The Bishop of London has added to his Address at
the Ruridecanal Conferences in November and December (just issued by Messrs. Longmans and Co.) an appendix which deals specifically with some of the causes of the recent disquiet. The Bishop also states certain general grounds on which opposition to the changes in services and ritual rests. We cannot summarise the whole of the appendix, but desire to draw attention to what seems to us the most important para- graph,—that which deals with the feeling of English lay- men in regard to sacerdotalism. Unwise attempts, says the Bishop, have been made to revive ecclesiastical discipline on arbitrary lines. "This is a point which more than any others comes home to every Englishman's heart. He cannot sym- pathise with punctiliousness about trifles, with excessive scrupulosity, with practices which rest on authority and not on the reason of the thing. This, I think, is at the bottom of his dread of sacerdotalism. He will not endure an ecclesiastical system which pursues small objects of its own apart from their connection with the great stream of national life. This seems to me to be the primary con. sideration which all have to face, and only the frank acceptance of it will restore lasting peace." That is a very wise and useful piece of advice to offer to the clergy. though we fear that the zealots of the Ritualistic party will be inclined to regard it as worldly and cynical.
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