CLERICALIST CHURCH REFORM.
[TO THE EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR:9
Si,—Most of your readers, I doubt not, are in favour of Church reform ; but not all of them would be able to join the Church Reform League. The first object of this body is to obtain self-government for the Church. I am inclined to rank this with Home-rule for Ireland, as neither in itself desirable nor likely to be conceded by the English people. But by self-government for the Church the League means government of the Church by the Convocations of the clergy. So Bishop Anson, a Vice-President of the League, explains it. "The Church could not allow the question of the considera- tion of the governing body of the Church to be discussed and settled by Parliament. I am sure no true Churchman would for a moment endure that Parliament should now
touch Convocation Of this I am certain, that what- ever position laymen are to occupy in the general councils of the Church must be decided and given to them by the Synods of the Church." I, on the other hand, am not certain that the clerks' assemblies of our two Provinces have so heavenly a character in the eyes of mankind in general as they have in those of Bishop Anson and his friends.—I am, Sir, So., Kirkby Lansdale, January 18th. J. LLEIVELYN Davin.
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