In a letter in our Correspondence columns, Dr. Field asks
us, in regard to a statement made by us as to the comprehensiveness of the National Church : "Do you really mean a thing of which every Englishman is not only potentially but actually a member by virtue of his nationality and without satisfying any other condition whatsoever ? That, permit me to say, would not be a Church. If there are conditions of any sort, then the Church must so far be exclusive." We say, and we have ample warrant, that all Englishmen and Englishwomen who profess and call themselves Christians are not merely potential but actual members of the Church which is legally the nation on its spiritual and religious side. The law as Fuller said will " un-Church " no man. That is why no stronger or harsher word is used to describe members of the various English Sects than "Nonconformists "— persons who voluntarily do not conform to the regulations of the Act of Uniformity and other Acts under which the Church of England is "by law established."
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