The Sun.
London, England, 1840-06-22 00:00:00

A LETTER TO THE RIGHT REV I
THE LORD BISHOP OF LONDON, ON HIS
LORDSHIP'S OPPOSITION TO THE IRO-
.POSED REFORMATION OF THE LAWS OF
CLERICAL SUBSCRIPTION. BY HENRY
ERSKINE HEAD, A.M , RECTOR OF FENI-
TON. DEVON, AND CHAPLAIN TO HIS MA-
JESTY THE KING OF HANOVER.

RECTORY, FENITON, JUNE, 1840.
MY LORD,—I hurab'y beg leave to address a few
words to your Lordship on your Lordship's recent op-
position to the Protestant petitions, presented by his
Grace the Archbishop of Dublin. Sentiments which
closed a debate of such importance to the Reformation
of the National Church, and which have met with no
reply that I am aware of, require a closer examination
than appears to have been bestowed upon them.
An eminent person with whom 1 lately had the
honour of holding some correspondence, observed to me
that " the daainatory clauses of the Athanasian Creed
are held in aversion by many pious Ci.ristians, and by
many of the most zealous supporters of the National
Church."

This important, though ob‘ious, remark should be
considered with reference to its bearing upon the cage of
candidates for offices of trust in the Church of England,
who are required to " declare their unfeigned assent
and consent to all and everything (the danmatory
clauses, &c. &c. included) in the book of Common
Prayer."
We may offer plausible arguments in favour of the
retention of such declarations. But what says Scripture
to such declarations " Cease to do evil, loose these
bands of wickedness, undo these heavy burthens, and
break these spiritual yokes."—lsaiah, chap. SS, v. 6.
Every reasonable person will acknowledge that, with
all its excellencies, which are not small or few, human
imperfections are to be found in the Prayer-book. These
imperfections are being held up every day more and more
to public view, not only unanswerably, but unmercifully ;
not in the spirit of reform, but of change ; not by those
who deal in herbs, but by those who deal in iron ; not by
physicians who would cure, but by combatants who
would conquer ; not by Jhpyx, tucking up his tunic to
assuage and soothe, but by Entellus, grasping his gauntlet
to kill and wound. Modern improvements arc cherish-
kg the spirit of inquiry. The Post-office and the rail-
roads lend their aid. Pamphlets, full of strictures and
criticisms on the faults of our rituals, are flying through
the length and breadth of the land. Meetings are held.
The Church canons, and other ecclesiastical laws, arc
brought to the test of common sense. Opponents, not
ignorant of polemies,' and exasperated by many an overt
act of ecclesiastical exclusiveness, are assailing our vul-
nerable points—and the worst of their arguments is, that
they are just. I mean as far as regards the laws of sub-
scription.

Oa the other hard, the champions of the Church, for
the most part, avert their eyes from those things which
imperatively demand their attention. The Archbishop
of Canterbury asserts that there is nothing in our rituals
to give offence to any denomination of Christians ;
or some such reckless assertions, which his Grace never
appears to have retracted. Many of our preacher; are
so busy in preaching the Establishment that they have
no time to repair its breaches ; and many more surren-
der their minds and judgments to the Oxford tract
writers, men as much opposed to the true gospel of
Christ—the " faith which was once delivered to the
saints"—as the idolators in Ezekiel worshipping their
idols, and turning their backs upon the temple of the
Lord.

What is to be feared for the Church of England is,
not that gold should depart from her coffers, hut that
the leanness of Popery should enter into her soul ; and
that the alarms which menace her from without should
stimulate the concentration of mendacity, my Lord,
which ferments within.

The conventional significations of the term " Protes-
tantism," is—adherence to the 1311 c alone ; that of
" Popery"—adherence to tradition. According to this
interpretaiian of the term, the Church of England
seems to he rapidly receding from the former, and ad-
vancing towards the latter. The most feasible mode
of checking this retrograde course, and carrying out the
principles of Protestantism ,which are interwoven in
constitution, (for, in spite of her friends, she is a
Protestant Church,) will be, I do not say radicaily
to correct the errors in rur rituals, &c., for that,
owing to its extreme difficulty, is perhaps rather
to be wished for than attempted,—but to neu-
tralize them by modifying such anti-Protestant and
stringent declarations as that which is found in
Charles the Second's Act of Parliament, on the prin-
ciple of " fas est et ab hoste doceri." For the power of
such declarations in giving the human mind a bias to-
wards the most erroneous conclusions, though it may
escape our observation, my Lord, does not escape the
observation of our opponents.
It fares ill with the clergyman who speaks of the
weak parts of the Establishment, with a view to their
emendation. He may point to the black rock of apos-
tucy to which the Church (like the ship in the Arabian
talc) is drawn every day nearer—in vain. He is sure
to be censured, to say the least, as one that steps out
of his sphere. So, when the ship's carpentcr reported
to his commander, before it was too late, that the Royal
George v4as sinking, he was haughtily repulsed. as me
that had presumed to dictate to his superior; his advice
was derided„ and the gallant ship sank beneath the
waves.

