The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1871-05-27 00:00:00

THE BISHOP OF MANCHESTER ON

MR. MIALL'S MOTION.

The Bishop of Manchester, speaking at the conse-
cration of a new church at Bolton last week, aaid that
he bad the pleasure of listening in the House of Com.
mon. to Mr. Mialla speech on hie motion for the dia.,
tahliahnient of the Lugbah Church. It was a well.
reaaoned and a well-expressed speech, and if he the
bishop) marked its temper, it was only to contrast it
moat favourably with the temper that was manifested
by the same hon. gentleman when, sonic twenty.five
years ago, he wrote a book called 'The Nonconformist
Sketch-book." Mr. Miall argued the question in the
House of Commons clearly on abstract principles.
The Bishop said he did not suppose that, accepting the
1 existing constitution of society and the great disintegra-
tion of religious Witte, it would be possible, if they had
to start anew, to build up an Established Church out
of existing materials. On the same principle he was
not sure that we could build up an hereditary
throne, or a House of Lords, or a House of Commons,
exactly as they were built up now. But, happily for
Englishmen, they had not been at the mercy of
abstract ideas to the same extent as their volatile
neigh)) tura across the Channel. Mr. Al iall, in the
'course of his speech—and this was the only thing in
which there was a tinge of bitterness, and he (the
bishop) fancied that Mr. al iall had some reference to
himself in his remarks—said that there were certain
right rev, prelates who, instead of providing for the
future and raising a sustentation fund for their Church
against the day when it ahould be disestablished—were
going about their dioceses saying, "What will become
offall the rural parishes in England if the Church be
disestablished and disendowed " Mr. Miall said he
would answer that question, aftir a fashion, by flaking
another, in which was the better tinge, viz., " What
hag become of the rural parishes under the teaching of
the Church of England?" He meant that little rural
parishes were little better than so many centres
of paganism and of ignorance and of vice. But
he was well answered by Sir Bounden Pal-
mer, who, admitting that there were spots
where there might be more light, more culture, and
more morality, still recognized the Church of England
as the great and the chief instrument of diffusing light
and culture and spiritual influence in every town and
hamlet in England. With 20,000 clergymen, it was
not likely that all would be perfect ; but things were
improving; and if they could only be a little more
united among themselves, he (the bishop) believed
there was a future in store for the Church of England,
as the great instrument for training and civilizing, in
the truest sense of the word, the people of this country,
by the side of which her past history, glorious as it was,
would melt into insignificance. It had been remarked
that the working classes were not very hot supporters
of the Liberation Society- that they had not been
agitated up to the mark. No doubt agitation would
do a great deal in England, but he did not think that
agitation would ever succeed in alienating the hearts of
the peoule from any institution, either in Church or
State, which could prove its right and title to a hold on
their affections by virtue of the work it was doing.