The Sun.
London, England, 1858-06-29 00:00:00

ROYAL COnmissfON.

The Royal assent was given by commission to
the following bills :—Property Qualification ; Chan-
cery Amendment ; Paace Preservation ; Harvey's
Charity ; Bristol Municipal Charities ; Bristol, St.
Nicholas and St. Leonard's Cbarities ; East Suffolk
Railway ; Waterford and Kilkenny Railway (Capital) ;
flors;,ham TornOte Trusts ; Stokes Bay Pier and
Railway ; Eat Kent Rail vi ay (DJYer Exten-
sion) ; Taunton \Va'er ; Tratnore Embankment ;.
Exeter and Fxmouth Railway ; Lindon and Brighton
and South Coast Railway (Capita!) ; Staines, Woking-
ham, and Woking Gas ; Emttern Steam Navigation
Company ; Globe Insurance Company ; Cronnford and
.High Peak Railway; Mancb'-ster Poor; Wallas, y Im-
provement ; Balleymena and Balleymoney and Coleraine
and Portrnsh Railway ; Salisbury and Yeovil Railway ;
Edinburgh and Glasgow and Stirling and Dainfermline
Railway ; Fife and Kinross Railway ; Blythe Harbour
and Docks ; Caledonian Railway (branch to Port
Carlisl,, Ayr, acd Dalmellington Railway) ; Bradford
Corporati in Water ; Luton, Dunstable, and Welwyn
Junction, and Hertford and Welwyn Junction Railway
Company Amalgamation ; Winchestei, Sheffield, and
Li eol~ shire Railway (Newton to Comps all) ; Luton
Gay ; Balby and Worksop Road ; Liar eily Harbour,
Chiswick Improvements ; and Wat?rf,rd Gas.

The Royal Commi6rioners were the Lord Chancellor,
the Earl of Hard wicke, and Earl of Delawarr.
Lord ItEDZSDALE presided during the remainder of the
rifting.