Such censures, however, are not confined to the in-
ferior ministers of the Church. Two of her Prelates,
the Archbishop of Dublin and the Bishop of Norwich,
have called the attention of the public to the question
of modifying the terms of clerical subscription—a mea-
sure which strikes at the root of much that is evil in the
Establishment, and promises to promote its enlargement,
reformation, and stability. But have they—has the
Bishop of Norwich especially, received the thanks of his
brethren for his patriotic exertion in this righteous
cause ? Yes—such thanks as the generous men of
Judah awarded their deliverer, when they gave him bound
into the hand of the enemy at Raruoth Lehi.
The Bishop of Norwich had asserted (and the asser-
tion is corroborated by the first ordination vow in the
Ordination Service), that the Church was founded on
liberty of conscience and private judgment.
This Protestant principle, however, is strenuously
opposed by one, loaded by the nation with honours and
emoluments, in consideration of his maintaining this very
principle—l mean the Bishop of London.
" Now he (the Bishop of London—l quote from a
Newspaper tivourable to your lordship and unfavour-
able to the Bishop of Norwich) had always supposed
that Church was founded on truth—( Hear, hear)—
that it was the depository of the truth, and that it was
its duty to interpret those truths, &c. &c
It had also to teach authorized expositions through ca-
techisers and certain forms of faith."
It is clear that your Lordship means to deny, not-
withstanding the authority of the first ordination vow,
the principle of liberty of conscience. What your
Lordship means to assert is not quite so clear, by rea-
son of the equivocal niture of the term " Church."
Your Lordship's meaning, however, esidently amounts
to ti's, that the laity and the clergy are not autho-
rised to make their own inferences from Scripture ; but
that intend of the doctrines of Scripture, they must,
in some instances, receive those doctrines which the dig-
nitaries of the Church find it convenient, my Lord, to
inculcate or fear to deny.
Your
Bishop Lordship makes some
also
h.id admitted. But your Lordship observes,
If ProtestantisM be advocated on these Popish
principles, the Papists, my Lord, will soon have the
rbei:sitrtyo.fnitnhee
Ar.ielese, n
ivt.hich tof Norwich
a*aument,
egtim
just observations on the inexpediency of altering the
" A sub-
scription to its Articles (the Thirty-nine) was not re-
quired from all its members ; it was merely demanded
from the ministers as a security against error. He
hoped, therefore, they should never:ost! the use of the
Articles—(Hear, hear)," &c., &c.
Here is an insinuation that "losing the use of the
I Articles" would result from a modification of the teens
of subscription. This is a conclusion which by no
means follows. Many Prelates have advocated the
latter who have been as able to appreciate -he former
as your Lordship. The Articles indeed were "in use"
hefose that. unholy innovation of stringent subscription
was superadded. Our ancestors saw what your Lord-
ship seems slow to perceive, namely that it is one thing.
to recommend these Articles to the candidate for
holy orders, and another thing to say to him—" You
shall subscribe to them or you shall nut be ordained."
Now, is there anything in the passage wide:. your Lord-
ship quotes from the writings of Burke, which in the
least degree militates against this modification of sub-
scription tests? Moreover, it is reported of your Lore.-
ship's speech—
" He knew that an immense and preponderating ma-
; eracons
should take place Amongst the laity, as well as
jority .of the clergy and laity desired that no e .
the clergy, there wes a strong indisposition to meddle
with the formularies of the Church.
This is a disputable point. The question ought not
thus to be hushed up. Tne just demands of British
subjects are not to be withheld from them, null° certa-
miue, because they are unpleasing to a Bishop or a
party. Will this vast " majority"of the laity sufFer the
clergymen of their parishes to say to them, " I have
subscribed to such and such doctrines, there-
fore you must believe them ?" Such is the logic to
which your Lordship's opinions will inevitably lead.
fie thing should be fairly put to the vote before it can
be confidently assumed that the nation at large depreca..es
the correction of what is erroneous in our lorrnularie.,,
c!ergy
and
Admitting, however, the assumption in its full force, it
Proves nothing at all. For if it be true that there are
errors in our formularies (and true it is), then the
irn esvtatilheair mobnegingc corrected laity," is no reason aga For
"strong indisposition" to correct them, which your
the .4 Lordship alleges to p
the ministers of Christ are not to consult the disposi-
dons or indispesitions of the multitude, but the truths
of Scripture. And these are to be" contended for"--
Jude 3—more than secular grandeur, my Lord, or con.
ven.ience.
doubt " a strong
indisposition" to have their favourite theories `'meddled,ith." But the Apostle Paul sharply rebuked these
The Galat..os manifested no
theories, without pausing to consider whether he was
in the " majority" or minority. The immediate ques-

