THE LATE BISHOP OF ST. ANDREWS. T HE death of Bishop
Charles Wordsworth is a heavy loss to the Episcopal Church of Scotland. It deprives the little hierarchy of a very eminent name. The son of a Master of Trinity, the nephew of a great poet, the brother of one English Bishop and the uncle of another, Bishop Wordsworth carried to Scotland the very finest flavour of literary and ecclesiastical England. Scottish Episcopalians have often to import their Bishops from England, and there are some advantages in the practice. But they have never imported any one with so many titles to distinction as Bishop Wordsworth ; nor is it likely that they will often find it possible to pitch their choice at so high a level. The career of a Scottish Bishop does not offer much attraction to English clergymen. The Church stands to the Church of England somewhat in the relation of a backwater to the main river. It has a brief history and few excitements, and as regards any eminence calculated to strike the ordinary observer, a man must take it with him rather than expect to find it on the spot. Yet if the English connection is advantageous in one way, there are other ways in which it is not advan- tageous. It is hardly too much to say that the habit of looking to the Church of England for example and support has been one of the chief causes why the Episcopal Church has made so little progress in Scotland Anglican episcopacy in that country is an exotic. Presby- terianism is indigenous, and in the Highlands Catholicism is indigenous ; but an Episcopal Church which is distinct alike from the Church of England and the Church of Rome, is to the Scotchman something puzzling and un- familiar. With only cold looks to expect at home, the Scottish Episcopalians have naturally turned their eyes across the border. They have sought to catch a. reflected glory from their sister in the South. From this point of view, Bishop Wordsworth was an admirab'e choice. The Bishop of St. Andrews moved on the same level as an English Bishop, and Scottish Episco- palians might be pardoned if they thought this imported dignity worth securing. But this is hardly the way to make the Episcopal Church take deeper root in Scotland. Most nations like their religion to be of home-raising. Even in the all embracing communion of Rome there is much divergence arising out of national character and habits, and it has been the wisdom of the Papacy to leave large room for this divergence to show itself. If the Scottish Episcopal Church is to make any appreciable way among the people, she must become something more than the Church of those among the well-to-do in whom English tastes and sympathies happen to be strongly developed, and the first step towards such an extension of her office must be to dissociate herself from everything that is specially English. Scotchmen do not much love Bishops, but we may be sure that the type of Bishop they love least is the Bishop of English origin, the Bishop brought into Scotland to take a place which no Scotchman is thought qualified to fill. The Episcopal Church has a dignified and venerable tradition of her own, and it is this that she ought to cherish, if she hopes to influence the great body of the Scottish people. It is the tradition of a persecuted religion, whereas the tradition of the Church of England—or rather, of the Episcopal Church which the English Kings tried to force upon the Scottish nation—is the tradition of a. per- secuting religion. The difference is a notable one, and it is made more conspicuous by the indifference of the English Bishops and the English clergy to the sufferings of the Scottish Episcopalians in the last century. The Tory High Churchmen who shouted for Dr. Sacheverell, or protested against " Occasional Conformity," cared nothing for the " rabbling " of their brethren beyond the Tweed. The Episcopal Church of Scotland owes no gratitude to her magnificent sister, and she has, consequently, no call to pay her the compliment of taking her Bishops from among the English clergy. If to do so is popular with well-to-do Scottish Churchmen, it lessens immeasurably the chances of influencing those who are not well-to-do, and a Church which appeals only or mainly to the educated classes is likely in these days to remain the Church of a small minority.
Bishop Wordsworth's episcopate will be chiefly remem- bered for his persistent attempt to effect a union between the Episcopalians and the Established Church. The basis of this union was to be the recognition, pro hat vice, of Presbyterian orders. The existing ministers of the Estab- lished Church were to be accepted as lawful ministers of the Episcopal Church, but no similar irregularity was to be condoned for the future. It was one of those well- meant schemes which derive a certain interest from the calmness with which they ignore logical difficulties. The dilemma which Dr. Liddon used to propose to the authors of similar proposals in England is especially applicable to the present case. Episcopacy is either of divine or of human institution. If it is of divine institution, what right has a Church to waive it pro hac vice—to make an exception, that is, in an ordinance of God—without any authority from him to make it ? If, on the other hand, episcopacy is of human institution, it may be suspended or abrogated when circumstances seem to demand it. It is impossible to conceive a more imperative instance of such a demand than is to be found in Scotland. The nation is Presbyterian by history, by habit, by con- viction. To the great body of the people, episcopacy is an alien and distasteful system, and, so long as the Epis- copal Church remains episcopal, the chances of any union between it and the Established Church are infinitesimally small. On what ground, therefore, can Episcopalians pre- tend to force their theory of Church government upon their unwilling countrymen ? Only, so far as we can see, on the ground that episcopacy is ordained by God, and so cannot be set aside by man. Nothing short of this will justify the maintenance of an institution which offers an insur- mountable barrier to the restoration of Christian union. If, as Dr. Liddon used to say, Bishops belong to the same category as Deans and Chapters, they ought to be at once given up if the divisions among Christians can be healed by surrendering them. The pattern for Episcopal Church- men in Scotland should be the conduct of the French nobles on the night of Fourth of August. No matter what length of prescription episcopacy has in its favour, it ought not to stand in the way of the healing of divisions among Christians. Any claim which is strong enough to justify Scottish Episcopalians in disregarding their plain duty in this respect, must be founded on the inspiration we attribute to every divine ordinance. But if this is once admitted, what becomes of the pro /we vice suggestion ?
There is another consideration of something the same kind which points to the same conclusion. When nego- tiations are proposed between two Powers of very unequal strength, it is usually the stronger of the two that opens its arms to the weaker. Here it is the weaker of the two that opens its arms to the stronger. Episcopalians come forward, not with a request to be received by the Presby- terians, but with a proposal to receive them,—upon condi- tions. Set episcopacy upon the pinnacle on which Dr. Liddon placed it, and there is nothing improper in this course. Numbers do not make a Church, and if the Scottish Episcopalians are in possession of some- thing which does make it, they are quite right in making the acceptance of this something a condition of union with those who do not possess it. If, on the other hand, what Episcopalians have, and non-Episco- palians have not, is only a respectable and historical adjunct to the essentials which both alike possess, it is surely the place of the smaller body to consider on what terms it may be received by the larger body, rather than on what terms it will consent to receive the larger body. Bishop Wordsworth's suggestions, charitable and well intended as they were, either went far beyond what he was justified in proposing, or stopped far short of what he was bound to propose. No amount of desire for Christian union excuses men from taking all the facts of the situation into account, and as soon as this has been done, the inconsistency of his solution, alike with the ecclesiastical condition of Scotland, and with any adequate theory of the duties of Christians in non-essentials, becomes at once apparent.
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