Lord STANHOPE said he wont(' now refer to the
s:rt, ices of the 30th of January and 29. b of May, There
were acts of per lament directing those days to be eh
served, of the 12th and 13:b of Charles II , but no ser-
vices were provhied ; it was idit to other authorities to
provide theme In this case the convocation of 1661 eid
provide such services. That convocation would not in
re-Fee a cemesend itself greatly to the religious be!-
in; f tl'e present day, for it directed that a portion of
the Apour.‘ pits aheu:d be-used fur the lessons of the
church. By it two new alines were drawn up for tbe
30h of January and the 29th of May. Dr. Sancroft
Fe *posed tbe,e services to the convocation, but it reins,
to adopt them ; and a royal proclamation was thereepon
i sue erjeining by the King's authority the use of the
very forms which the convocation bad rejscted. So far,
therefore, from the services for the 30th of Jenuary and
the sth of Nov. having received the approval of convo-
cation, that body bad actually deetne d to sanction their
tee. There was, therefore, no authority beyond the
royal proclamation for these services in their present
form ; and as for the act of parliament, they would of
course become obsolete the moment the crown ceased to
insist on the use of the services. He (the noble earl) next
came to the question, were those services such as would
be desirable, for their intrinsic merit, to retain I He
must, for his own part, confess that he found an ohjec-
ii‘ n in the very title of that for the 30:h of January.
He considered that the name of martyr ought, at all
events in divine worship, to be reser. eel for those Celia-
tiaes who, neither than renounce their faith, soffered at
the hands of Pagan persecutors. To apply it to a king
who, however barbarously had been put to death by his
own subjects—who, however orrirg and guilty, were
nevertheless Chii,tians, seemed to him (the noble earl)
to be a c enple's misapprehens on cf the term.
(Cheers.) He (the noble earl) could not admit that
C. arks I. belonged to that noble army who were cele-
brated in another and very beautiful part of the Liturgy ;
but when he came to the details of the service he felled
it even still more of jectionable than its title ; for a
parallel was drawn in it between the sufferings of cur
Divine Itodeemer and those of King Charles, ths. tee's
of the 0:d Testament, which were' prophetic of the pas-
sion, being drawn out in array and applied to the royal
martyr. (Bear.) He found in it, too, a prayer in which
Kieg Charles was spoken of as the "greatest kings
and the best of men." Was it desirable tbatthe authority
of the church should appear to be given to a statement
like that I Many el their lordships might no doubt feel,
as he tthe noble earl) himself felt, much sympathy for the
fate of Charles I.; but that was no reason why a state-
ment like that to which he had referred should remain
in the public services of the church, To the service for
the sth of November similar remarks applied.; and he
would ask whether it was desirable to maintain fermu-
larke which were no longer applicable, and which were
held in estimation by no school in the national church.
(Hear) He proposed to adopt the form of moving an
a:dress to her Majesty, in preference to prop %sing the
repeal . f the statutes, and that for several reasons. Iu
the fi ,t place, ashe had already observed, if the services
were discontinued, the statutes would immediately be-
come oheohte. But, in any case, the form of an address
would be the most respeethil to tbe Crown. Tue preree
genre of the Crown was the first. thing ihat would be
Kff,ctsd. It was signified at the commence went of etch
reign by a proclamation tigne.l by the soverrian, an.
counter-hue by the secretary of state ; and if, there-
fore, they prom led to rep• al the eels without taking
any notice of the prerogative, their conduct would hardly
be eoneeistent with that respect which they would all he
anxious to show to her Msjeety. Tice proper course
w therefore he to commence with an address to the
Crown, aftsr which it weuld t e comp• tent to her Ma-
ja-ty'e Ministers either to advise her to withdraw {h.
proclamation at once or to proses t.t e p-... the
statute-. (Meer, h, a:.) Toe service for the anniversary
el tee accession was more ancient than any of the other
three. It could be re aced to the reign of Queen Ellza-
beth and the year 1570. There was also a case ie. which
proceedings had been threatened against a clergyman
tiamsd Johnson, who in the reign rf George I
La i refused to lead it, probably because be, had scruples
as to the right of the Hanoverian succession. He made,
however, his submission, and the matter went no further.
was remarkable that notwithstanding the emphatic
manner in which the proclamation was worded, the use
of these forms practically depended after all upon the
feeling of each individual clergyman. In 1844 there was
published upon this sul j• et a work which, theugb not
free front some prepossession, was di-tinguiehed by learn-
ing and research—" How shall we Coeform to the
Liturgy ?' by the Rev. Jae. Robertson ; and this gentle
man's cenclusion was thus summed up :—" Wo very
rightly use these state services, provided that there is no-
thing iu them which we do not consider wrong; but we
are not ob;iged to use them, because they form no part
of be services of the chui eh as by law e. t eblished." In
paint t f fact, there were very few churches in which
these days were observed, in less they happened to fall
en a Sunday, in which case it occasionally happened that
a few prdyers selected from the prole! services were in-
troduced into the ordinary services of the day. It might
be asked, why thus disturb the present state i f thiegs ?
The services did, however, continue to be us ..ti in the
college chapels and cathedrals, although there were some
cathedrals which bad discontinued them. One of the
latest examples of this kind was the ea‘leedral church of
Canterbury, where the services had lately been omitted
by the authority of the dean and chapter, and with the
sanction of the most rev, prelate who presided over the
southern province. Still it must be admitted that the
cathedrals and college chapels were in this matter some-
what behind the parochial churches, which be thought
was te be regretted, for they ought to be examples to
the rest, and not to follow in the rear. The service for
the sth Nov. was seldom used except under the prompt-
ing of a strong party feeling. Where a clergyman was
strongly opposed to Roman Catholic principles, it was
no doubt his right and his duty to warn his flock against I
them; but he denied that that c old be done in any eats