tion, however, is not the alteration of the formularies,
' but the alteration of the terms of sul.scription. More-
() ye r•---
" Ile (the Bishop of London) thought that if they
svere to.permit a clergyman, declaring that he subscribed
the articles ex animo, to take them in any sense he
pleased, they might as well permit him not to subscribe
them at all."
Now the fact is, the clergy do " take them in any
sense they please." The great giant who was shut up
in a little box—Milton's angels, which were all of a
sudden transferred into pigmies—suffered less in their
corporeal dimensions than the Articles suffer in their
grammatical sense. They are made to be, contrary to
their own nature, so wonderfully and notoriously elastic
es to suit the creed of every clergyman in the Queen's
dominions, from the stumbling Pelagian to the supra-
lapsarian Calvinist.
Yet your Lordship would have us believe that ri-
gorous subscription is a " security against error."
This yoar Lordship will not find easy to prove. It
:night be easier to show that the abolition of rigorous
subscription would be a " security" against endless
prevarications and perveesons of plain language.
Agaicst what " error" has rigorous subscription ever
proved a " security '?" Which of U 3 has ever been
hindered by rigorous subscription from blundering in
many points of doctrine To preserve the Articles
reverectly in the Prayer Bock is one thing ; to exert
r.gorous subscription to there is another. These
two things are perfectly distinct. If any
of us have been benefited by the Articles
this has been owing, not to our having rivetted them
upon ourselves with oaths and adjurations, but to the
blessed influence of the Eternal Spirit,who has gradually
developed to our minds and hearts the inestimable sys-
tem of doctrine they contain.
The truth is, that that principle of private judgment
which your Lordship so strenuously deprecates is em-
braced and acted upon every day, even by those who
disavow it. On the principle of private judgment and
liberty of conscience, every clergyman gives h:'s own
interpretation of the Articles. So obviously necessary
is this principle in the ministerial office, that it will shay
and exert itself maugre all subscriptions, and everything
that can be said or done against it. Hence, it is to be
inferred, that that which is acted upon by general con-
nivance, should be openly recognised as an established
principle. This is just and reasonable. He who is tit
to be admitted to the sacred office is fit to trusted to
pi each his own interpretations.
And, if he seek the teaching of the Eternal Spirit,
these interpretations will become more and more disen-
tangled from error, and the individual will " wax riper
in his ministry." Ignorance in many points of Christian
doctrine is to be expected in young ministers, pardoned
in aged ones, and tolerated in all. We raise the stand-
ard of spiritual attainment too high if we insist oe a very
great degree of light in candidates for holy orders.
Willingness to learn might supply its place. Your
Lordship observes, "No man was forced to eat the
bread of the Church.—(Hear, hear.) A man ought to
be so well versed in what he should have to do .. . that
a hen the time of ordination came, he ought to subscribe
the Articles with a clear conscience or not at all.—
( Hear, hear.) This was an abundant censure of the
doctrine, that the sense of the obligation of subscription
of the Articles ought to be expanded.—(Hear, hear.)
It was now the question whether they ought to alter
the Articles of subscription or not." I should like to
kilow bow many of the clergy have " clear consciences"
in this respect. If your Lordship means to predicate
what your Lordship calls " clear consciences" of all the
subscribers to the Articles—if your Lordship means to
intimate that the majority cf the clergy who subscribe
actually understand at the time of subscription the sys-
tem of doctrine from the 9th to the 17th Articles inclu-
sive, your Lordship exhibits to the public the picture
of a state of things utterly inconsistent with reality and
truth. But if your Lordship means simply that the
clergy ought to subscribe with a clear conscience—that
is, with a competent understanding and approbation of
the scope of the doctrine to which they assent, yr or
Lordship advocates a system of pernicious rigour which
was neither required nor practised in the primitive
Church. I allude, for instance, to the account given of
Apollos in the Acts of the Apostles. He had sub-
scribed to no Articles, yet this omission did not hinder
him from learning " the way of God more perfectly,"
and thus, from correcting, at a period sobse-
pent to the cononencewent of his ministry, those
blunders into which he had fallen, from his

