The Express.
London, England, 1852-01-09 00:00:00

of St. Paul and St. Barnabas, the public had not taken I
any interest in the reverend gectleman; he had gone
unnoticed to Rome, am was %1112.7 natural ;
but,
when
dere, did not outwardly confirm till Popery. lit
was very illogical. Still, in that exercise of fret
of thought and ef conduct, there was nothing *OlO
lie had any right to num& on. Mr. lem Niar,
the private person, we entitled to be ma lamas- II
tent as he pleased, without popular reproach ; the
responsibility was his alone. There was no desire to
molest him after he had ceased to outrage us. We
might have un opinion that he ought nut to remain
in the church of England, but we had not the
I slightest wish to drive him out. Persecution never
entered into our heads. All we wanted was to forget
him; for we had other and better things to think
about than Mr. BENNETT.
One of his disciples has, however, forced hint once
more On public attention. Mr. 111:xxErr's strength
lay amongst the aristocracy. It was in Belgravia
he planted his peculiar "centre of unity, and
thence he exorcised all popular Christianity; there
it was that he raised nunneries and appointed lady
abbot..in; propagated meth:era taster, habits and
practices; opened shops for the sale of what pour
SYDNEY S3IIIII called "little books of nonsense,
pictures of the VIRGIN and illuminations of the
saints:" undertook to reconcile dirt and diamonds,
squalor end %plendour, at ;tryst ion and superabundance,
misery and fashion. Belgravia had. indeed, always
had its qualms of conscience and its tweaks of piety.
Some fifteen scars ago evangeliennism was growing
fashionable flierr ; but evangelicanism insisted too
much on the difficulty of the camel passing through
the eye ot a needle; so Dr. Tilton% s chaps: ceased
to be attractive. The Bishop, too, did not choose
that Arcadia of Bon Tun to be disturbed ; he refused
to license Irish curates to " set a trembling" the shat-
tered nerves of its charming shepherdesses; and
Mr. Bust N crr became the Ammo Los of the Flock.
...

•The difficulty Bishop !limit',mu) had in pulling
down the piping Pan he had assisted in setting up
we all recollect; for we all enjoyed the trounc-
ing which Mr. BENNETT gave The episcopacy
which he commenced with reverencing. It was ou
both their parts, however, an indecent and discre-
ditable controversy. For it displayed a bishop with-
out any consistent rules for the proper government of
his clergy ; ready to take advantage of all their
vagaries when they were popular; yet prepared to
sacrifice and abandon them to the first burst of public
indignation; and it also ',hosed how such prelatimil
lubricity encouraged a bold and audacious priest to go
On advancingin Itomish errors and practices until a
sense ofehame cut off any retreat; and hence, owing
to his obstinacy, far more than to his bishop's firm-
ness, Mr. HENN I:TF.9 expulsion from Belgravia.
Belgravia was indignant ; Belgravia subscribed its
money. censured its bishop, and vowed desperate
deeds of insubordination against the divine right
of episcopacy. It resolved to fellow Mr. BENNETT
wherever he went, and the probability is, that Mr.
BENNEtr's hesitation, and not Dr. BLONIFIELD.B
influence, has kept half Belgravia from Rome. At
last, however, Belgravia has had its great revenge :
for again Mr. BENNFrr has been presented to a
benefice of the church of Eugland.
The noble house of TII YNN F. has large passessions
in the west of Fngland ; and attached to them is, of
course, a corresponding amount of church patronage.
The church has, therefore, always rejoiced in an
abandance, sometimes in a superabundance, of
TIITXNES ecclesiastical. At present, it seems from
the Clergy Lid. we have only two,—Lord CHARLES,
a canon of Canterbury and vicar of the family living
of Long-bridge Deverill, in Wiltshire; and Lord
Joitx, a cation of Westminster, and rector of the
sinecure rectory of Backwell, Somersetshire—" pa-
tron, the Nlarquis of BATH." Such were the uses the
T/ITXN ES in times past put their church patronage to.
Non cadem est :etas non MOM" New lights
have, however, dawned even upon the TitvNNEs—or,
at least, upon one of them. I.ike other noble ladies,
the Dowager Marchioness of BATH has seen the
errors of her family's ways ; and, eschewing what
Mr. Disk IEI.I calls the tt meagre theology " of the
Chun h of England, has bestowed her widowhood on
that church universal which is to be found nowhere;
and in the true spirit of a Norman conqueror has
resolved to impose it and its apostle on her vassals at
Procne.

