Mr. Russell Gurney has, as we anticipated, stated his intention
not to introduce this year any measure for the extension of the Public Worship Regulation Act to questions of doctrine. He put his change of purpose, which he announced yesterday week, on the ground that he had anticipated last Session that the Judge under the Public Worship Regulation Act would be the Dean of Arches, and would therefore necessarily be charged with deciding on all the cases of ecclesiastical offence. The postponement of the Public Worship Regulation Act, however, had altered the arrange- ments, and at present the Judge under that Act would be charged with the trial of no other ecclesiastical offences. Under these circum- stances, Mr. R. Gurney deemed it " exceedingly desirable that there should be some experience of the working of the present system before any change was made." That is a dignified excuse, but we suspect it only means that Mr. Russell Gurney, like a good many other persons, recoils before the dangers which seem likely to arise out of the false policy of last Session, and has no mind at all to increase them at the present moment. It is not, we believe, a retreat preparatory to a new advance, but retreat simple and final.
Previous page