imperfect knowledge of Scripture. Ti-)is is a
clear example that where " strong meat,' cannot be
administered by reason of the ignorance of the preacher,
" milk" may be profitably received at his hands. The
existence of national churches depends in a great tnea-
sure on their admission of this principle. The doctrine to
be preached to the public isr;;.L.7.-iirr.tAoc,(Eph. iii.lo.)
or multiform. The pastures which the Gospel affords
are various, and suited to different degrees of spit.tual
light. In these pastures, the candidates for the minis-
teria office, when once launched forth by ordination,
should be le!t to range at liberty, not coerced by the
hedges and ditches of an over-stringent system
of subscription, but committed with affectionate
prayers to the teaching and guidance of the
great Shepherd of Israel, who, though we
mistrust him, never fails to feed his flock.
Illiberal suspicions, vexatious difficulties, contradic-
tory doctrines, and insuperable tests, answer no good
purpose, and never were the invention of the Apostles,
who were generous and confiding, communicative and
tolerant, and accustomed to give the right hand of fellow-
; ship to all who loved the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity,
and who desired to preach his word. This has been
perceived by some ofour Bishops.
What says Bishop Burnet ?
" The requiring subscription to the Thirty-nine Ar-
ticles is a great imposition I think it a better
way to let such matters continue to be still the standard
of doctrine, with some few corrections The
greater part subscribe without ever examining them ; and
others do it, though they can hardly satisfy their con-
sciences about some things in them." " Our worship is
the perfeetest
would bring in the much greater part of the Dissenters
to the communion of the Church ; and are in them-
selves desirable, though there were not a Dissenter in
the nation. Ido wish, and I will pray for it as long as
I live, that some regard may be had to these scruples,"
&c.

And what says Bishop Stillingflect ?
Whether a solemn using the Liturgy, and appro-
bation and promise of the use of it, may not be sufficient,
instead of the late form of declaring their assent and
consent, which bath been so much scrupled by our bre-
furen ? These . . . . I suppose, may be granted
without detriment or dishonour to our Church."
It is much to be prayed for, my Lord, that some of
that wisdom which appears in tie remarks of these
ght Reverend Prelates should be poured from on
High upon the Heads of the Church.
In conclusion, I would remark that a more righteous
adjustment of the law of subscription (the only point I
would at present contend for) needs not afford any
precedent for any alteration in our formularies, far less
in our Articles. That on the supposition that " all and
ever) thing in the book of Common Prayer'' is strictly
accordance with Scripture, the exactio❑ of the de
clarotions of " unfeigned assent and consent" to it is
wrong, nevertheless, as there are many truths which
are not at times perceived, even by true Christians ;
and Scripture is always tender, and Christ himself is
tender of forcing upon his 'disciples doctrines which are
beyond their strength. " I have many things to say
unto you, but ye cannot bear them now."—John
That, on the contrary. and more probable supposition,
that th..re ma!, be found something erroneous in the
Pryer Book (which is a human compilation, and in
some respects the production of discordant minds).
The impropriety of the declaration is still mere obvious.
That iu either ca,e it is the duty of the Church of Erl -
hind, come what may, to take the necessary steps for
effr,cting this reformation, and to leave the results with
God.

When th, proposal for a new translation of the Bible
was maiie in the time of his Majesty King James the
First it gave great. displeasure to the Bishop of Lon-
don (your Lorddlip's predecessor). It happened, how-
ever, to please the King.
And it is owing to the interposition of Royal au-
thority, overruling prelatical opposition, that we are
indebted, under Divine Providence, to the inestimable
translation which we have at present.
The evil which presses now is very considerable.
I have no hesitation, my Lord, in asserting, that it
is ba,ely possible for any having a clear view of
the leading principles of Scripture, to remain in the
Church of England as a Minister; and quite impossible
for such a man to enter it as a Minister, oAing to the
itrinwency of clerical subscription. This is the ftict,
though, of oaurse, it will be denied with the utuaos.t viru-
lence by those who are interested, my Lord, in conceal-
ing the truth.

The Queen in Council (I speak from good authority)
ought to be addressed on the present occasion—ad-
dressed with all reverential loyalty and submission—by
a humble petition, praying that a general promise of
con!Ormi,y to the Liturgy, &c. be substituted for the
slringent declarations now is use.
And may God preserve her Most Gracious Majesty.
I have the honour to be, my Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient bumble Servant,
HENRY ERSKINE HEAD.
Thi; It.w, the Lord Bishop of London.

[ THE MOORS.—We have received intelligence
fi:nrri several parts of the grousing localities, in this county, and
as concur; that in consequence of the mildness of the weather
du7:ng the process of incubation, the young birds are both
Plentiful a.d very forward, and that the approaching season
will be the best known for a number of years past. The rain
which fell in April was not at all injurious to the birds
in tact, it had a tendency to cause them to hatch their young'
'with more certainty and less danger. The reports from Seot:
land are, that broods are large and numerous, and the birds
particularly strong. —Leeds- Intelligeecer.
HUDDERSFIELD MARKET, JUNE 16.—. There
was little done in this market in any description of goods to-
day. Perhaps there has not been a more discouraging market
during the rear, and prices ore quite nominal. Wools are
heavy of sale, and late prices arc scarcely sustainad. In the
warehouses there is little doing. In short, trade wears any-
thing but a pleasing aspoct.—Doicarler Garotte.