which might abstract it from the reach of 
 Parliament, but to the wisdom and integrity of our rulers. Out 
 of the means which He had given me, I dedicated to God a 
 House of Prayer, to the free use for ever of Christ's poor. Had 
 I entrusted my offering to the Congregational Union, to the 
 Eoman Catholic Committee, or to the Wesleyan Conference, its 
 religious dedication for the benefit of either of those commu- 
 nities would, I am assured, under any contingency, have been 
 inviolate. Shall it then be insecure because for the benefit 
 of the whole nation it has been intrusted to the guardianship 
 of the State? Shall Grod be robbed and the poor despoiled by 
 the Imperial Legislature? I reject such a monstrous sup- 
 position. I believe in the Divine mission of the Church of 
 England ; I lament the defects (quite removable) which impair 
 her action ; but I am persuaded that she has laboured, and 
 will continue to labour effectively, in Grod's service ; and I 
 committed my humble offering to the "Church to the protection 
 of my fellow-countrymen, with implicit confidence in the justice 
 of their decision upon any case which is truthfully presented 
 to them. 
 
 The Liberation Society, in their recent scheme, suggest 
 that modern churches and modern endowments (created since 
 1818) may be restored to their donors or their representatives, 
 or should become the property of the congregations ; but this 
 disposition to disgorge the newer portion of the plunder is 
 obviously prompted by the policy of sacrificing a portion of the 
 plunder, the better to secure possession of the residue. 
 
 The argument that the State gave, and that the State can 
 therefore take away, the ancient endowments of the Church, has 
 no foundation, if it imply that the endowments were provided by 
 the State out of the taxation of the people. Mr. Edward Miall, 
 in his book, " Title Deeds of the Church of England," concludes 
 (p. 113): *• What is usually called Church property — at any 
 " rate, all that portion of it wliich consists in tithes or rent 
 
 c
 
 34 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 " charges— was originally created by public law;" or (p. 6), 
 is " the product of public law exclusively ;" and if this be 
 true, it is " national property," and may be dealt with by the 
 State at its discretion. 
 
 Mr. E. Miall quotes, "as constituting the basis of the 
 *^ tithe system in England," a law of Ethelwulf (a.d. 855), 
 in which he says : " I grant as an offering to Grod . . . and the 
 " blessed Virgin and all the Saints, a certain portion of my 
 " kingdom, to be held by perpetual rights, that is to say, the 
 " tenth part thereof .... to be applied only to the service 
 " of God alone." In this document Mr. E. Miall finds the 
 foundation of the civil rights of the clergy to tithes in England ; 
 and he supports his affirmation that tithe arose not from " the 
 " exercise of individual liberality," but from an enactment of 
 public law, by reciting subsequent royal laws of the same 
 character ; by King Edmund in 944, by King Edgar in 967, 
 and by King Ethelred in 1012 ; the latter containing these 
 words : " We command that every man, for the love of Grod, 
 " shall pay his Church scot and his full ^ithe . . . that is, that 
 " he pay for tithe every tenth acre that the plough shall go 
 '' over. And every other customary due must be paid to the 
 " jNIother Church to which every man belongs, for the love of 
 " God. And let no man take from God what belongs to God, 
 " and which our predecessors ha.ve consecrated to Him.'* 
 (" Title Deeds," p. 24.) 
 
 Mr. E. Miall then informs us : " That after the conquest 
 " of England by William of Normandy, he re-enacted the laws 
 " by which the kingdom had been governed in the reign of 
 " Edward the Confessor, thus constituting the foundation of 
 " the 'Common Law' of England. Amongst them is one for 
 " payment of tithe." These laws William's successors were 
 sworn to maintain and observe, and thus there is on record the 
 " evidence of 400 years that the public law of England, and not 
 " the private liberality of individuals, created the tithe system 
 " for the maintenance of the Clergy." (" Title Deeds," p. 26.) 
 
