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 pN flDDI^ESS 
 
 GIVEN AT CROYDON, 
 
 AT A 
 
 CQBBfPING OP rpHB 
 
 ON MONDAY, NOV. 28th, 1887, 
 
 THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF 
 CANTERBURY.
 
 CANTERBURY DIOCESAN 
 
 (§,£)uvci} ^Ica6iitg ^ocietx? 
 
 The meeting held to promote the objects of this 
 Society, marked the commencement iu Croydon of one 
 of the most important organizations of the present 
 day in connection with the Church of England, an 
 organization which has for its main object the removal 
 of that reproach, which has been levelled against so 
 many Churchmen, that they are unable to give a 
 reason for the faith that is in them. A Society of this 
 nature properly supported, and efficiently conducted, 
 should be one of the strongest bulwarks of Church 
 defence, a bulwark of constantly increasing strength, 
 which will be the most effective barrier against the 
 attacks of the enemies of the Church. 
 
 After addresses had been given by the Rev. J. H. 
 Carr, Professor J. M. Fuller, and W. A. Stone, Esq., 
 
 His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury said 
 there had been such able speeches, so full, so clear, 
 so distinctly stating honest motives for desiring to 
 know more of this great subject, and there had been 
 put before them so simple a programme of the means 
 by which anyone who can find even a little leisure 
 could inffU'm himself upon it systematically, that 
 there was little left for him to say. But he would en-
 
 4 
 
 deavoiir shortly to sum up what lie thought ho should 
 have himsell' gathered that evening if he liad known 
 little or nothing of the subject and the means which it 
 is proposed to use to make it better known. Well, he 
 certainly should have felt this. As a matter of 
 common sense it was his duty to understand any great 
 institution to whicli he belonged, in which he believed, 
 and which he felt at all disposed to defend against 
 attacks, and he thought he could not state their love 
 for their Church in drier and blanker terms than that. 
 If that were all he felt he should stiJl say that, 
 considering what is said of this great Institution to 
 which he belonged, it was his duty to understand it. 
 But when he had a certainty that it was the greatest 
 Society in the world, that it was the greatest Religious 
 Society, that it touched the very depth of his ow^n 
 being, touched his life, his conduct, his faith in the 
 present, his hope of the future, that he had learnt all he 
 knew about these things from it, and when he put his 
 trust in its teaching because he could see that it 
 livingly represents the teaching of his Lord and 
 Saviour, then he felt that it was not enough to speak 
 of it as more or less a duty to understand it, but that 
 he should be bitterly to bkune if he did not understand 
 it. But Englishmen, English Churchmen, did not 
 understand their Church as tliey should. They had 
 gone on so quietly for so many years, taking its 
 existence as a law of nature, feeling and yet not 
 feeling its quiet, gentle pressure upon life, manners, 
 and conversation, that when it is attacked they 
 suddenly found out— and tliis might be one of the 
 greatest benefits whicli proceeds from the attack, 
 which undoubtedly has a place in God's providence — 
 that they had no right to belong to an Institution such 
 as this, and yet not to know more about it than we do. 
 Well, next he was sure that he should carry away 
 from what he had heard this evening, a penetrating, 
 an overwhelming sense of the great interest which 
 
 \^ /
 
 xronld attach to such kiiowlo(lp:c. He should feel that 
 a little period such as Professor Puller touclied upon 
 did really contain some of the most interesting', 
 penetratiu":, should he say exciting knowledge of 
 human nature in its grandest forms that he could 
 anywhere find. And he should come presently to feel 
 that the attacks whicli had been made upon their 
 Churcli could not have been made if their people 
 had possessed the knowledge which he now felt it his 
 duty to obtain, knowledge which he felt would bring 
 with it so much interest. Mr. Stone had spoken of 
 the general idea of what the Church of England was, 
 and he wished that he had pursued a little farther the 
 line upon which he had entered. The common place 
 idea of the Church of England was probably what 
 he had described ; and to it they might add, as Professor 
 Puller had said, that there was a further common 
 impression that the property of the Church was taken 
 away from a certain body of religionists called lloman 
 Catholics, who were allowed to shift for themselves, 
 while their possessions were handed over to another 
 sort of people who were called Protestants. Xow, if 
 they would enter with clear minds, and a determination 
 to understand what they were about upon the history 
 of the Church of England, they would know that the 
 Reformation was no such sudclen scene or act at all, 
 that it was the culmination of a very long period of 
 struggle. They would know there had been a time 
 when this country was free from the yoke of a foreign 
 body, until slowly and insidiously the strong, cold, bony 
 hand closed on the neck of the English people or 
 Church. And they would know that the English people 
 had never been content. As they turned over ])i\'^c 
 after page of chronicles tliey felt that the whcde nation, 
 from the highest to the lowest, from its rulers to the 
 lowest of the people, was always chafing with indig- 
 nation, quivering, and determined to throw off this 
 unsupportable yoke as it came down closer and
 
