16 



ANGLICAN RITUALISTIC CONTROVERSY. 



demand. And, having regard to the uncertainties 

 which have been widely thought to surround some 

 recent interpretations of ecclesiastical laws, as well as 

 to the equitable claims of congregations placed in the 

 moot dissimilar religious circumstances, we can not but 

 think that the rccogni/.cd toleration of even wide 

 diversities <>f ceremonial is alone consistent with the 

 interests of true religion, and with the well-being of 

 the Knirlish Church at the present time. The imme- 

 diate need of our Church is, in our opinion, a tolerant 

 recognition of divergent ritual practice ; but we feel 

 bound to submit to your Grace that our present 

 troubles arc likely to recur unle>s the courts by whieh 

 ecclesiastical causes are decided in the first instance, 

 and on appeal, can be so constructed as to secure the 

 conscientious obedience of clergy men who believe the 

 constitution of the Church of Christ to bo of divine 

 appointment, and who protest against the state's 



i-neri'achmeiit upon rights assured to the Church of 

 England by solemn acts of Parliament. We do not 

 presume to enter into details upon a subject confessedly 

 surrounded with great difficulties, but content our- 

 selves with expressing an earnest hope that it may 

 receive the attention ot your Grace and of the bishops 

 of the Church of England, 



The archbishop replied to the memorial by 

 republishing a letter which he had previously 

 addressed to Canon Wilkinson, in which be 

 said : 



It is a peculiarity of the present troubles that the 

 clergymen who have fallen under the penalties of the 

 law, in a way we all much regret, have come under 

 the authority of the Provincial Courts of Canterbury 

 and York, as the result of their having positively 

 refused to conform to the admonition of their bishops ; 

 and, indeed, so far as I know, no case of prosecution 

 for ritual has (at least for many years past) been 

 allowed to proceed in the case of any clergyman who 

 was willing to comply with such admonition. It cer- 

 tainly may fairly be taken to show that there must be 

 some exceptional difficulty in present arrangements 

 when clergymen of otherwise unimpeachable character 

 think it their duty to run the risk of having their use- 

 fulness in their parishes rudely interrupted by the 

 authority of the law rather than yield to those set over 

 them in the Lord that degree of willing obedience 

 which seems to most men to be enjoined mike by the 

 traditions of their Church and the written words of the 

 prayer-book (in the preface, " Concerning the service 

 of the Church"), as well as by their promise of 

 canonical obedience. I am quite sure I may under- 

 take for my brethren of the Episcopate that we are 

 ready very carefully to consider at the present junct- 

 ure the grounds which appear to have led to so 

 strange a result. 



The archbishop alluded to a petition em- 

 bodying the views of the memorialists, which 

 had been presented to convocation in 1877, 

 referred to a committee, and reported upon by 

 the same in 1879, and promised to call the at- 

 tention of convocation to the report and the 

 subject as soon as the forms of that body would 

 allow. A memorial signed by several digni- 

 taries of the Church, among whom were 

 Bishops Perry and Ryan, and the Deans of 

 Exeter, Carlisle, Ripon, Chester, Gloucester, 

 Peterborough, and Canterbury, was afterward 

 presented to the archbishop, opposing the 

 memorial of the Dean of St. Paul's and others. 

 The signers of this address said : 



We have no desire to narrow the comprehensiveness 

 of the national Church, or to abridge that reasonable 

 liberty which has always been conceded to churchmen 

 in matters non-essential. We are, however, firmly 

 convinced that neither in public prayer nor in admin- 



istration of the sacraments ought there to be granted 

 any toleration of the use of vestments and symbols 

 avowedly introduced as exponents of doctrines which 

 wo believe to be unscriptural, or which had been de- 

 clared to be not in accordance -with the plain inten- 

 tion of the articles and formularies of the Church of 

 Kngland. Wo therefore respectfully but firmly en- 

 treat your Grace to give no countenance to any attempt 

 to procure toleration for ritual practices, which for 

 more than three hundred years, and until a very recent 

 date, were almost unknown to the Church of England, 

 and which, when submitted to the highest courts, have 

 been declared to be contrary to the laws of the Cnurch 

 of the realm. 



The archbishop, presenting the matter of 

 these memorials before the Convocation of Can- 

 terbury, at its meeting February 8th, remarked 

 that there seemed to be a certain indefiniteness 

 about those addresses which asked for a greater 

 amount of liberty in the matter of ritual, and 

 it seemed to have been overlooked that, while 

 there was an innocent liberty, there was a lib- 

 erty which degenerated into license. He had 

 no reason, however, to believe that those who 

 had asked this had any desire for the use in the 

 Church of England of any form of the Roman 

 Catholic communion which might he identified 

 with the profession of Roman Catholic customs. 

 The bishops in their dioceses, under whose ju- 

 risdiction these matters came, would not, lie 

 supposed, be disposed to interfere with lawful 

 ornamental ritual not contrary to the doctrines 

 and principles of the Church of England; and 

 he also supposed that the law was now so inter- 

 preted that great discretion was shown to be 

 left to their lordships as to whether or not 

 prosecutions or suits against clergy in ritual 

 matters should proceed ; so that now the 

 bishops could refuse to sanction a mere vexa- 

 tious attempt to interfere with a worship which 

 approved itself to the parishioners, and was 

 not contrary to law. He did not think that 

 any more than this should be claimed, and it 

 could not be expected that there would be any 

 legislation in the direction of legalizing those 

 things which the Reformation had abolished. 

 The convocation suggested a reference of the 

 subject to a royal commission, and advised 

 that authority be given to the bishops to settle 

 difficulties that might arise, and that they exer- 

 cise such authority discreetly and kindly. 



A memorial signed by nearly twenty-four 

 thousand laymen was presented to the Arch- 

 bishop of Canterbury, April 2d, entering the 

 solemn and emphatic protest of the memorial- 

 ists against the toleration, within the Church 

 of England, of any doctrines or practices fa- 

 voring the restoration of the Roman Catholic 

 mass or any colorable imitation thereof, any re- 

 introduction of the confessional, or any assump- 

 tion of sacerdotal pretensions on the part of the 

 clergy in the ministration of the Word and sac- 

 raments. 



The public attention was kept fixed upon the 

 ritualistic controversy by the proceedings in 

 the courts in cases of ritual, by the fact of 

 the imprisonment of clergymen who had been 

 adjudged guilty of contumacy in violating the 



