156 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 120. 



Battell of the Soide in Deaths by Mr. Zachary 

 Boyd, Glasgow, 1629: — 



" Men's dayes are distributed vnto them like houres 

 upon the Horologe : some must liue but till one ; ano- 

 ther vnto two; another vnto three. The Palme turneth 

 about, and vi^ith its finger pointeth at the houre. So 

 soone as man's appointed houre is come, whether it bee 

 the first, second, or third, there is no more biding 

 (abiding) for him. Nee prece nee precin, neither by 

 prt/ce nor prayer can Death be moued to spare him but 

 an houre ; no, not, As the sound of the cloche hell ring- 

 ing, his last houre passeth away with all speede, and 

 turneth not againe, so must the poor man at death 

 packe him out of sight, and no more be scene upon the 

 land of the living." 



Nigel. 



Glasgow. 



CAN BISHOPS VACATE THEIR SEES? 



(Vol. iv., p. 293.) 



In answer to your correspondent K. S.'s Query, 

 " Can bishops vacate their sees ? " I have little 

 hesitation in saying that they can ; though I know 

 of no instance (in modern times) of such an occur- 

 rence (except colonial bishops) ; nor have I ever 

 heard of any one but Dr. Pearce who wished so to 

 do. Lord Dover is, however, mistaken in suppos- 

 ing that " his resignation could not be received, 

 on the ground that a bishopric, as being a peerage, 

 is inalienable." The bishop's own account of the 

 matter (see his Life, prefixed to his Commentary 

 on the Gospels and Acts) is as follows : — Feeling 

 himself unable, from his age and other infirmities, 

 to perform any longer his duties as Bishop of 

 Rochester, and wishing like Charles V. to retire 

 from the world, he requested his friend Lord Bath 

 to apply to the king for permission to resign. He 

 was soon after sent for by the king, who told him 

 that he had consulted Lord Mansfield and Lord 

 Northington, and that neither of them saiv any ob- 

 jection. In the mean time, however. Lord Bath 

 asked the king to appoint, as his successor in the 

 see of Rochester, Dr. Newton, then Bishop of 

 Bristol. On this the ministry, not wishing any 

 ecclesiastical dignities to be granted except through 

 their hands, interfered so as to prevent the resig- 

 nation from being effected ; Dr. Pearce being told 

 by the king that his resignation could not be ac- 

 cepted, but that he should have all the credit of it. 



Lord Dover's mistake is, I think, to be attri- 

 buted to his assumption that bishops are peers of 

 the realm. This is, however, by no means the case. 

 A bishop is simply a Lord of Parliament, and pos- 

 sesses none of the privileges of the peerage ; not 

 those, among others, of freedom from arrest, and 

 trial by their peers. A peer can only be deprived 

 of bis peerage by a special act of parliament, and 

 after a trial by the House of Lords ; Avhile a bishop 

 can be deprived of his see, and, of consequence, of 



his seat in the House of Lords, by the sentence of 

 the archbishop of the province, assisted by such of 

 his suffragans as he may summon. The two last 

 instances of deprivation were those of Bishop 

 Watson, of St. David's, by Archbishop Tenison, 

 and of the Bishop of Clogher, in 1822. 



A bishop so deprived does not cease to be a 

 bishop, but only ceases from having jurisdiction 

 over a diocese. Whether a bishop can be deposed 

 from his episcopal office altogether is a matter of 

 doubt, though it is held by most of those who are 

 learned in the canon law, that there is not suffi- 

 cient authority in any ecclesiastical person, or 

 body of persons, to degrade from the office of 

 bishop any one who has once received episcopal 

 consecration. R. C. C. 



Oxon. 



CHAEACTER OF A TRUE CHURCHMAN. 



(Vol. v., p. 105.) 



J. Y. makes an inquiry as to the author 

 of the Character of a True Churchman, printed 

 1711. Your correspondent will do me good ser- 

 vice by stating the size, and giving the first few 

 words, of his tract. In 1702, or perhaps in tho 

 preceding year, Richard AVest, D.D., Fellow of 

 Magd. Coll. Oxford, and prebendary of Winches- 

 ter, published The True Character of a Church- 

 man, shoiving the False Pretences to that Name, one 

 sheet in quarto, no date, of which I have two 

 editions; and it was reprinted in the Somers' 

 Tracts : " It is commonly observed," &c. This 

 was answered by Sacheverell in The Character of 

 a Low Churchman, 4to. 1702 : " It cannot but be 

 visible," &c. And in the same year there was an 

 edition of both these characters printed, paragraph 

 by paragraph, the original character and the reply : 

 London, for A. Baldwin. 



I have also The Character of a True Church of 

 England Man^ a siniile sheet in 4to. : London, by 

 D. Edwards for N. C. 1702 : "Next to the name 

 Christian." And The True Churchman and Loyal 

 Subject: London, for J. Morphew, 1710, 8vo. 

 pp.168.: "The^name of the church in whose 

 communion I am," &c. Is this the same with 

 J. Y.'s book with another title ? P. B. 



[We have submitted the above to J. Y., who states 

 that " neither of the tracts mentioned by P. B. is the 

 one noticed in his Query. It commences with the 

 following words: ' He \i. e. the True Churchman] is 

 one who is not only called a Christian, but is in truth 

 and reality such.' Prefixed is a short letter from the 

 author to his friend in the country ; and the edition of 

 1711 appears to have been the first. It makes sixteen 

 pages of octavo, and consists of short sententious para- 

 graphs, more practical and devotional than contro- 

 versial. J. Y. discovered it in the British Museum 

 bound up with Dr. Hickes' Seasonahle and Modest 

 Apology, and other tracts."] 



