The Express.
London, England, 1850-12-10 00:00:00

the erpretM

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LONDON, TUESDAY, DECEMBER 10.

CARDINAL WISEMAN has at length replied to
some of our charges. " Not one," says he, "of
the new bishops obtains any increased power or
jurisdiction over clergy, or laity, or property,
or trusts, or any person, or thing. If any-
thing, powers before held are curtailed or limited.
Not one of them will gain by the change any increase
of emoluments or of income. Not one acquires or
dreams of acquiring the slightest alteration of social
position. Each one remains where he wee, and as he
wee, and what he was, with the sole change, si far ae
outward relations go, of the title which he bears, I
tell you, as you have been again and again told, that
the bishops, as now constituted, have straitened and
not enlarged powers, compared with what they bad

before."
The audacity of this line of defence is admirable.
The Cardinal joins issue with all who have hitherto
written on this subject—himself not excepted—truly
the mat general of issues. lie contradicts the POPE
—he denies Dr. ULLATHOHNE, he ignores himself.
That which wu true last month is true no longer.
The Pores Letters Apostolic of Michaslmiu are
• • .ulv. sad esarosly that. Evi-

reTtily a new edition is preparing to come out wan
the serials of Christmas.
Let us refresh the memory of this ineoestant po-
lemic. In the tint place, let ua ask him this
plain question :—it no other change has taken
place but that of the mere titles of himself and the ,
other prelates, was it worth his while to incur so mach
odium—nay, to risk the very existence of his church
upon the soil of England—for such a trifle ? In the
next place, we will set before him the following ex-
cerpts from his own pastoral, "given out of the
Flamini.° Oats of Rome "—from the Papal Reetrint
itself—and from Bishop litiarnoanz's letter, and
ask him how the world at large, and Roman catholice
in particular, are to construe his present denial ?
On the seventh day of October, in the year of our
Lord MDCCCL," thus wrote the Cardinal :
The grestest of blessings ham just been beerowed upon our
essetry by the reservation of its true catholic Aiesardlical
government. For..liis Holiness Pape Pius IX. we.
graciously pleased to issue his letters Apostolic..mbsr in ►e
enbstitated for the 'Litt apostolic triettiates heretofore
existing, oze arebispissepsl or metropolitan and twelve epis-
copal Bees; repealing, et Me mine time. and annulling all
disposition, tura catechism!, made for England by the Holy
See with, reference to its kW form of aothsiastical govern.

mut.
Toe effect of the Letters Apostolic was even greater
than the Cardinal states; for, uwe hero shown in
farmer articles, not only " the enactments made for
England," but all enactments (that is to say, the whole
Corpus juris Canonici), were repealed by that in-
strument in the most explicit language. Nor, se we
have shown, was this the utmost extent of the repeal-
ing clause in question. " All eorutitutitms and pen.
liar pririkges of missions, and vicariates, and of all
Marches and pious places whatsoever, and ail customs,
by trhoinsoerer' or at whatever most antient or imme-
morial time beonght is," are now for ever abrogated
by thi, new papal ense'ment —which proceeds very
coolly, but yet logically, to draw from their repeal the
following cuelosion :
Ilene* it w.II for the fate,* be misty rwagetent far the
Archbishop. and &shops of England to thetblealsh what
things helot* to the ezecatlou of the COMMON wissiostical
aaJ whet. wording to the ormatoon diwipluse of the
eftereh, are ea,rusted to the issistionty of the bishop..
_ .