 heavier. And as they studied the facts more closely 
 still, they would see how in many of their Catliedrals 
 a vast proportion of the stalls were filled with 
 Italians ; they would see men like Robert Grosseteste 
 refusing to institute a Pope's nephew, yet in another 
 century, in that same Cathedral of Lincoln, they would 
 find eight cardinals and seventeen foreigners mostly 
 Italians in actual possession of stalls, besides several 
 with foreign names. So also they would see* how 
 their livings were held by aliens, their revenues and 
 their consciences alike pinched by foreign pressure, and 
 new superstitions poured in apace; how, in all direc- 
 tions, the bondage came upon the English people. But 
 the English Church never gave up the struggle. Then 
 they would come to one of the most prominent points in 
 all history; the years just before what they called their 
 Keformation, when men of the greatest ability and 
 knowledge were searching the greatest questions of 
 doctrine and history, — for they would find that their 
 Latimer and their Cranraer were accomplished " school- 
 men," as they were called, steeped in the old learning — 
 when they went forth, and without stint and with- 
 out fear, poured upon the ears of the English nation 
 the knowledge they had acquired, and when the whole 
 nation, and its greatest and most thoughtful leaders, 
 determined that they would have the truth, the whole 
 truth, and nothing but the truth. Then, as they went 
 on with their studies, they would understand that 
 there was no b )dy of people called Koman Catholics, 
 and no body of people called Protestants. There was 
 a Avhole Church, unchanged in its constituents, protest- 
 ing against what was properly culled Romanism. Thej^ 
 would look into their lists, and they would find that 
 from point to point of the Reformation there was scarce 
 a change in the ])ersonnel at all. They would see the 
 Deans remaining- in the Cathedrals, the Canons in their 
 
 * Bishop Beke's Register 1343, published by Precentor Venahles, 
 Archceological Journal, vol. xlii.
 
 stalls ; and when certain of the IMonasteric's were 
 made into Cathedrals, the A bhots became Deans, the 
 Monks Canons, the Hectors and the Vicars, as much 
 as the parishioners, remaining in their parishes. Tliey 
 would SCO that there was no taking away possessions, 
 but that a whole nation, with one heart and soul, so 
 completely followed the great teaching that out of 
 15,000 clergy there were not 400 who did not retiiin 
 their places and pursue their teaching. AVhen they 
 had ascertained this for themselves they would see 
 what became of the claims of these who in the present 
 day arc, forsooth, sending an Italian Mission amongst us 
 to try to bring back this great nation or Church (call it 
 which you will) to the old bondage which we had 
 broken. 
 
 There was another great question of a different 
 kind at the present day. They found people 
 questioning whether Christianity had really made so 
 great a change as was attributed to it, whether or not 
 civilisation and the mere progress of the human race 
 had not ameliorated things. They might be helped to 
 read and see for themselves the truth about great facts 
 like these. For example, the greatest of great plagues 
 that ever devastated the earth, was a plague that 
 for 20 years of the third century after Christ 
 raged up and down the civilized world, beginning 
 in Ethiopia, devastating Africa, Asia, and Europe, 
 returning again and again to the greatest cities, 
 and spreading such ruin, that it was said that in 
 a single day it killed 5,000 in the city of Kome, and 
 5,000 in Constantinople. They would see how that 
 while first it saved the Roman Empire, by devastating 
 the barbarians, it ultimately gave up the Romans 
 to the barbarians by almost annihilating the Roman 
 armies. And when they had seen that, th(;y asked 
 themselves what the boasted, advancing Roman civilisa- 
 tion did in the face of this great evil. They would read
 
 awful accounts of how the nearest relatives threw their 
 dead and dying into the streets; how morals, instead 
 of becoming improved by this descending scourge, grew 
 "worse and worse, until people began to fear the 
 extinction of morals altogether. Then they would 
 see how the Emperors drove about the city, earning 
 golden opinions by burying the dead, not as a sanitary 
 measure, but as a religious action ; how there went up 
 from the Roman temples, sacrifices to all the many 
 gods ; how the mints poured forth medals and coins 
 dedicated to health, to the Apollo of Health, the 
 Diana of Health, and how the Christians were being 
 put to death because they would not join in the 
 sacrifices. Then they woukl read how Cyprian, Bishop 
 of Carthage, organized his band of Priests, Deacons, 
 and Laymen, and how tliey went from house to house, 
 taking all the humane measures which Christian love 
 and nothing else suggested ; taking up the wretched 
 people who liad been thrown into the streets, entering 
 houses in wliich people liad been left alone to die, tending 
 them tenderly, and then dying themselves by scores and 
 by hundreds from the pestilence. They would see how 
 the clergy of Alexandria Avere swept off by the con- 
 tagion, and they would see that the Christians made no 
 distinction whatsoever between Christians and heathen, 
 and that they showed exactly the same attention to the 
 worshippers of other gods, and to their own destroyers, 
 as to their most devoted followers ; and then they would 
 ask themselves whether the progress which the world 
 had made was an advance simply of its own civilisation, 
 or whether or not it was the effect of the Cross and 
 of discipleship to Christ. It had been most rightly 
 said by the Bishop of Durham, tliat Church History 
 was an excellent cordial for drooping courage, and so 
 it was; and it was something more, it was a most 
 excellent answer to nine-tenths of the most subtle 
 objections that were poured out against the Church 
 and against their Christian faith. He was glad to
 