 Laboriously Mr. E. Miall applied himself to disprove the 
 individual spontaneity of the origin of tithes, and not less 
 earnestly he insisted that the repeated interference of the State,
 
 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 35 
 
 enforcing, regulating, assigning, and commuting tithe, esta- 
 blished its right to deal with Church endowments as with a 
 property which it had created, had never wholly parted with, 
 and could therefore reassume and dispose of at its discretion. 
 Mr. E. Miall fails to establish this proposition. 
 
 Whether in any, or every ecclesiastical endowment, the 
 donor, or lord of the manor upon whose property it was charged, 
 was moved by an instinct of piety, by the persuasion of Chris- 
 tian Teachers, or by the authority of the law, must be a point 
 of great uncertainty, as it is one wholly unimportant. The 
 duty of giving tithe to the service of Grod was inculcated in 
 the older dispensation ; it was enjoined by Christ's Apostles 
 that " they who preach the Gospel should live of the Grospel," 
 and the missionaries of the Cross depended for their maintenance 
 upon the liberality of the people towards their teachers. Long 
 before Ethelwulf had promulgated the law already cited, tithes 
 had been rendered to the Clergy in this country; his laws, the 
 laws of his successors, and the enactments enforcing tithes 
 down to the latest provisions in the Statutes, only serve to 
 confirm a title springing from religious duty, and enshrined in 
 immemorial custom. The formal records of parochial endo\^^- 
 ments since the time of Henry YIII. might be deemed a valid 
 title, but curiously enough the Liberationists, who question the 
 Church's title, freely admit the titles of Laymen to estates 
 alienated from the Church some 330 years since. The aliena- 
 tion may have been sacrilegious, and those on whom the 
 secularised property devolved may have been devoid of any 
 deservings, but the lapse of centuries confirmed a lay title, 
 scandalous in its origin, while the title of Christ's Ministers to 
 a provision originating in an irreproachable source, is ques- 
 tioned in the face of the most venerable prescription. 
 
 Mr. E. ^liall's argument, that because the State has dealt 
 legislatively with Church property, it may therefore alienate 
 it, is inconsequential — it confuses the duties of tlie trustee with 
 the rights of the owner. There is no matter or property with 
 which the State has not dealt. The State has by law re- 
 gulated the distribution of real and personal property, yet 
 that property belongs not to the State but to the subjects of
 
 36 THE NAIIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 the State. The State by law compels a man out of his means 
 to provide for his offspring, but it does not claim possession of 
 those means. The State is the trustee and not the owner of 
 Church property. 
 
 Mr. E. Miall discussed the title of the Church to her endow- 
 ments upon capriciously devised premises, and his conclusions 
 were irrelevant and arbitrary. In ecclesiastical as in other 
 legal questions, their decision must depend, not on assumed 
 motives or feeliugs, but on facts and on declared purpose. Mr. 
 E. Miall's book supplies historical matter harmonising with 
 conclusions widely differing from his own. The property 
 assigned for the endowment of the Church could not be (in his 
 words) the '^product o/" — or " be created by public law" — for 
 law can neither produce nor create. Church property was the 
 portion of their possessions which princes and their subjects 
 dedicated to God, moved by pious liberality or obeying a re- 
 cognised obligation. The State, the nation, became the trustee 
 of these endowments — granted, in the words of King Ethelwulf, 
 "as an offering to Grod " — to he applied to the service of God 
 alone — and to be protected by the solemn warning pronounced 
 by King Ethelred : " Let no man take from God luhat belongs 
 " to God, and which our predecessors have consecrated to ffim." 
 
 The proposal to distinguish between ancient and modern 
 endowments, to the advantage of the latter, is an unmistakable 
 evidence of a proceeding which has no principle to guide it. 
 Every particle of Church property, from the most ancient 
 down to the newest Churches, which, with their endowments, 
 were last year conveyed to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners as 
 Stewards of the Church's possessions, all had been offered to 
 God, and for all the nation was made the trustee. 
 
 '' The Church has failed in her mission " (we are told), and 
 so she must be disestablished and disendowed. 
 
