The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-09-20 00:00:00

must be a purer and a nob

[ging from the in
as of human ki

all the tendern

has no higher feeling than th,
his pay. If he had no high
should have t

oidid thou
Mn between

and bell,

that the rel

flocks will be of a higher character, that

by mutual affection- and

self-devotion on one side,
the other. With this im

l by responsive g
ssion, I certainly

only hope that, in the coarse of tir.

mented, partly by the privat
have already done so much so w(
confident, grow weary in well-doir
from the fund of Queen Anne's bount3
in beneficial operation for so long a cou
partly by the application of such sums
tical Commissioners will, I hope, in tim
this end, out of the eniscorml. canitular.

His lordshija, t

the evils of a small endowment, that

permit of the- engagement of a second clerg
his services were required, and aclmowleiged
tude that the want had in a g
by the Additional Curates'
He mentioned specially the

inunilicem
ho h

of distinguished position, ..
pends for two additional curates, if his contribution were
doubled by other subscriptions. That had been done, and
four additional curates had been employed in consequence.
Scripture readers had also been appointed. The bishop
then, at very great length, noticed the asylum for the
' education of the orphan daughters, &c., of clergymen, es-
tablished at Warrington, in connexion with the training
school for school-mistresses, speaking very highly of the
joint institutions. He then proceeded :--I have spoken
with 'satisfaction of the harmony which has prevailed
throng! - If there has been anything that
ration,

,tiout the diocese.
assumed even the momentary appeaL.—
it arises out of the proceedings for electing prt
present the clergy of the diocese in the provincial convo-
cation at York. He entered at great length into an expla-
lation on this subject. The mandate issued by his
the Archbishop of York for the clergy of this dio-
appear in convocation, was expressed in terms
corresponding with the ancient form of the diocese,
but were not adapted to it in its altered position
Only two proctors had be,
whereas the general rule was

tee of an exc

tors to re-

Gra(
cese to

m summoned from the diocese

moned for each arehdeaconr

could be sum-
oken with the
1.4" was certainly
aid be set

He had sr

Archbishop of York Lr
desirable, he said, that the point in question &Li,
at rest. If the meeting of the convocation of the province
should remain a mere official ceremony, it would be much
to be regretted that any uncertainty as to the rule of elec-
tion should prove a cause of dissatisfaction and disunion,
when the whole matter would be, as it was, a form; but
if, on the other hand, the convocation of the province
should ever be called upon by royal authority to exercise
active powers, then it was really important in the highest
degree that there should not be any doubt remaining as to
any part of the clergy being adequately represented. In
the meantime, he confessed that nothing was further from
the wish of the archbishop, and most certainly nothing
could be further from his own, than to curtail or abridge
any rights the clergy of this diocese might be shown to have
possessed in this matter, either by law or custom. Those
doubtful points he had referred to affected the composition
of the house of convocation, not its functions. They were
entirely independent of another question which had re-
cently been much agitated ; he meant the expediency of
reviving the exercise of the long dormant powers of con-
vocation. That appeared to him to be a question of prac-
tical prudence, on which men who were equally faithful,
and equally friendly to the church, might possibly come to
opposite opinions. He thought himself that in this, as in
many other cases, the importance of the question, great
as it was, had been exaggerated, both by those who desired
and by some of those who deprecated, the revival. If
convocation were regarded theoretically as the Church of
England by representation, then no doubt it was possessed
with attributes of high authority ; but then the royal writ
was necessary for its assembling, and the exercise of its
powers was limited and restrained by law. It was not
permitted to enact, promulgate, or execute any canons
constitutions, or ordinances, unless it 1-1 "

mi the subjec

assent and license so to
but a narrow s'

That restric
here of spontaneous action

gave it

Its powe

scarcely extended beyond' addressing

the crown a

respectful representation of any grievances, or a peti-
tion for a license to transact business. Within a range
so circumscribed, if on the one hand there was little
effectual good to be expected, yet on the other he thought
there was but little evil to be apprehended, provided only
that the proceedings be conducted in a spirit of modera-
tion, and mutual forbearance, and comprehensive charity.
Those restraints of which he had spoken as to the convo-
cation might at first sight appear to place the church in
an anomalous and disadvantageous position ; but they
were in reality, to a great extent, at least a necessary con-
sequence inevitably flowing from the connection that
subsists between the church and the state. The church
was established by law as a national institution. The
state secured to it extensive rights, and privileges, and
endowments. It was the guardian of its interests, the
trustee of its funds. That relation necessarily required
that the internal constitution of the church, as to its doc-
trines and discipline, should be so defined as to charac-
terise and identify it. They possessed such characteristics
in their articles, their liturgy, their canons. Those were
at once the rules by which the church regulated itself as
a religious society, and they were at the same time the
marks of identity by which the state recognised it as esta-
blished. Any alteration or modification, therefore, in its
internal laws and formularies, could only be made with
the assent and sanction of the state, either of the Sove-
reign or of the legislature, according to the nature and
magnitude of the change. To this extent the indepen-
dence of the church was necessarily abridged, and its free-
dom of action limited by its connection with the civil
power. Now this might happen to be a disadvantage, but
it was far more than compensated by the reciprocal benefits
the church and state derived from their connection with
each other, and it was, he ventured respectfully to express
his opinion, a disadvantage in appearance rather than in
reality. The affairs of the world, they knew, were subject
to perpetual change. Improvements in art and science, new
forms of productive industry, new developments of power,
new combinations of materials—these and such things
called continually for new legislation, in the incessant

progress of society ; but affairs of religion were placed
above these mutations by a fixity and permanence of
their own. The great truths of the Gosp(
changeable as their Divine Author, the a
and to-day and for ever. It was one of th

-ere as

Teat princi-