24 



ANGLICAN CHUECHES. 



by sacraments; and the exclusive priesthood 

 of Christ as opposed to a human priesthood. 



The long-continued movement for an in- 

 crease of bishops in the Church of England has 

 proved so far successful, that in 1870 the Bishop 

 of Lincoln and the Archbishop of Canterbury 

 received suffragan bishops as assistants. They 

 received the title of Suffragan Bishops of Not- 

 tingham and Dover. 



The question of introducing lay delegation 

 into the Church of England attracted great 

 attention. The Convention of York adopted 

 a resolution recommending the more extensive 

 use of the unpaid services of accredited laity, 

 and a committee was appointed to consider 

 whether, " without invading the spiritual and 

 constitutional rights of convocation," any 

 methods might be devised for obtaining the 

 sanction and assistance of the laity " in matters 

 for promoting our holy .religion or the welfare 

 of the Church." This was adopted by way of 

 amendment to a resolution moved by Arch- 

 deacon Churton, which asserted the right of 

 the laity to be represented in Church councils 

 by members of their own order. The foremost 

 champion of the cause was the new Bishop of 

 Salisbury, who read a paper concerning it at 

 the Church Congress in Southampton. An in- 

 fluential meeting for the discussion of the sub- 

 ject took place in November in Nottingham, 

 under the presidency of the suffragan bishop 

 of the diocese. A resolution, affirming the 

 principle of organizing a body of laity for 

 united deliberation with the clergy, was pro- 

 posed by Lord Belper, and seconded by Earl 

 Manvers. Next, the Speaker of the House of 

 Commons moved " that the proposed lay body 

 consist of members of the Church of England, 

 and be formed partly of official and partly of 

 elected members, the official members to be 

 the lord-lieutenant, peers, privy-councillors, 

 baronets, knights having property in the coun- 

 ty and boroughs therein, lay chairmen of 

 quarter sessions, and mayors ; the elected 

 members to be chosen by the several rural 

 deaneries, as the persons best qualified to rep- 

 regent the laity of the Church." The duke of 

 St. Albans seconded the resolution, which was 

 unanimously adopted. A letter from Mr. Glad- 

 stone to the bishop was read, saying that for 

 many years it had been his special desire to see 

 an organized cooperation between the bishop 

 and the clergy on the one hand, and the laity 

 on the other, and expressing his interest in the 

 present movement for "lay organization in the 

 Church." 



The Convocation of the Province of Canter- 

 bury declared in favor of a revision of the 

 English Bible; and two committees of revi- 

 sionists, one for the Old, and one for the 

 New Testament, were consequently appointed. 

 The committee invited several distinguished 

 scholars of other churches, as Principal Fair- 

 bairn. Professors Milligan and A. J. David- 

 son, Dr. Lindsay Alexander, Dr. Alexander 

 Roberts, Dr. Angus, and Dr. J. H. Newman, to 



take parts in its labors, and most of them ac- 

 cepted. The Convocation of York, on the 

 other hand, was nearly unanimous in refusing 

 to join in the re visionary movement, and Bishop 

 Coxe, of Western New York, published, in 

 a Church paper of London, a remonstrance 

 against a revision of the Bible by one convo- 

 cation of the Church of England. 



The presence in England, at the beginning 

 of the year 1870, of the Greek Archbishop of 

 Syra and Tenos gave a new impulse to the 

 negotiations for establishing closer relations 

 between the Anglican and the Greek com- 

 munions. On the 4th of February, 1870, a 

 conference took place between the archbishop, 

 attended by the Archimandrate Stratalis and 

 Mr. Lymbas on the one hand, and the Bishop of 

 Ely, attended by the Rev. George Williams, and 

 Rev. F. Meyrick, well known as prominent 

 champions of the intercommunion movement, 

 on the other. The archbishop classed the points, 

 on which the two churches differed, under three 

 heads, namely : things to be corrected ; things 

 to be discussed ; and things to be tolerated. 

 On the first head he ranged but one point, 

 namely, the doctrine of the procession of tho 

 Holy Ghost, and he insisted that the doctrine 

 of the Church of England respecting it must 

 be corrected before there could be any hope 

 of union between the two Churches. The 

 Bishop of Ely handed to the archbishop a 

 paper stating the doctrine of the Church of 

 England on the procession, and the latter con- 

 ceded that the doctrine set forth in the pam- 

 phlet was fully orthodox, and agreed with 

 the doctrine of the Greek Church, which holds 

 that the Holy Ghost eternally proceeds only 

 from the Father, while she admits that in time 

 he proceeded from the Son by means of vt^is. 

 Nevertheless he declared that the removal 

 of Hhsfilioque from the creed of the English 

 Church was an indispensable condition of the 

 union of the Churches, and that the Greek 

 Church would not be satisfied, if, while retain- 

 ing the word Jilioque, the English Church 

 nevertheless anathematized the doctrine of the 

 processions in the form of an anathema drawn 

 up by the archbishop himself. Knowing, 

 however, the orthodoxy of the Church of Eng- 

 land, he promised to explain it to the Patri- 

 archs of Constantinople and Jerusalem, and to 

 the Holy Synod of the kingdom of Greece, 

 and to try to stir up a desire of union among 

 the people. In the latter part of the year, the 

 intercommunion movement suffered a great 

 check by the proselytizing efforts made in 

 behalf of the Greek Church by the Rev. Dr. 

 Overbeck, formerly a Catholic priest of Ger- 

 many, who has joined the Greek Church and 

 has been authorized by the Holy Governing 

 Synod of Russia to open a chapel of the Greek 

 Church in London. The Rev. George Wil- 

 liams, one of the principal promoters of the 

 scheme, said, at the Church Congress at South- 

 ampton, that it was difficult to imagine lan- 

 guage more bitterly hostile to the Anglican 