 What evidence of this failure has been adduced ? It is the 
 presence of millions in our midst who are spiritually destitute ; 
 and that they are so, is due to the marvellous expansion of the 
 population, following the growth of industry in varied forms 
 and in new districts. The " Home Mission Field " for January 
 lies before me. It opens at the title of " An Unknown Parish,"
 
 L
 
 ij^iUl^ U.,y^^ntc^' /^^jf>-A^ ' 
 
 REGISTERED TELEGRAPHIC ADDRESS I' p, jBnd(^e S,, JfesimlnsteK S.W 
 
 "church defence. London!' ^
 
 
 /^^4^^-*-^ 
 
 /^n. 
 
 puJ^.^^^^M^^ 
 
 /uJ^. 
 
 iu-C 
 
 

 
 THE NATIO>'AL CHURCH. 37 
 
 and it tells me that the parish of West Ham, four miles east 
 of London, had in 1^41 a population of 12,738, and that it 
 now numbers 127,593 souls. It had, in 1841, three Churches; 
 it has now twelve Churches and thirty Clergy. I know not 
 what other denominations have done, but obviously here is a 
 case in which the population has outstripped the means of 
 grace. Whence should have come the funds with which the 
 defective ministrations could be provided? The living is in 
 the gift of the Crown, and its value is £700 a year. The popu- 
 lation has enlarged owing to the demand for labour of one or 
 more railway companies, and they do not, as a rule, provide 
 structures for spiritual instruction. 
 
 In the North there are instances even more remarkable, in 
 which population has distanced the attempts to provide ade- 
 quate religious ministrations, and in which, therefore, a very 
 large proportion of the people would be recorded as attending 
 no religious services whatever. 
 
 How, then, is this lamentable state of things to be remedied ? 
 Disestablish and disendow the Church of England is the reply 
 of Mr. Miall and the Liberation Society. The prescription has 
 the merit of originality, for it conflicts with a primary economic 
 axiom ; it meets an increasing demand by restricting the 
 supply ; it proposes to mitigate scarcity by ensuring famine. 
 Had the Legislature in 1870, in view of the uneducated mil- 
 lions, decided, not that more schools should be built and more 
 teachers trained, but that the existing schools should be con- 
 verted into club-rooms and that the teachers should be cashiered, 
 they would have created an exact precedent for Mr. Miall's 
 specific. A large portion of the people are unprovided with 
 spiritual instructors and places of worship. Eject, therefore, 
 the Clergy wherever they are found, confiscate their revenues, 
 alienate existing Churches to secular uses. Such is Mr. Miall's 
 proposal, and I confess that I fail to see its logical propriety, nor 
 do I admit the justice of depriving the agricultural labourers 
 of Adding ton and the artisans of St. Alban, Holborn, of their 
 Churches and of the freely given ministrations of their Clergy, 
 because Mr. Miall discovered that the majority of the in- 
 habitants of Liverpool went to neither Church nor Chapel. A
 
 38 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 precedent may, in a different way, be found which would go 
 far to explain any amount of hostility to the Church. The 
 Eev. Thomas Binney, a renowned Dissenting preacher, left upon 
 record (to be quoted and to be cheered in anti-Church gather- 
 ings) his conviction " that the Established Church is a great 
 *' national evil ; . . . that it is an obstacle to the progress of 
 " truth and godliness in the land ; that it destroys more souls 
 " than it saves ; and that, therefore, its end is most devoutly to 
 " be wished for by every lover of Grod and man." To the mind 
 which could conceive these thoughts the disruption of the 
 Church would assuredly be most welcome ; but I venture to 
 believe that few even of the sturdiest Dissenters would now 
 share the feeling expressed by Mr. Binney, and that, enjoying 
 perfect liberty themselves, they may be content that Church- 
 men also should be free to exercise the same precious privilege 
 of freedom in word and deed. I have already noticed Mr. 
 Morley's disavowal of any remaining grievance, and now I 
 gladly record Mr. Hugh Mason's declaration (Nonconformist, 
 Feb. 2, 1882) : "That, with regard to the most important rela- 
 " tionship which religion has in view with regard to the drawing 
 " of mankind generally into closer communion with Grod, we 
 " lack nothing." At the same meeting the Eev. J. Guinness 
 Eogers " was thankful to think that the time had passed when 
 " they had occasion to meet in order to seek for the redress of 
 " Nonconformist grievances." Yet Mr. Mason and Mr. Eogers 
 both insist that " religious equality " must be included in the 
 programme of the Liberal party. I have earlier dealt with 
 " religious equality," and presented as an impassable barrier to 
 its attainment the Act for the Limitation of tlie Crown. And 
 now I find that the Liberation Society recently determined, in 
 carrying out their scheme of " religious equality," for the pre- 
 sent at least, to leave untouched the Act which binds the 
 Sovereign to the Anglican Church. By this reticence they 
 indefinitely postpone the Eepublic. But then, where is their 
 " religious equality ? " By what process will they attain their 
 nominal equality of religions while the Statute Book contains 
 unrepealed the credentials of the Church of England to her 
 titular nationalitv ?
 
