No doubt those who wished to see the recalcitrant clergy
treated after the manner of the Prussian drill-sergeant to the recruit (i.c, with a "Hound, you mutiny ") will call this utterance weak. To us it seems wise, moderate, considerate, and therefore statesmanlike. In effect it tells the clergy that those who continue to set at defiance the rulings of the Primates are undermining the very foundations of the episcopal form of Church government. The nation at large judges roughly and broadly. If it continues to see the authority of the Bishops denied, defied, and set at naught, we may be sure that, rightly or wrongly, it will draw the con- clusion that the Anglican Church is incapable of that discipline and good order which are essential to a national Church. We do not want or expect slavish obedience, but if in the Church of England we cannot even obtain agreement on its episcopal character, then assuredly the Church as we know it now is doomed. Heavy indeed will be the respon- sibility which must rest on men who will risk the future of the English Church rather than obey those whom they are under the most solemn obligations to obey, and who now claim that obedience in the most patient and temperate spirit. The men who reject this last appeal, and refuse to give heed to its admonitions, may be good and sincere men and zealous Christians, but they have clearly no true under- standing of the nature of a Church founded on the rook of episcopacy.
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