8 



ANGLICAN CHURCHES. 



In the thirty-three years following 1840 the 

 total sum expended on church building and 

 church restoration was 1,089,247, while the cor- 

 responding sura for the eighteen years succeed- 

 ing these to 1891 was 1,127,476 a rate of ex- 

 penditure in the former period of 38,000 a year, 

 and in the second period of more than 62,000 

 a year, the total for the half century being 

 2,216,723, or an average of 2,216 for each par- 

 ish. The statistics of communions give results 

 showing that among the same number of people 

 for every three communicants in England there 

 were four in Wales, and the reports of confirma- 

 tions give similar results. 



The Rev. Dr. Deed, honorary secretary of the 

 Church of England Incumbents' Sustentation 

 fund, founded nearly twenty years ago by the 

 Marquis of Lome, has prepared the following 

 tabular statement of the result of an analysis of 

 the " Clergy List " and of " Crockford's Clerical 

 Directory : 



CLERGY LIST. 



CROCKFORD'S CLERICAL DIRECTORY. 



It is shown in the forty-fifth report of the 

 ecclesiastical commissioners that during the 

 year ending Oct. 31, 1892, numerous grants were 

 secured to benefices, which raised the total value 

 of augmentations made by the commissioners 

 since 1840 to 791,300 per annum. In the same 

 period the value of the benefactions secured to 

 benefices by private donors exceeded 170,000 

 per annum. The accounts showed a falling off 

 in the income derived from estates,* and the 

 commissioners anticipated a still more serious 

 diminution for the current year, owing to strikes 

 and the losses of agricultural tenants. The 

 commissioners had therefore been obliged to 

 reduce the appropriations. 



The ecclesiastical commissioners announced 

 in February that they were prepared to receive, 

 on or before Dec. 1, 1893,offers of benefactions of 

 not less than 100 each in capital value toward 

 making better provision for the care of souls, 

 with a view to such offers being met by the 

 board with grants of capital sums, during the 

 spring of 1894, it being understood that the 

 means at the disposal of the commissioners for 

 meeting benefactions being much reduced, the 

 board did not undertake to meet all the offers 



which might be made. The commissioners were 

 also prepared to receive offers of benefactions of 

 not less value than 2,000 each in favor of par- 

 ishes or cures containing populations of 6,000 

 and upward, with a view to such benefactions 

 being met by grants, not exceeding 60 per an- 

 num in each case, to be appropriated toward the 

 maintenance of assistant curates. These grants, 

 too, could only be a few in number. In connec- 

 tion with these announcements the specific con- 

 ditions were published, on which the grants 

 would be made. 



Addressing the House of Laymen of the Con- 

 vocation of Canterbury, the archbishop spoke of 

 the evidences of material strength in the Church 

 of England, embodied in the returns made in 

 answer to a Parliamentary inquiry in 1891, as 

 "not short of surprising." Neglecting all ex- 

 penditures of less than 500, there had been 

 spent in the building and restoring of churches 

 in England and Wales in the eighteen years then 

 ended more than 20,500,000. In the four poor 

 dioceses of Wales alone more than 1,000,000 

 were so spent. Upon Church schools in the same 

 period 20,000,000 were spent in England and 

 Wales. The voluntary outlay of the Church ap- 

 peared, in fact, to be not short of 5,000,000 a 

 year. 



Convocation of Canterbury. At the meet- 

 ing of the Convocation of Canterbury, in Febru- 

 ary, particular attention was given to the re- 

 duced incomes of the rural clergy. A resolution 

 was passed in the lower house requesting the 

 president to appoint a committee " to inquire 

 into the statements relative to the depressed 

 condition of clerical incomes, and to consider 

 what steps should be taken for their improve- 

 ment." Speaking upon this resolution, Preben- 

 dary Salmon quoted statistics showing that at 

 present one third of all the benefices in England 

 and Wales were under 200 in annual value, and 

 that the distress of the poorer clergy was serious 

 and widespread. The incomes of the poorer bene- 

 fices had decreased very rapidly within the last 

 ten years, and some action was necessary to deal 

 with the matter. It was said that there were 

 plenty of men with private means to take the 

 poor livings, but such men were decreasing in 

 number every year, and great difficulty was ex- 

 perienced in securing suitable persons. A com- 

 parison of the stipends of nonconformists with 

 those of the clergy would show that in the Pres- 

 byterian Church the average was 317 a year, 

 as against an average of 230 in the Church of 

 England. Separate committees were appointed 

 on the subject in the upper and lower houses, 

 which will communicate with one another. A 

 committee was appointed in the upper house to 

 inquire into the subject of fasting communion. 

 The lower house requested its Committee on 

 Education to report the best measures by which, 

 in its opinion, Church schools maybe maintained 

 and their efficiency increased. 



The Houses of Convocation met March 16 for 

 the purpose of considering the Church Patron- 

 age bill, then pending in Parliament. The bill 

 was reviewed in all the houses, a number of 

 amendments suggested, and approved as a 

 whole. The House of Laymen resolved that no 

 act dealing with the subject would be satisfac- 

 tory which did not provide some such safe- 



