BISHOP COLENSO AND THE THIRTY-SIXTH CANON. 223

Whatever value may attach to Bishop Colenso's recent work on the Pentateuch, or however much we may deplore that he should have deemed it incumbent on him as a solemn duty thus to sap the very foundation of ordinary faith in the Scripture story, it is impossible not to sympathise with him. in the following remarks, which we extract from his concluding chapter :

"It may be that the time is near at hand, in the ordering of God's providence, when a Missionary Bishop of the Church of England shall not be prevented, as I myself have been, from admitting to the Diaconate a thoroughly competent, well-trained, able and pious native, because he must be ordained by the formularies of the Church of England; and those require that he should not only subscribe to the Thirty-nine Articles, and acknowledge the Book of Common Prayer, parts of which, the nice distinctions of the Athanasian Creed for instance, cannot possibly be translated into his language.

"I cannot say that I felt a religious scruple myself about ordaining a native candidate under such circumstances, though aware that, by the 36th Canon, I should have rendered myself liable to suspension. But others about me had scruples of this kind, and I deemed it best to defer to their judgment until I could lay the matter before the Church at home. I do now lay it before the Church."*

Canon xxxix. is (we believe) universally disregarded.

"None licensed, as is aforesaid, to preach, read lecture, or catechise, coming to reside in any diocese, shall be permitted there to preach, read lecture, catechise, or administer the Sacraments, or to execute any other ecclesiastical function, by what authority soever be he thereunto admitted, unless he first consent to subscribe to the above three Articles, in the presence of the Bishop of the Diocese wherein he is to preach, read lecture, catechise, or administer the Sacraments, as aforesaid."

Canon xl. contains the well-known oath against Simony, on the alleged ground that "buying and selling of livings is execrable before God: "______

“I, N. N., do swear that I have made no Simoniacal payment, contract, or promise, directly or indirectly by myself or by any other, to my knowledge, or with my consent, to any person or persons what

*The Pentateuch, &c., by the Right Rev. J. W. Colenso, D.D., Bishop of Natal. Longmans; 1862. Chap. xxiii., pp. 149, 150.

soever, for or concerning the procuring and obtaining of this Ecclesiastical dignity, place, preferment, office, or living,-nor will at any time hereafter perform or satisfy any such kind of payment, contract, or promise made by any other without my knowledge or consent: So help me God."

Of the above it may be sufficient to say that it has utterly failed in securing the object named in its preamble, inasmuch as livings are openly "bought and sold," the Canon notwithstanding; while we fear that the oath is constantly evaded in the spirit, though it may be observed to the letter. After all, too, everything depends upon the arbitrary interpretation of the epithet "Simoniacal," the ordinary acceptation of which, while it remains a bar to the scrupulous and timid, is notoriously gulped by those who are least calculated to add strength or efficiency to the Established Church.*

Canon xlviii. appoints that

"No Curate or Minister shall be permitted to serve in any place, without examination and admission of the Bishop of the Diocese. And the said Curates and Ministers, if they remove from one Diocese to another, shall not be by any means admitted to serve, without testimony of the Bishop of the Diocese from whence they came, in writing, of their honesty, ability, and conformity to the Ecclesiastical laws of the Church of England. Nor shall any serve more than one church or chapel upon one day, except that chapel be a member of the parish Church, or united thereto."

Canon 1. orders that

"Neither the Minister, Churchwardens, nor any other officers of the Church, shall suffer any man to preach within their churches or chapels, but such as, by showing their licence to preach, shall appear unto them to be sufficiently authorised thereunto."

Canon lv. directs that

"Before all sermons, lectures, and homilies, the Preachers and Ministers shall move the people to join with them in prayer in this form, or to this effect:-Ye shall pray for Christ's holy Catholic Church, &c.'-always concluding with the Lord's Prayer.”

It is needless to say that this form is no longer observed

The Report of the Commission on Subscription (1865) recommends this Canon for revision.

DE EXCOMMUNICATO CAPIENDO.

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except in cathedral and university churches; while the omission of the Lord's Prayer has been especially sanctioned of late by episcopal authority!*

Canon lix. requires that

"Every Parson, Vicar, or Curate, upon every Sunday and Holyday, before Evening Prayer, shall for half an hour or more examine and instruct the youth and ignorant persons of his parish in the Ten Commandments, the Articles of the Belief, and in the Lord's Prayer, and shall diligently hear, instruct, and teach them the Catechism set forth in the Book of Common Prayer. And all fathers, mothers, masters, and mistresses shall cause their children, servants, and apprentices, which have not learned the Catechism, to come to the church at the time appointed, obediently to hear, and to be ordered by the Minister, until they have learned the same.

