The Ritualist organ has tried to open our eyes to
the neces- sity under which Mr. Stanton lay of not celebrating the Eucharist in a common surplice, but it is not as lucid as we could wish. Mr. Stanton himself not only believes, but maintains that " bread and wine and a priest" are the only necessary conditions for insuring the presence of Christ on the altars of the Church ; and he main- tains that he is a priest, and does not deny that he had bread and wine at his command. Our Ritualist contemporary appears to put his case on this,—that the Anglo-Catholics cannot allow the lawyers of a civil State to interrupt the continuity of the historical usages of the true Church without being unfaithful to that Church. But in that case, why did Mr. Mackonochie before his suspension so often discontinue historical usages—as he held them—of the true Church, in compliance with the injunctions of our Judges ? We suspect that it is with Mr. Stanton a matter of expediency, after all,—that he thinks a sen- sation and a procession into the City will give him and his people the credit of a mild martyrdom. Well and good ; but then he should not talk of their enemies having had power to deprive them of the sun of their day, the moon of their darkest night, the day-star of their hopes. Surely strict accuracy in the use of religious eloquence is of the essence of true reverence ?
Previous page