Now, Frome is not an obscure, scurvy village, or
• great straggling rural parish, illustrating what
Lord GRET when a liberal used to term the " bar-
barous agriculture" of Mr. MitEs's constituents.
Frome is a considerable town full of educated people,
with a large district surrounding it ; together con-
taining some 12 or 13,000 inhabitants. It is a vicarage;
the vicar has generally kept three or four curates
and there are in the parish three chapels, all in his
gift. The importance of a new vicar to Frome re-
sembles the importance of a new Prime Minister to
England; and what that is we all at present feel. The
peace, the policy, the improvement, and the comfort
of the place. are all concerned in the appointment. ,
When, then, a vacancy recently occurred, Lady
BATH was addressed by the inhabitants, with a view
to a suitable appointment; and she, it seems, pro-
mised to attune her choice to their wants. But
a suitable appointment, in their opinion, meant
something very different from what it did in
her ladyship's judgment. By it they expressed
attachment to that good old protestantism for which
the West of England has always been famous; whilst
by it their feudal chief signified that Sacerdotalism
with which the weak and sensuous portion of our
aristocracy has of late been inoculated. They relied
on her promise; and, dreaming only of coming
low church zeal and fervour, were astounded by
the news that Mr. BENNETT was to be their vicar.
Frome rose at the announcement ; clergy
_and laity,
uniting, poured forth their sorrows to Lady BATH;
snatching at the first (and it by no means the most
offensive) of Mr. Berme-Ws books on the shelves
of the town library, they pointed out his
infidelity to the church of England ; they showed
thence how he had aspersed their Church,
maligned the Reformation, and denounced Pro-
testantism to his own children ; and, drawing
thence the inevitable inference, that under him they
and theirs could not be secure, they implored Lady
BATH to save them and their little ones from such a
vicar and such a pastor. Lady BATH is a mother,
a religious woman, and a person of generous sympa-
thies, as well as dispenser of church patronage; and
here is her reply ;
Longleat, Jan. 3.
Rev. Sir,—l have received with sincere regret a commu-
nication signed by yourself and others, relating to the ap-
pointment of the Rev. W. J. E. Bennett to the vicarage of
Frome, in my gift. In reply, I beg to inform you that the
appointment is already mad, and cannot be revoked.
I remain, rev. air, yours faithfully, li. BATH.
The Rev. W. Calvert, Vicarage, Frome.
On Lady BATH personally,—u the writer of this
letter, we have no further remark to make. The law
enables her to give such an answer ; and for it the
law is answerable. Let us view it from an emi-
nence loftier than Longleat. Here then we have •
whole parish rising against Mr. lietcsim's appoint•
ment ; showing irresistible reasons for their host i ity to
it ; and all the answer they can get is " the appoint-
ment in already made, and cannot be revoked." The
peace of Froine has therefore to he disturbed, religions
animosities and discords have to be introduced into it,
the church has to be rent, and strife to become the
order of the day therein, because the law has con-
ferred on Lady BATH the unrestricted power of
assigning to the 13,000 people of Frome a vicar,
against whom the meanest parish in England
would protest. The cure of their souls is
" in my gift." What is given " cannot be reroked."
The church in Frome was consequently established
for the benefit of Lady BATiI'S patronage; not for
what its 13,000 inhabitants deem their spiritual edifi-
eation. Such is the legal position of the matter.
This, we say, is • monstrous grievance; it is a
state of things for which there is no parallel in any
other protestant country ; from which even Scotland
is free. Under each bondage, the church belongs, not
to the people, but to the aristocracy and to the episco-
pacy of England. The benefice of Frome, in Laid,
trit's gift, is convened into a piece or semi-popish
missionary machinery, which its inhabitants, with
souls as immortal, feelings as acute, capabilities as
cultivated, fears as sensitive. and hopes as humble as
her ladyship's, can only avoid contact with by
leaving their parish church. The church at Frome
was, therefore, made for Lady BATH, not far the
people.
But there is the bishop to protect them against the
patron's wantonness and disregard of their wishes
and entreaties. Yes, there is the bishop. And small
is the se"urity Protestantism him in Dr. !Wan%
under whose fostering care, while at Oxford, the
Mammas and the WARDS were encouraged to enter