 9 
 
 liear Professor Fiilkr say that Croydon itself suggested 
 the study of the English Church. The broken monu- 
 ments even now in the Parish Church, the monuments 
 of the Archbishops rent by the fire, were a silent 
 warning, and a silent stimulus to their pride ; one 
 of these monuments, Archbishop Whitgift's, whose 
 buildings and foundations were still the pride of the 
 town, and the strength of their education, he was very 
 lilad to see they were meaning to restore. Yes, Croydou, 
 wliicli was given to the Archbishops of Canterbury by 
 AN'illiani the Conqueror ; Croydon, which had been 
 in every age the residence of the chief officer of the 
 English Church, and touched English History at so 
 many points ; Croydon, whose memorials on every 
 side testified that whatever was going on in the Church 
 of England, Croydon was to the fore, from William 
 the Conqueror up till our own days. When he con- 
 sidered how Croydon had responded that evening by 
 that crowded gatheiing, and when the Clergy had, 
 every one of them, seconded the efforts of this Society, 
 he thought that the Church Reading Society had a 
 function before it here. He had been through the 
 prospectus and seen some of the examination papers 
 (not questions only, but answers too), and as an old 
 schoolmaster and an old examiner of many years, he 
 was perfectly satisfied that they were proceeding on 
 the right course. If they followed the lines marked 
 out they would find the knowledge of Church History 
 to be acquired was plain and thorough. The study of 
 Church History would make even the dry details of 
 daily practice interesting, because it makes for these 
 details themselves a phice in the great history which 
 was working itself out. They had been told that they 
 were preparing a history of the future ; they were 
 doing more than that, they were making history now. 
 By the study of the past they would see how problems 
 as hard as ours, and harder than ours are overcome. 
 What wonderful faith and courage this would give
 
 10 
 
 them! They would see that the old problems were but 
 the x^robleras of the present day, old foes, as Charles 
 Kiugsley used to say, with new faces, and they would 
 find as they went on, that the workiup; out of this 
 great mass of problems was the continuation simply of 
 the Acts of the Apostles, Avhicli ended without an 
 ending- to the last chapter, because the remaining 
 chapters of Church History had yet to be added ; nay, 
 they would see in the successive ages of the Church 
 new problems ever emerging, ever receiving their 
 illumination from the reflection of the glory of Him, 
 Who not only was, but is, and is to come. 
 
 The CANTi:RBuiiY Diocesan Church Reading 
 Society was formed in 1886, to assist those who are 
 reading the subjects suggested each year by the 
 Diocesan Board of Education, in Holy Scripture, the 
 Prayer Eook, and Church History, in a course of 
 continuous and systematic study. Among the d van- 
 tages offered to members of the Society are these : — 
 
 i. Admission to all Lectures and Examinations. 
 
 ii. The right to '' Occasional Papers " on the 
 subjects of the j'car ; Examination Questions 
 for private use ; and correspondence with 
 the Lecturers and others who are willing 
 to receive communications. 
 
 Members arc required to read at least one of the 
 thr(!e subjects in the Syllabus, and to pay an annual 
 subscription. 
 
 Tjie Objects which the Society has in view are : 
 (i.) to promote a continuous courseof reading and study 
 as distinct from mere desultory reading, and attendance 
 at occasional lectures ; (ii.) to instil the idea that the 
 best results of thought, reading, and study, are to be 
 obtained, not at School or College, but in after life ;
 
 )1 
 
 (iii.) to remind those whose attention has not already- 
 been called to the subjects, that it is hardly ever too 
 late to begin ; (iv.) to insist on the extreme importance 
 of more regular, careful, and intelligent study of the 
 Bible, Prayer Book, and Church History ; (v.) to create 
 fresh opportunities for those who are eminently qualified, 
 or who may qualify themselves, by experience, study, 
 and intellectual endowments, to assist others in the 
 pursuit of similar studies to those which they have 
 found profitable and pleasant for themselves. 
 
 Upwards of 600 members have joined the Society. 
 Any information required will be given by the Rev. 
 James H. Carr, Adisham Rectory, Wingham. 
 
 Gibbs and Sons, Printers, Palace Street, Canterbury.
 
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