We have h:re "authority of the bishops" set
serenest " common ecclesiastics' law," just as in other
days kings set " prerogative " and " law " at issue.
If kings had been " solely competent" to legislate,
would " law "have triumphed, or " prerogative r
Just s 3, we need not doubt which of the twain—
" jss ranoniraina " or " ottetoritne epitelyi " is like to
profit of the " sole competence " to legislate now con-
ferred upon the prelates.
The new Bishop of BIRIMPOII Se has informed the
Times newspaper that (the Cardinal excepted) ho
is the only catholic bishop now in England who has
been immediately engaged in negotiating the re-esta-
blishment of the spice "al hierarchy." How does he
interpret the passage last cited from the Puez's
letter ?
ll,tholie biehips in Easland are no longer the Pops's
vicars, but Banish bishops having power ti tom their own
cosulatefiess of pororeabeng [and that of their clergy and
floths by sapeueseseerades. Ws are now left to cesium
sinew whatever kcal vegelatiess and customs may be sill
expedient; we are freed in oar miaistradeas from those
which are not suitable, and we have the whale fue 0011411,111114
to draw from Ist what may be farther malted. la other
words, his Holiness leaves ca. aseath-gle bishop, to legislate
fee religious purposes, AS WS 111 EXPEDIENT, WITHOUT
ANT TIE PROM TIES PAST.
But, although now "no longer the Pope's vicars,"
and notwithstanding their investiture as English
bishops in ordinary, with all the jurisdiction, metro-
politan and diocesan, ever possessed by Roman catho-
lic archbishops and bishops in this country or else-
where, the new prelates are not to lose the extraordi-
nary jurisdiction and privileges which they enjoyed
when they were the Pope's vicars.
It is erre far," says the reecript, " from our iodation or
donee that the relates of Repined, now posteraia; the title
and rights of bultips ia ordinary, should, in any other to
epee, be deprived of trey adrantaget which they Aare rte.
"eyed heretofore under the character of voeareopostolio.
For it would not be reasonable that the enactments we now
make, at the instance of tbe &wish catholic., for the good
of religion in their country should turn to the detrirnase
of the said nears •apoetolic. MOTOOVIM we ars most firmly
armed that the same, our beloved shildrra in Christ, will
henceforward manifest even greater lilhrolsey towards
bishops who are snow bound by a stronger tie to theAnglieas
cturchet ; so that these same may never be in want of the
temporal means necessary for the expenses of the desist j
splendour of the churches, and of divans service, and of the
rapport of the clergy, and of the relief of the poor."
We pause for a reply to the question with which
we preluded these extracts. How will Cardinal
WISEMAN reconcile them with his bold denial of
Sunday last ?
When Sir CHARLES TEMPEST, the munificent
founder of the Roman Catholic church at Skipton,
presented his own chaplain to the new Bishop of
REVERLET,—then a "Pope's vier,"—as the first in-
onmbent, the prelate refused institution, on the pre.
tence that by canon law the nomination belonged
absolutely to himself as prelate. The canon law wee
looked into, and the bishop, being found to be in the
wront, was obliged to submit.
The POPE'S reecript has repealed the whole of the
canon law, and it is not very likely that this part of
it will be re-enacted ; for the bishops are clearly in.
terested the other way. Indeed, Cardinal WISEMAN
had, and still has, they say, a similar controversy
about the lay patronage of th 3 church built by the
late Mr. Raexamt, M.P., in the neighbourhood
of Kingston. Nor is that the only instance.
The case of Doddin Green, an endowed chapel
in Westmoreland, in the gift of the RIDDELL
family, has been a perfect scandal for these
twenty years past, and we believe that, down to this
moment, the sacraments continue to be denied to its
congregation because the Bishop of HIULHAM—Iate
vicar apostolic of the north—disputes Mr. RIDDELL'S
interpretation of some passage in the
,ies conosicum
about the rights of patrons. The dispute is over
now, we fancy; for the ambiguous passage is repealed
with all the other contents of LanceLo'r's bulky
digest;—unless, indeed, Mr. RIDDELL invokes the
Queen's courts to his assistance. For that the Bishop
ef REMISE', at the approaching " Synod of English
Bishop," will give his voice for restoring the ob-
noxious canoe, is hardly to be hoped for.
Cardinal WISEMAN, it is said makes no secret
amoopt his friends of hie being 'the adviser of the
promulgation of the reecript in its actual form and
IP:adjoin and that the Pora, but for his counsels,