The Bishop of Lincoln, as we have more than once
had occasion to observe, is a man the roots of whose ethics and theology appear to cling with the utmost tenacity to the stratum of the conventional. Not long ago he intimated that the practice of burning the bodies of the dead would, if adopted, in some inscrutable way be utterly fatal to the Christian faith ; more recently, he dilated on the sin of giving the title of " Rev." -to Wesleyan preachers and others without regular episcopal " orders ;" and last week he solemnly rebuked one of his own -clergymen for being the owner of a mare, "Apology," which was the winner of the Oaks and the St. Leger. But it appears that the aged clergyman in question, the Rev. John King, is not only the vicar, but the squire of Ashby, a large land- owner, and as such a breeder and admirer of horses. He is not a betting man, and his near neighbour, Mr. Henry Chaplin, who is also the owner of racehorses, is actually one of the Bishop of Lincoln's lay-consultees, chosen by Bishop Wordsworth himself, in conformity with one of his decisions at the Diocesan Synod. Now either it is sinful for a rich layman as well as for a rich clergyman to own a racehorse, or it is sinful for neither ; and then the most that can be said against Mr. King is that, in running a race- horse, he is not very careful of the external proprieties of .a clergyman's position. It will never do to raise all this cry Against a sacerdotal caste, and yet make clergymen feel that there is one morality for them and another for the laity. Our own feeling is, that a clergyman ought to be even more profoundly devoted to his profession than average laymen, because kis hardly one to be idly chosen ; and that such a clergyman would not be apt to burden himself with any exciting occupation running into questionable spheres, and as a matter of fact, though not of necessity, tending to foster a brood of parasitic vices. (One would certainly like to know how Mr. King employed the great winnings his horse gained for him). Undoubtedly there are a good many clerical occupations almost as liable to abuse as that of breeding and owning a racehorse ; and as regards Bishop Wordsworth's pompous rebuke, we can- not recognise it as having any deeper source than a habit of mind which makes a prim and rigid, but not very potent, religion .of rather shallow social conventions.
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