And if any Minister neglect his duty herein, let him be sharply reproved upon the first complaint. If, after submitting himself, he shall wilfully offend therein again, let him be suspended. If so the third time, then excommunicated, and so remain until he will be reformed!

And likewise, if any of the said fathers, children, servants, or apprentices, shall neglect, as aforesaid, let them be suspended by their Ordinaries-if they be not children—and if they so persist by the space of a month, then let them be excommunicated."

Canon lxv. is a remarkable illustration of the manner in which this body of statutes is gone into hopeless desuetude. It enjoins that

"All Ordinaries shall, in their several jurisdictions, carefully see and give order, that as well those who for obstinate refusing to frequent Divine Service, as those also-especially of the better sort and condition—who for notorious contumacy, or other notable crimes, stand lawfully excommunicate-unless within three months they reform themselves and obtain the benefit of absolution-be every six months ensuing, as well in the parish church as in the cathedral church of the Diocese, by the Minister openly in time of Divine Service, upon some Sunday, denounced and declared excommunicate, that others may be thereby admonished to refrain their society, and excited to procure out a writ De excommunicato capiendo, thereby to bring them into due order and obedience."

Canon lxxiv. is a fit corollary to the last, as ordaining that

"All Ecclesiastical persons shall usually wear in their journey cloaks with sleeves, commonly called priests' cloaks, without guards, welts, long buttons, or cuts. And no Ecclesiastical person shall wear any coif or wrought night-cap, but only plain night-caps of black silk, satin, or velvet. In private houses, and in their studies, the said persons Ecclesiastical may use any comely and scholarlike apparel, provided it be not cut or pinkt; and that in public they go not in their doublet and hose, without coats or cassocks; and also that they wear not any light-coloured stockings. Likewise poor Beneficed Men and Curates, not being able to provide themselves long gowns,* may go in short gowns, of the fashion aforesaid."

Of this last Canon it may well be said,

"Nil ultra quo jam progrediatur habet.”

Having, therefore, now extracted about a tithe of this obsolete code of laws (being altogether 141 in number), and having, we fear, sufficiently wearied our readers by the painful recitation, we shall leave the curious to draw for the remainder at the fountain-head. There is one Canon, however, which demands a brief notice in conclusion, as having been recently made the subject of a Parliamentary discussion with a view to its repeal.

Canon lxxvi. orders that

"No man being admitted a Deacon or Minister, shall from thenceforth voluntarily relinquish the same, nor afterwards use himself in the course of his life as a layman, upon pain of excommunication."

There can be no doubt that the effect of this Canon adds materially to the other influences, to which we have before alluded,† as acting to deter men of the higher grade

We presume this is the origin of the modern practice of a certain class of the clergy perambulating their parishes in "long gowns," after the fashion of Popish priests on the Continent. (1878.)

See Letter c., p. 176. The late Bishop of Manchester (Prince Lee) observed at a Meeting of the Church Building Society, "It has been a matter of sincere concern to me, for two or three years past, that we are in want of more efficient candidates for the ministry. I should be sorry indeed ever to find that we are placed again in the position in which we were a few years since, of having churches provided faster than we could obtain

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of attainments from entering the clerical profession. It may well be questioned whether the Church would not be rather a gainer than a loser in the long run by relaxing her hold upon an unwilling servant, in order, thereby, to make room for another whose heart and soul would be in his work.*

LETTER CIX.

A LAYMAN'S THOUGHTS ON THE CHURCH.

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Caput inter nubila condit."-VIRGIL.

SIR, We regard anonymous pamphlets with no favour; and are therefore sorry that the writer of the one we are now about to notice has thought fit to conceal his name, -to walk, in short (as says our motto), with his head shrouded in thick clouds and darkness.

The tract to which we refer is entitled, "An Address to the Laity of the Church of England upon the Errors

ministers for them. Bitter indeed would be the grief, and sad the loss to the Church of England, should the standard of her clergy be lowered. We must have men of earnestness and piety, but we must also have men of learning and of patient research. The people around us, thanks to the different measures which have been introduced, are rising daily in intelligence, and they must be met by corresponding intelligence and information on the part of their ministers; and I do trust that the time will never come when I shall fail to reject from the ministry those whom I believe not fully competent to undertake its duties." To which may be added (valeat quantum) the testimony of the Bishop of Natal:-"It is a fact which has been lamented by more than one of the English Bishops, and which every Colonial Bishop must still more sorrowfully confess, that the great body of the more intelligent students of our Universities no longer come forward to devote themselves to the service of the Church."-The Pentateuch, by the Right Rev. J. W. Colenso, Pref., p. xxiii.

* This burden is now happily removed from the Clergy: a third point gained by the much-abused agitation of the Reformers. (1878.)