The Express. — 1850-12-11 (London, England)

POPE—against their own ministers as well as Cardinal Wiseneg —against the popery of Oxford as well as against the popery of Rome. There can be no smaller or weaker philosophy than that which treats the present controversy as a squabble between contending sect., or as an outburst sot national intolerance. Bigotry we have, to doubt, in abundance in England; with intolerance in religion we are, certainly, very amply supplied, and, if Mr. Rot BUCK will allow us, with intolerance in politics also. But, if there be much bigotry and rest intolerance in England, there is also much religion ; and he is a shallow observer and an incomplete politician who does not appreciate and understand the power which religious considerations have over the great majority of every influential class. The intolerance of religious animosities is not, it is granted, a spectacle that any rightthinkirg man can take pleasure in ; but he his read our history in vain who does not comprehend how much of our national policy and of our liberties are mixed up with, and have grown out of, our religious rivalries. To rend an empire by a dispute about titles i., it may be admitted, deplorable folly; bat to overtrick what the assumption of those titles indicates would be little lees than national suicide. That there are both bigotry and intolerance in the premed crisis is probable; but that it is based on so low and vulgar a foundation is utterly incorrect. It springs from indignation at papal audacity and horror at trectarian treachery; it aims at the repulsion of a foreign aggression and a re-adaptation of the church of England to the principles of the Reformation. So regarded, it is by far the greatest internal question that has occupied Ragland since the Reformation of 16tori ; and on its settlement gristle depend.; the future character and polity of this empire. But, then, it can only be settled by something more serious than wordy resolutions, trimming, haltiog, unmeaning episcopal addresses, royal sieechee, or even legislation against popish title& "Less than thorough" will not settle it. And Lord Jong RoesaLt, having evoked the storm, must either rim to the greatness of the emergency, or be destroyed in the whirlpool he cannot otherwise control. So far, no doubt, the movement has tended to make Ireland a difficulty of whig government—a difficulty, however, which may be very easy to overcome. It may be hopeless to abate Primate Cuttem's pretensions; to wring from an ultramontane priest his Italian prejudices and his Roman ambition ; but it is net hopeless to conciliate a brave and noble people by the removal of insults, and by the substitution of justice; it is not hopeless to endeavour to convince the moderate among the Irish Roman catholic clergy, that to all that is reasonable for the predication and exercise of their religion, there is no objection nor opposition ; and it cannot be hopeless to show the Raman catholic laity, by reducing the established church in that island to its reaper dimensions, that English devotion to the Ra formation is quite consistent with regard for their honour and respect for their faith. It cannot, then, be a mere squabble between contending sects that must thus precipitate the considerstion and settlement of the Irish church question, as a mark of justice and symbol of peace to Ireland. Nor is it a mere burst of nuance that necessitates a thorough reform of the Church of England; for fruitless I. these two respects, Lord Jong Roseau's letter would be worse than political insanity ; it would be senseless bigotry. A thorough reform of the Church of England, we say, bat not in a mere fiscal sense; not only la a re-arrangement of its revenues; not only in a redistribution of its parochial divisions; not only in an augmentation of its working clergy and in a redaction of its episcopal pomp and revenues: sot, in short, such a material reform as three years ago Mr. Holleman asked for and was denied by the whig government; even that would not now satisfy Lord ABBLEY ; for be, who then shrank from touching the falaic of the old building lest it should fall, now *matins it with destruction unless separated and elegageg fees the medimval weight that oppresses it. Greatly sa material, external reform was required, tams more is now needed ; for at last we have tbat the church, as it sow exists in praodes, Is set ties church which the Reformation founded In 01. Wirt SW Reformation intended—what legislation liss MEM of the Reformation meant—and what the Midas prepared by our reformers aimed at giviag England—imam a church composed of a Christian cams munity, with a defined faith, a fixed ritual, sail • well-ordered ministry; not a church with any sup posed commission from Heaven, or deriving its sr i *Deity from the Apostles, either to give a law to the people, or to assume by its inherent power i a ministry amongst them ; a church in which them should be common prayer, not sacramental sacrifices; a church in which there should be plain, unostentatious services in which we all should join, not a gaudy display of mediatorial functions, a church which should minister to and with the laity, not interpose between them and salvation. Such was the church the Reformation established in England ; without a priesthood, without eacerdotal pretensions, without sacrificial functions, without mediatorial power ; where is it now ? Deeply still, doubtless, in the hearts of the laity ; but rarely to be found on the lips, or in the practice of the clergy. In its steed, the church of England is with thorn part of some intangible, mystical, supernatural organisation or corporation called the church catholic or universal ; and in this church catholic, which is nowhere to be found, mists power infallible; and in the aura of Ragland id • Flathead laving divine  protestant. There is hope in this pluck, even though it be not at present rightly directed, for the primary want of county constituencies is indepethdence. That achieved, intelligence and sound principle will follow in due course. And it the "Dukery " lead the way to independence, who need fear for the rest of English counties? It is, therefore, a great matter they have inthand, these tenant farmers of South Notts, in pitting Mr. BARROW against Lord