The Express.
London, England, 1852-06-09 00:00:00

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LONDON, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 9.

FlasT amongst the Orders for this Day in the
House of Commons stands the second reading
of Lord BLANDEORD.B bill for the regulation of the
duties of ecclesiastical persons and for the manage-
ment and distribution of episcopal and capitular re-
venues ; and it is understood that, regardless alike
of personal interests and of episcopal solicitations,
the noble Marquis is determined to advocate fear-
lessly the cause which he has honourably under-
taken. It is very desirable that ecclesiastical abuses
should be handled in a more vigorous way than is
proposed by Lord BLANMORD; he is nut sturdy
enough ; and moreover that part of his scheme
which suggests the creation of new bishops is
certainly most objectionable. Yet, notwithstanding
these drawbacks, it must he admitted that the
bill has been carefully drawn and ably introduced,
and that it deserves temperate criticism, patient con-
sideration, and some support. Amongst the pro-
posed regulations of the duties of ecclesiastical per-
sons are the addition of the decanal duties to those
of the bishopric; making the deanery house the
episcopal residence the endowment of cathedral
grammar schools;--the reduction of canonrics to two
in each cathedral;—the constitution of a acc of
Westminster ;—and the separation of the ices of
Gloucester and Bristol.

The consolidation of the offices of dean and bishop
is the only new and decided change amongst those
proposed, the other provisions being merely
further extensions of the recommendation of the
church commissioners in 183.5; and perhaps it would
have been safer for Lord BLANDFORD'S plan if he had
abstained from any suggestion involving a funda-
mental alteration in the constitution of the ecclesias-1
tical corporations. The endowment of grammar
schools attached to cathedrals is a graceful conces-
sion to public opinion—outraged by the gross
abuse of statutablo power in the proceed.
ings against Mr. Wnisron—and would afford
the Established Church a mode of strengthening and
extending its influence, less obtrusive, indeed, but
not less real, than the appropriation of its funds to
the endowment or the augmentation of parochial
incumbencies. The reduction of canonries to two in
each cathedral is a proposal which will meet with
little opposition from any quarter. It may limit the
opportunities for episcopal nepotism, but the cathe-
dral duties will be at least as effectively performed
as when twelve wealthy pluralists slumbered in the
golden stalls of Durham. fhe act of 1840 allotted but
two canons to the cathedrals of St. David. and of Lien-
daff, where the duties are the same asat other cathedrals.
The creation of a see of Westminster to relieve the
overgrown see of London is no new suggestion, but
has been in turn approved by all parties, and only
waits a convenient opportunity for establishment.
The severance of the sees of Gloucester and Bristol is
less likely to command general acquiescence. The
union of these sees was recommended but recently
by persons best qualified to judge of episcopal duties,
and the present bishop has found leisure for a close
attention to the temporalities of the united sees.
But the proposal to empower the creation of new
bishoprics without seats in parliament endangers
the whole bill. The bishops will oppose it, as
leading to their ultiesete expulsion from the
House of Lords; the clergy, knowing already too
such of bishops, will osbe io the increase of their num-
ber ;--the laity will ye of the creation of au
order of men with imam than those of third-rate
lawyers to ape the lordly gentility of the episcopal
peers ;the politician, rosele.*.g the abuses of fre-
quent translations, will not tolerate the re-introduo-
fion of a system so subversive of episcopal morality ;
—and the whole body of the community will oppose
the diversion of estheintke resources from their
legitimoto sliest et poulid extension, and will no
lese eto the ldest bee of a class of dignitaries
whom wahines bag been ea poorly demonstrated.
The pooch's= for the management and diet:Motion
of ma*, loveness met the eepitular shim wholly
in the embehelleal erameimioners, giving to the pre-
sent main et ehaptcr their average inoomedering
the wet shin years, and to the future umbers
750L4 year ; and wit the umbel el the wise*
incomes (hot not the he of the emits) in
the ewe body, reducing the Ineemesi*Xibll ire senior
prelates hem 60,0001. to 34,0001. Them enostmente
are not soffieient for the exigency of the cue. bet
they will remedy a part of thiamin of ecelesiostleal
rapacity, and they carry one step further the meow
mendations of the church commissioners in 1536.
The Folioed to divest the chapter of the manage-
ment ear eapitular estates, and to substitute fixed
incase% is a change which cannot be delayed much
longer. Under the cathedral acts tho twelve canons
in soh eathedral are in course of reduction to four,
and k would be preposterous to suppose that the
frit tunas is the receipt of one-third of the revenues
eon eldne to be entitled to the control of the whole
copitalar estate. As the management of the pro-
perty vested in the Ecclesiastical Commission is under
the control of the three lay official members, the sub-
stitution of that board is a step in the right di-
rection. But it will be difficult to persuade
the country that bishops should retain the control of
the dealings with episcopal property, or that lay
management with respect to episcopal estates is less
imperatively called for than the better regulation of
celPii6ler.,Preperty. The object of the distinction is
the provision of funds for the endowment of new
biebegehe I and its retention will be unnecessary
when tint portion of the bill is expunged. The cry-
ing went—segicat on the part of the church, as of
the stall—is the organisation of arrangements to
carry instruction to the mass of the poorer people of
this esontry, who have been left in a state of igno-
ramuy es full of danger to the very existence of
sanity es destructive to their own personal interests.
The extent of the additional funds which would be
provided by the diminution of the incomes of the
senior prelates, by the reduction in the number of
canons, and by the transfer of the control of the
estates, cannot bo even approximately estimated
from the parliamentary returns on ecclesiastical
incomes; but there can be no doubt that the total