The Bishop of London is not a man to act
without discretion even in small matters, and we have no doubt that he must have had both the legal right to inhibit Mr. Haweis from delivering a sermon in Dr. Parker's pulpit last Thursday, and some weighty reason for exercising that right. But we find it very hard to understand what that weighty reason could be. We have heard it suggested that as the clergy cannot legally recipro- cate these acts of kindness by giving up their• pulpits to Non- conformists, the spectacle of Nonconformists giving up their pulpits to clergymen is likely rather to increase than allay the bitterness between the Dissenters and the Church. But surely that is rather a large assertion. One can hardly em- bitter a quarrel by gratifying a good number of those who might otherwise quarrel with one. The inhibition seems to us quite inexplicable, unless, indeed, Mr. Haweis is regarded by the Bishop as so likely to misrepresent to Dissenters the teaching of the Church, that he thinks him the worst ambassador who could be sent from the Church of England to the Gentiles.
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