 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 39 
 
 However, so let it be. Let Nonconformists desist from their 
 assault upon the Nationality of the Church, and if they can 
 allege any grievance clashing with the truest and most expansive 
 religious liberty, its removal will not be asked in vain. 
 
 We would say to our Nonconformist brethren : You expatiate 
 upon the shortcomings of the Church of England, whom you 
 arraign as responsible for the widespread spiritual destitution 
 which you lament. Whether the blame should fall upon the 
 Statesmen, the Episcopate, the Clergy, or the Laity, for past 
 remissness, do not aggravate the mischief by thwarting the 
 efforts wliich are being made for its correction ; rather by your 
 own generous rivalry in the same cause stimulate the exertions 
 of the Church. There is room for many labourers in the vast field 
 of humanity which lies as yet unoccupied by religious agencies. 
 The property, the revenues, the pastors of the Church, are far 
 from adequate to the daily demands upon them, and they daily 
 need fresh supplies, both in men and means. There can be no 
 reason for disparaging either annual gifts or secured endow- 
 ments as a provision for the ministry, for both are needed. 
 Dissenters are supposed to look unfavourably upon endowments. 
 Why ? If annual subscriptions are righteous, their capitalised 
 equivalent cannot be an iniquity. The source is the same — 
 voluntary benefactions — but in the one case the benefaction is 
 limited to annual subscriptions, in the other it assumes larger 
 dimensions, and seeks by investment greater security for the 
 future maintenance, and greater independence of the ministers. 
 You are quick- sighted in detecting and prompt in exposing 
 defects which attend the administration of the National 
 Church. Are you interested in her efficiency as a Gospel 
 Missioner ? If you are, help her loyal members in Parlia- 
 ment to control the exercise of patronage, to strengthen the 
 Bishops to exclude unfit persons from the cure of souls, and 
 to enable the people to take their part in the acceptance of 
 Bishops and Priests presented for institution by those who are 
 privileged to present them. Those who share Mr. Binney's 
 conviction touching the Chm'ch will naturally strive to realise 
 his aspiration for its disruption ; and should such an attempt 
 be made, Churchmen will steadily and fearlessly resist it. But
 
 40 THE NATIONAL CHURCH. 
 
 I anticipate a happier future, and though we may not venture 
 to expect that in a country which cherishes religious liberty 
 diversity of thought shall never generate contention, we will 
 yet trust that men, whatever their other differences, who have 
 a common belief in Christ, may, whether in political struggles 
 or religious controversy, observe the rule of Christian charity. 
 
 LONDON ; PBINTED BY 
 
 8POTTISWOODK AND CO., NEVV-STREBT SQUARE 
 
 AND PARLIAMENT STREET
 
 mi. 
 
 mmm 
 
 OT 
 
 
 1' 
 
 r"^^"--^^ 
 
 
 
 H rc'V 
 
 ^■f 
 
 
 
 
 *^ -l-^^^-. 
 
 ',««l • -1 
 
 'f*-m'^\ 
 
 ' ^^ ir ill 
 
 rl'-'^^fd